What’s New

Good afternoon. Here’s the latest news you need to know in Chicago. It’s about a 5-minute read that will brief you on today’s biggest stories.

This afternoon will be mostly cloudy with a high near 53 degrees. Tonight will remain cloudy with temperatures dipping to a low around 37 degrees. Tomorrow will be similar to today with lots of clouds and a high near 54 degrees.

Top story

Lightfoot says Chicago ‘failed’ Adam Toledo, vows to do more to save teens like him

Mayor Lori Lightfoot joined community leaders at a news conference this afternoon and called for calm, just hours before the video showing police fatally shooting 13-year-old Adam Toledo is expected to be released.

The planned video release comes one day after a private meeting between the city’s top attorney and lawyers for the 13-year-old’s family.

“We live in a city that is traumatized by a long history of police violence and misconduct,” Lightfoot said.

“It is certainly understandable why so many of our residents are feeling that all-too-familiar surge of outrage and pain. And it’s even clearer that trust between our communities and law enforcement is far from healed and remains badly broken,” she added.

“This lack of trust makes it even for more difficult for many of us to wait and hear all the facts before making up our minds . . . I urge each resident who cares, and loves this city, let’s wait until we hear all the facts.”

Lightfoot recalled that as president of the Police Board, “it was my job for many years to investigate police-involved shootings. These videos and these moments are never easy to bear witness to, regardless of the circumstances. And what I’ve learned is, you need to brace yourself beforehand. Let yourself feel the pain and anguish and the shock of these traumatic events to avoid becoming numb as you watch.”

Read Fran Spielman’s full story before the expected release this afternoon of video and other materials related to the police shooting of Adam Toledo.

More news you need

1. CPS and CTU have reached a tentative agreement to reopen the city’s high schools next week. The union’s House of Delegates is scheduled to convene at 4:30 p.m. this afternoon to review terms of the pact and set the stage for a full vote.
2. The city plans to use more than half of its $1.9 billion in upcoming federal relief funds to pay off a portion of the city’s substantial debt. Ald. Jason Ervin said the mayor’s plan to end “scoop-and-toss” borrowing would be a “tough sell” to Chicagoans who’ve been impacted financially by the pandemic.
3. Federal prosecutors told a judge today they “will be starting” the process of moving R. Kelly from Chicago’s downtown lockup to custody in Brooklyn, where the R&B singer appears likely to stand trial for racketeering later this year. Jon Seidel reports the latest on Kelly’s cases.
4. With movie houses closing around the area, could massive pot palaces end up taking over those buildings? Tom Schuba spoke with people in the legal marijuana industry about their efforts to turn a former AMC cineplex in Springfield into a large cannabis co-op.
5. Chicago Water Taxi plans to resume ferrying passengers Memorial Day weekend. Two of the company’s five yellow boats – the pair with the most open-air deck space – will be back in service beginning May 29.

A bright one

Through family foundation, ex-McDonald’s CEO adds education as focus in helping entrepreneurs

Before former McDonald’s CEO Don Thompson and wife Elizabeth launched their vision of supporting food and beverage entrepreneurs through their successful venture capital firm, they’d dreamed of helping youth access the education that had propelled a couple from Cabrini-Green to the pinnacles of success.

Cleveland Avenue, LLC, launched upon Thompson’s retirement in 2015 — to focus on new food, beverage and restaurant concepts — is widely known for its incubator, Taste 222, and its backing of the uber successful, plant-based meat substitute firm, Beyond Meat.

But a year before that, the duo launched their family foundation, the Cleveland Avenue Foundation for Education, (The CAFE), in order to give back to the Black community.

Provided

On April 28, The CAFE will unveil “The 1954 Project,” launched in 2019 to support goals of investing in innovative and culturally affirming approaches to teaching and learning, expanding educator and leadership diversity, and increasing economic mobility in the Black community.

The CAFE will dole out $1 million to each of five organizations achieving those goals nationwide at a virtual event headlined by folks like Chicago hip-hop artist Common, basketball legend Earvin “Magic” Johnson and wife Cookie, actor/philanthropist Jay Ellis, and others: “The 1954 Project Presents: The 2021 Luminary Awards.”

Read Maudlyne Ihejirika’s full story here.

From the press box

Bulls guard Zach LaVine is expected to miss several games while in the NBA’s coronavirus protocol.

Alex DeBrincat mastered using his quick hands to score goals in the NHL years ago. Now the Blackhawks winger is learning to use those talents on defense, too, Ben Pope writes.

Former Bears quarterback Jim McMahon slammed the organization as “where quarterbacks go to die” during a recent interview, then compounded the pain for local fans by praising his stint with the Packers: “the best organization that I played for.”

Michael Jordan will be the presenter for Kobe Bryant’s induction into the Basketball Hall of Fame next month. Jordan also spoke at Bryant’s funeral last year.

Your daily question ?

If you live with roommates, how has the pandemic affected your relationship with them?

Email us (please include your first name and where you live) and we might include your answer in the next Afternoon Edition.

Yesterday, we asked you: How concerned are you about the Cubs/White Sox two weeks into the season? Here’s what some of you said…

“Sox have had many questionable lineup decisions in recent days but it is very early in the season. Plenty of time to hammer out the details and make a push for the pennant. Go Sox!” — Angel A. Alicea

“Cubs need to rebuild. Sox will get better as the season goes on.” — Pascual Madrigal Jr.

“Cubs: wait till next year. Sox: currently underperforming, but have some talent.” — Scott Barliant

“Sox will be fine. The Cubs will be lucky to finish .500 and I’m a Cubs fan.” — Ken Olenek

“Both teams hired the wrong manager. Joe Maddon is looking good in the Theo [Epstein] vs. Joe argument. Cubs’ offense is a pathetic repeat of 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020.” — Dennis Nowak

“Cubs need to get somebody that can hit the ball! Every batter thinks he’s a home run hitter and that will put them in last place at the end of the year.” — Jeffery Bryant

Thanks for reading the Chicago Afternoon Edition. Got a story you think we missed? Email us here.

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WASHINGTON — A much-awaited economic boom coming off the pandemic recession appeared to edge closer to reality Thursday with fresh data showing the pace of layoffs dwindling, consumers spending freely and manufacturing rebounding.

The latest barometers point to a U.S. economy that’s steadily regaining its health as vaccinations accelerate, business curbs are lifted in many states and more people are willing to travel, shop, eat out and otherwise resume their spending habits. Though many Americans who have lost jobs or income are still suffering, hopes are rising that the benefits of the recovery will spread further in the coming months to groups of people who have yet to benefit.

The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits tumbled last week to 576,000, the Labor Department said Thursday, a post-COVID low and a sign that layoffs are easing.

And sales at retail stores and restaurants jumped 9.8% in March, the biggest gain since last May, when the economy first started to rebound from the virus’ initial blow. With U.S. household savings high, economists are optimistic that the faster spending is sustainable.

“We are really kicking into that next gear now,” said Adam Kamins, senior regional economist at Moody’s Analytics. “Things are moving more decisively in the right direction than at any time in the past year.”

The pace of weekly applications for unemployment aid is now down significantly from a peak of 900,000 in early January and has dropped below the 700,000-plus level where it had been stuck for months.

A total of 16.9 million people are continuing to collect unemployment benefits, down from 18.2 million in the previous week. That decline suggests that some of the unemployed are being called back to jobs. But the large number of ongoing recipients also points to the harsh impact of the pandemic on tens of millions of households.

Trillions of dollars of government stimulus, including $1,400 checks that have gone to most adults, as well as higher savings that many households have managed to build, have fueled more spending. Auto sales soared 15% in March, according to the government’s retail sales report. Purchases at electronics and appliance stores jumped more than 10%. Sales at clothing stores soared 18%.

Warm weather in March, after ice storms in some states had held back consumers in February, likely drove more retail spending. Restaurants and bars reported a 13% increase in sales, the most since last June. Most states have allowed more indoor dining, and outdoor dining likely picked up as well.

Among the consumers who are stepping up their spending is Teresa Golden of Renton, Washington state, who said she used her first two federal stimulus checks to catch up on rent and bill payments. With the most recent check, she said she spent $500 on Levi’s jeans, Old Navy clothing and shoes from Finish Line. An additional $500 went to restocking her pantry with items that will last a while — ketchup, sugar, spices and Clorox wipes, among other things.

“I finally caught up on my bills and could go on a bit of a spending spree,” said Golden, 49, who works in accounts receivable at a school system.

At the same time, factories are humming again. In March, the Federal Reserve said Thursday, manufacturing output increased 2.7%. Many economists expected a larger gain after output had fallen in the midst of February’s unseasonably cold weather. But shortages of raw materials and parts, from lumber to semiconductor chips, probably slowed factory production.

Still, manufacturing in the New York and mid-Atlantic regions is recovering strongly, according to separate surveys by the Federal Reserve Banks of New York and Philadelphia, with both reports showing more hiring, growing shipments and rising orders.

Thursday’s encouraging news follows a report earlier this month that employers added a healthy 916,000 jobs, the most since August, during March. The unemployment rate fell to 6%, less than half the pandemic peak of 14.8% in April of last year.

Kamins, the Moody’s economist, noted that data from Google’s mobility tracking service shows that Americans are increasingly venturing out to shop, visit restaurants and go to movie theaters and other entertainment venues.

Even so, travel to worksites hasn’t picked up as much, a sign that many people — mostly in white-collar professions — are still working from home. A result is that lower-income workers in large cities are likely still struggling, because many downtown restaurants and coffee shops haven’t yet reopened or, if they have, are seeing far fewer customers.

Most analysts have grown bullish about the economy’s prospects for the coming months. They include Fed Chair Jerome Powell, who expressed his belief in an appearance last Sunday on “60 Minutes” that the economy is at “an inflection point” and appears poised for a boom.

“We feel like we’re at a place where the economy’s about to start growing much more quickly and job creation coming in much more quickly,” Powell said. “This growth that we’re expecting in the second half of this year is going to be very strong. And job creation, I would expect to be very strong.”

Many economists, in fact, are concerned more about a potential burst of inflation stemming from the unleashing of pent-up consumer demand. Prices for lumber, copper, oil and other raw materials have already risen as demand for gas, homes and electronic equipment has jumped.

Consumer prices rose 0.6% in March, the most since 2012, the government reported Tuesday, and are up 2.6% in the past year. Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, though, prices rose by a more benign 1.6% year over year.

Powell has said that while inflation will likely pick up in the coming months, the price increases will probably ease as the pandemic-induced disruptions in many industries’ supply chains are worked out.

___

Pisani reported from New York.

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R.J. Griffith, an acclaimed Chicago singer, songwriter and audio engineer, wants to give his uncle, R&B singer Thomas Williams, his flowers before it’s too late.

He came up with an idea to ensure that his uncle’s legacy stands the test of time by covering “You Turn Me On,” a 1970 song by The Fabulous Turks, Williams’ group.

In many cases, Black creatives from bygone eras die two deaths: the physical one and the second when their legacies fall by the wayside.

“I think I had to be about 25 or 26 when [Williams] played the music for me, but when he played ‘You Turn Me On,’ I said, ‘Wait, I need to hear this one again,’ ” said Griffith. “My uncle gave me a CD with the music on there, and then come to find out my mom had a 45 [vinyl record] in the basement of the song, so I went home and started using her record player and was listening to the song.

“As technology advanced, I found it on YouTube. I just ripped it off of YouTube and kept listening to it over and over again. I went to my uncle and said, ‘I want to remake the song.’ “

Aaron Reese Boseman

Griffith, 31, a Seton Academy alumnus, says singing is in his genes, and he can pinpoint when he knew music was what he wanted to do with his life.

His career started in 2016 with “Prey,” an EP that received favorable views from multiple media outlets. Griffith’s music has appeared in films such as “The Assumptions” and “Canal Street,” starring Bryshere Y. Gray (“Empire”), Mekhi Phifer (“E.R.”), and Harry Lennix (“The Five Heartbeats”).

“I used to go to church and see my uncle Thomas singing all the time,” Griffith said, “and I was like: ‘Man, I wish I can be like that’ — he was a very smooth singer. In my teenage years, I started imitating Jamie Foxx. That’s how I developed my voice, by singing for girls in high school and seeing if it worked, and if it did, I knew I was onto something. And if not, I just kept working.”

The Turks opened up for James Brown and Isaac Hayes at the first Black Expo started by Operation PUSH in 1972.

Jerome Davis, a retired postal service employee, not only remembers hearing “You Turn Me On” for the first time on WVON, he also was a manager of a record store where customers came in specifically to purchase it.

“It was different, and if you stretched out your imagination a bit, it may have fit into a doo-wop style, but [The Turks] were mainly an R&B group,” said Davis, who says “You Turn Me On” was a local hit. “I vividly recall that song. As a salesman, I remember recommending it to customers.”

Williams says he was receptive to hearing that his nephew was looking into his music.

“I was very honored,” said Williams, who lives in Romeoville. “A young man would look back at something that was done way before he was born, and see something in it.”

Thomas Williams

Griffith’s next step was to find Willie Weems, the man who wrote “You Turn Me On.”

It turns out Weems had a specific woman in mind when he wrote “You Turn Me On.”

“Her name was June Wright,” said Weems. “When you see a woman you admire, it’s a natural feeling. … At the time I was doing sets, and we were making music, and she would show up to watch us play. There were issues that kept us from going forward; we were friends but never lovers. She inspired me to come up with the lyrics.”

Did Williams give his nephew a stamp of approval?

“I love what [Griffith] did because he brought it up to date. I was really impressed,” said Williams.

Aaron Reese Boseman

And that level of affirmation means everything to Griffith since learning the backstory of the song’s lyrics.

“When I first heard it, I thought about me as a teenager with the hormones going through your body. You’re looking at the girl but you don’t know how to express yourself,” said Griffith, who says he has some shows lined up in the near future. “Most men don’t express themselves anymore, so it’s bringing back that vibe of R&B and love songs.”

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Guard Coby White appears lost in his bench role.

Forward Lauri Markkanen looks like he already signed elsewhere.

Patrick Williams seems to have gone head first into the rookie wall.

Then factor in two embarrassing losses in less than a week to last-place Minnesota and a tanking Orlando team, and well, there’s seemingly no way it could have gotten worse.

Then Thursday hit.

Scheduled to practice at noon, that was quickly cancelled when the Sun-Times confirmed an ESPN report that guard Zach LaVine had gone into the NBA’s health and safety protocol with a positive coronavirus test, according to a source.

What that means immediately for one of the elite offensive players in the game, is optimistically the hope is LaVine is out for a handful of days, but with the Bulls scheduled to play five games in the next seven days and only 18 games left in the regular season, that could be the difference between holding onto the final play-in spot or sitting in a lottery position and praying for lottery luck.

The Bulls traded their first-round pick to the Magic in the Nikola Vucevic deal, but it is protected Nos. 1 through 4.

Anything higher than the fourth overall pick, it goes Orlando’s way, leaving the Bulls in the worst-possible scenario – no meaningful games to play, no meaningful draft asset coming in.

And if going without LaVine’s 27.5 points and 5.1 assists per game wasn’t bad enough, the positive test also took away a key practice day for coach Billy Donovan to continue trying to repair this sinking ship on the fly.

With back-to-backs Friday and Saturday, it’s unlikely Sunday will be a practice opportunity, and then on Monday the Bulls play in Boston.

That leaves a possible Tuesday practice in Cleveland, another back-to-back, and a rest day on Friday.

What’s been refreshing about Donovan, however, is he won’t let the excuses become bigger than the results. He made that very clear Wednesday night after a lethargic first three quarters in the Magic loss, before the team made a push the final nine minutes of the game before coming up short.

“We were getting stops and we were flying around and we were covering for each other, and like where was that for the first three quarters?” Donovan said Wednesday. “I don’t think we can make excuses for Covid, four [games] in five nights, we’ve been on the road … it’s the NBA. All we have to do is worry about basketball.”

Now they have more to worry about.

It’s almost like Donovan is running out of fingers to plug up all the holes in the leaking dam.

“We know we’re a better team, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how much talent you have,” LaVine said of the latest loss. “It’s how you go out there and compete. Obviously, we’re trying to battle through some comfortability things, some injury things. Other teams don’t care.”

LaVine does, which makes the timing of him being sidelined so unfortunate. As the face of this franchise, he knows it was also partially on him for being in this position, and he would have welcomed the opportunity to get them out of it.

That no longer is an immediate option, with some players missing multiple weeks in the wake of dealing with the virus.

“Frustration has to turn into something on the court,” LaVine said. “You have to put it together sooner or later. You don’t look forward in the calendar, but obviously these games are against us. We’re talking big game. We’ve got to go out there and walk it too.”

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WASHINGTON — The Biden administration on Thursday announced the U.S. is expelling 10 Russian diplomats and imposing sanctions against dozens of companies and people, holding the Kremlin accountable for interference in last year’s presidential election and the cyber hacking of federal agencies.

The sweeping measures are meant to punish Russia for actions that U.S. officials say cut to the core of American democracy and to deter future acts by imposing economic costs on Moscow, including by targeting its ability to borrow money. The sanctions are certain to exacerbate tensions with Russia, which promised a retaliatory response.

Sanctions against six Russian companies that support the country’s cyber efforts represent the first retaliatory measures against the Kremlin for the hack familiarly known as the SolarWinds breach, with the U.S. explicitly linking the intrusion to the SVR, a Russian intelligence agency. Though such intelligence-gathering missions are not uncommon, officials said they were determined to act because of the operation’s broad scope and the high cost of the intrusion on private companies.

The U.S. also announced sanctions on 32 individuals and entities accused of attempting to interfere in last year’s presidential election, including by spreading disinformation. U.S. intelligence officials alleged in a declassified report last month that Russian President Vladimir Putin authorized influence operations to help Donald Trump in his unsuccessful bid for reelection as president, though there’s no evidence Russia or anyone else changed votes or manipulated the outcome.

The actions, foreshadowed by the administration for weeks, signal a harder line against Putin, whom Trump was reluctant to criticize even as his administration pursued sanctions against Moscow. They are the administration’s second major foreign policy move in two days, following the announcement of troop withdrawals from Afghanistan. Until now, President Joe Biden has focused on the coronavirus pandemic and economy in his first months in office.

The 10 diplomats being expelled include representatives of Russian intelligence services, the Biden administration said. They were selected on the basis “that they were acting in a manner inconsistent with their status in the United States,” a senior official said.

Other measures are expected as well, though the administration is not likely to announce them. Officials have been advising that their response to Russia would be in ways both seen and unseen.

The sanctions announced Thursday are the latest in a series of actions that successive presidential administrations have taken to counter Russian behavior seen as antagonistic. Both Trump and Barack Obama expelled individual diplomats during their presidencies.

Some experts suggest this latest round might have more resonance because of its financial impact: The order makes it more difficult for Russia to borrow money by barring U.S. banks from buying Russian bonds directly from the Russian Central Bank, Russian National Wealth Fund and Finance Ministry.

The White House did not impose sanctions related to separate reports that Russia encouraged the Taliban to attack U.S. and allied troops in Afghanistan, saying instead that Biden was using diplomatic, military and intelligence channels to respond.

Reports of alleged “bounties” surfaced last year, with the Trump administration coming under fire for not raising the issue directly with Russia. Administration officials said Thursday they had low to moderate confidence in that intelligence.

Among the individual companies sanctioned were websites that U.S. officials say operate as fronts for Russian intelligence agencies and spread disinformation, including articles alleging widespread voter fraud in 2020. The individuals who were targeted include Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian and Ukrainian political consultant who worked with former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and who was indicted in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.

The U.S. said on Thursday that Kilimnik had provided campaign polling data and strategy to Russian intelligence services. Mueller’s office said it had been unable to determine what Kilimnik had done with the information after getting it from the Trump campaign.

Also on the list of those sanctioned was the Kremlin’s first deputy chief of staff, Alexei Gromov, several individuals linked to Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman with close ties to Russia’s president, nicknamed “Putin’s chef” for serving Kremlin functions, and a number of front companies that U.S. Treasury says help Prigozhin evade sanctions imposed earlier.

After the sanctions were announced, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova warned that “such aggressive behavior will undoubtedly trigger a resolute retaliation.”

“Washington should realize that it will have to pay a price for the degradation of the bilateral ties,” Zakharova said, adding that “the responsibility for that will fully lie with the United States.”

She said the ministry has summoned the U.S. ambassador for a “hard conversation,” but wouldn’t immediately say what action Russia will take.

President Biden informed Putin that the sanctions were coming earlier this week. Biden administration officials have made clear in their contacts with the Russia side that they are hoping to avoid a “downward spiral” in the relationship, according to a senior administration official who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity following the sanctions announcement.

The two leaders had a second tense call this week in which Biden told Putin to “de-escalate tensions” following a Russian military buildup on Ukraine’s border, and said the U.S. would “act firmly in defense of its national interests” regarding Russian intrusions and election interference.

In a television interview last month, Biden replied “I do” when asked if he thought Putin was a “killer.” He said the days of the U.S. “rolling over” to Putin were done. Putin later recalled his ambassador to the U.S. and pointed at the U.S. history of slavery and slaughtering Native Americans and the atomic bombing of Japan in World War II.

It is unclear whether the new U.S. actions will result in changed behavior, especially since past measures by the U.S. have failed to bring an end to Russian hacking. The Obama administration expelled diplomats in 2016 in response to interference in that year’s presidential election. And though Trump was often reluctant to criticize Putin, his administration also expelled diplomats in 2018 for Russia’s alleged poisoning of an ex-intelligence officer in Britain.

U.S. officials are still grappling with the aftereffects of the SolarWinds intrusion, which affected agencies including the Treasury, Justice, Energy and Homeland Security departments, and are still assessing what information may have been stolen. The breach exposed vulnerabilities in the private supply chain as well as weaknesses in the federal government’s own cyber defenses.

—

Associated Press writer Zeke Miller in Washington, Vladimir Isachenkov and Daria Litvinova in Moscow and AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee in Kabul contributed.

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Len Kasper might be the highest-profile person with a new job in the city, moving from the Cubs’ TV booth to the White Sox’ radio booth. So when we talked this week about how it’s going, the first question was obvious:

How’s the commute?

“I added 9 miles to my commute, but it’s all basically the Kennedy and the Ryan [expressways],” said Kasper, a Glencoe resident. “My trip to Wrigley was shorter, but once you get off on Irving Park or Addison, it can be tricky. So it’s been fine. I throw on an audio book or a podcast.”

It’s just a small part of Kasper’s seamless transition on the South Side. A first-time listener wouldn’t think for a second that Kasper has been on the Sox’ mic for just two regular-season weeks. And Kasper feels like he has been with the team for years, thanks to the warm welcome he has received.

“Roger Bossard came up to me [Tuesday] and gave me a big hug,” Kasper said of the Sox’ head groundskeeper.

Nothing against his last job on the North Side, where Kasper worked for 16 years, but he feels reinvigorated in his new gig. It’s a combination of a fresh start, a dream job and fans in the stands. After calling games in an empty ballpark last season, Kasper said having even just 8,000 fans is wonderful.

He felt that energy in the first inning of the Sox’ home opener last week. With two outs, Jose Abreu doubled and Yoan Moncada and Yermin Mercedes hit back-to-back home runs, sending the crowd into a frenzy. “I’ve got goosebumps,” Kasper said with a laugh on the ESPN 1000 broadcast.

“That was magical. That was one of those moments that I will never forget,” Kasper said Wednesday before calling another memorable moment, Carlos Rodon’s no-hitter. “When I think of career highlights and broadcast moments, it was hard to describe just how cool that felt.”

With the Cubs, Kasper said it took a year or two for his personality to come out because he knew viewers didn’t know anything about him. His goal was to nail the basics and let his personality appear with time. But having been in town for so long, it’s all coming naturally to him with the Sox.

Analyst Darrin Jackson feels that, too. He was comfortable with Len from the start, having shared conversations over the years in spring training and during the season when the Cubs and Sox met. Jackson has been most impressed with how Kasper has immersed himself in all things White Sox.

“His preparation since joining the organization is unmatched,” said Jackson, who’s in his 22^nd season as a Sox broadcaster. “The guy has informed himself so well about the personnel, the organization, this side of town, you name it. He has become part of the White Sox culture as quickly as anybody ever can.

“But the big thing is, it was his choice. He chose to make a change and go where he wanted to be. It’s real easy to acclimate to a new environment because that’s what you wanted. He feels at home.”

To some, it might sound odd to hear the former Cubs voice calling Sox games. And for those of a certain age, it might have been downright bizarre to see Kasper join Sox TV analyst – and former longtime Cubs analyst – Steve Stone on NBC Sports Chicago on Monday, when Jason Benetti had an ESPN commitment.

“That was fun,” Kasper said. “The only conversation we had, I said, ‘I do the lineups, you do the pitcher and defense.’ He said, ‘Yeah.’ There was no strategy discussed. We just do it. And that’s how I always want to do it. I hate overthinking and overplanning when it comes to chemistry on the air. That has to be as natural as possible.

“But I’m so close to it that I have to take a step back and understand that a lot of people on the outside are experiencing this through a different lens. So when they hear two familiar voices together that have never been together, I can understand how that might feel jarring.”

Kasper will have another new partner Saturday, when he moonlights for Fox Sports 1. He’ll join another former Cub, Eric Karros, for the White Sox-Red Sox game in Boston. Kasper will call the action from the Big Ten Network’s studios in Chicago; Karros will be in Los Angeles.

Kasper also is scheduled to call FS1 broadcasts of White Sox games April 24 against the Rangers and May 1 against the Indians. He’ll be joined by former Sox catcher A.J. Pierzynski. ESPN 1000 pre- and postgame show host Connor McKnight fills in for Kasper on those occasions.

In the next few weeks, Kasper hopes to debut a podcast with Benetti. It’s still being planned and needs a name. The two also will call a couple games together in mid-May on NBCSCH.

“That’ll be old-school with two play-by-play announcers,” Kasper said.

Kasper certainly has gone old-school, not only calling games on the radio but listening to a lot of radio broadcasts, as well. The self-proclaimed audiophile is reacquainting himself with the medium where his broadcast career started and his baseball fandom was kindled.

“I feel like I’m 12 again,” he said. “It just feels right. That’s the best way I can put it.”

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Chicago Bears 7-Round Mock Draft: Ryan Pace goes nuclear by Ryan Heckman

With the 2021 NFL Draft two weeks away, the Chicago Bears have several needs on their roster and that includes the need for a long-term solution at the quarterback position.

The Bears began to address the quarterback position this off-season when they signed veteran free agent Andy Dalton to a one-year, $10 million deal. One of the reasons why Dalton chose to sign with the Bears is because of the assurance he received that he would be the team’s starting quarterback in 2021.

That sentiment has caused backlash among Bears’ fans. The backlash continued when the Bears were mocked both locally and nationally for posting a tweet of Dalton in a Bears’ uniform with a caption that read “QB1”.

The backlash has been misguided. Since the signing of Dalton, it is important that Bears fans realize that neither general manager Ryan Pace nor head coach Matt Nagy insisted that Dalton would be the long-term answer for the Bears at the quarterback position. Dalton is not the Bears’ long-term answer at the quarterback position and the team is aware of that fact.

More from Chicago Bears

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• Chicago Bears 7-Round Mock Draft: No quarterback in Round 1
• Chicago Bears NFL Draft 2021: 5 scenarios trading out of the first

That would be why eyes should be on the 2021 NFL Draft for the Bears. A recent report from Brad Briggs of the Chicago Tribune suggests that the Bears are prioritizing the quarterback position in this year’s draft:

There has been sentiment around the NFL for a few weeks that the Bears are plotting a move for a quarterback, that Pace and Nagy view that as their best chance to spark a turnaround while also providing hope for the future. The Bears could continue with their plan to start Dalton while bringing along a rookie, hoping the veteran performs well enough that they don’t have to turn to a draft pick in an effort to try to save jobs.

There are currently five quarterbacks projected to be selected in the first round of the 2021 NFL Draft. Those quarterbacks are Trevor Lawrence, Zach Wilson, Justin Fields, Trey Lance, and Mac Jones. From previous reporting, we already know that the Bears have attended the Pro Days for both Lance on Jones.

On Wednesday, Bears’ head coach Matt Nagy was spotted at Fields’ Pro Day.

Where will @justnfields go? ?#GoBuckeyes #DevelopedHere pic.twitter.com/cdeWra23rZ

— Ohio State Football (@OhioStateFB) April 14, 2021

When talking about the prospects of the Bears trading up and taking another risk on a rookie quarterback, there is one important distinction to make. That distinction is that Nagy was not with the Bears when the team gambled on Mitchell Trubisky in the 2017 NFL Draft.

Nagy, who appears to be on the hot seat as the Bears’ head coach along with Pace, may have hung the prospects of saving his job on the idea of selecting his own quarterback. If that is the case, along with the idea that Pace and Nagy are unchecked in their football decisions, it is not out of reason to think that the Bears could be eyeing a move up in the first round of the 2021 NFL Draft to select one of the five top quarterback prospects.

There are still scars from the Bears’ mistake of selecting Trubisky and for that reason, there is skepticism over Pace being allowed to trade up and select another quarterback. Here is the thing about life in the NFL, a team can not let their past dictate their future.

Related Story: Chicago Bears find their QB in latest Mock Draft

A team must keep taking shots at fixing the quarterback position for however long it takes until they find a franchise quarterback. It may not be ideal that Pace is the general manager taking the shot for the Chicago Bears but if he has an opportunity to select a quarterback like Fields, he needs to act upon it.

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To this day, I still sing Prince’s “The Ballad of Dorothy Parker’’ as a lullaby. Yes, I know it is probably inappropriate for my daughter to know all the words, but the melody puts her to sleep. 

When I lived in St. Paul, Minnesota, in the early 2000s, working as a reporter, friends from elsewhere gave me pity and grief. They wondered how I could live in a place so famous for its freezing weather and fly fishing.

Well, pretty easily.

I loved the Twin Cities. And I reminded them of the state’s most famous resident, to whom regular folks like me actually had access: Prince.

That turned the Minnesota naysayers purple with envy.

Prince lived in a Minneapolis suburb and his DIY spirit permeated the local art and music scene. More than that, he often opened his Paisley Park complex on weekends for after-parties, sans alcohol. You found out via word of mouth. Ahem, social media and smartphones didn’t exist back then.

The first time I made the pilgrimage, my friends and I drove out, exhausted, at about 1 a.m. A huge white house illuminated with purple lights magically appeared. It was like manna from heaven.

That night, Prince regaled the crowd of 100 with his presence. A DJ was playing unreleased music.

No one bothered him. A big no-no. Groupies and super fans had no place at Paisley. Still, hanging out in an annex of Prince’s home felt totally normal.

One of my biggest regrets in life, which came later that summer, was watching him perform at Paisley Park with my friend Nikki and not joining him on stage. It was so late and we were so tired, and we remained as stationery as the couch we were parked on when he asked ladies to come up on stage with him.

Prince welcomed babies and old people with walkers to Paisley Park. You wouldn’t ever make a song request, though, especially not from the “Purple Rain” album.

I have plenty more Prince stories, such as watching his hair blow without a wind machine as he crooned “Joy in Repetition” and the time I posed in front of the car used in the “Sexy M.F.” video on one of his birthday weekends.

I am reminiscing about Prince because this month marks five years since his unexpected death. Since then, people have ruefully remarked that our country hasn’t been the same because of an ensuing torrent of beloved celebrity deaths and political upheaval. But this five-year anniversary also marks another milestone for me. My daughter’s due date was the day Prince died. She actually came along a few days sooner, but those early days and months of motherhood were, for me, intertwined with Prince, grieving and joyful.

I tried to get the hang of breastfeeding by pumping to “The Beautiful Ones” and “Computer Blue.” As I held my new baby, I didn’t weep for one of my favorite singers but exposed her to his music. I changed the name of the song “My Name is Prince” to her “My Name is Skye,” my daughter’s nickname, and sang to her, “and I am funky, the one and only.”

To this day, I still sing “The Ballad of Dorothy Parker’’ as a lullaby. Yes, I know it is probably inappropriate for her to know all the words, but the melody puts her to sleep.

The summer after Skye was born, and only months after Prince’s death, the movie “Purple Rain” played at Millennium Park to a crowd of thousands. I met up with a group of friends and Skye wore a Prince symbol onesie and purple poofy ruffled skirt that my friend Heather had bought her. I always considered Prince a feminist, but that 1984 movie is rife with sexism. The crowd booed every sexist scene.

But at the end of the movie, as the sun set, all of us — the whole crowd — sang “Purple Rain.” It was healing and beautiful.

Springtime is usually unmerciful in Chicago. We feel the sunshine, hear birds chirping and smell the freshly cut grass, but then winter comes back with a vengeance. So if a blanket of white returns this month, I’ll play Prince’s “Sometimes it Snows in April” and tell myself it’s an omnipotent message from the Purple One.

Sun-Times columnist Natalie Moore is also a reporter for WBEZ.org.

Send letters to [email protected].

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The species roamed North America for about 1.2 million to 3.6 million years, meaning the T. rex population density was small at any one moment.

One Tyrannosaurus rex seems scary enough. Now picture 2.5 billion of them. That’s how many of the fierce dinosaur king probably roamed Earth over the course of a couple million years, a new study finds.

Using calculations based on body size, sexual maturity and the creatures’ energy needs, a team at the University of California, Berkeley figured out just how many T. rex lived over 127,000 generations, according to a study in Thursday’s journal Science. It’s a first-of-its-kind number, but just an estimate with a margin of error that is the size of a T. rex.

“That’s a lot of jaws,” said study lead author Charles Marshall, director of the University of California Museum of Paleontology. “That’s a lot of teeth. That’s a lot of claws.”

The species roamed North America for about 1.2 million to 3.6 million years, meaning the T. rex population density was small at any one moment. There would be about two in a place the size of the Washington, D.C., or 3,800 in California, the study said.

“Probably like a lot of people, I literally did a double-take to make sure that my eyes hadn’t deceived me when I first read that 2.5 billion T. rexes have ever lived,” said Macalester College paleobiologist Kristi Curry Rogers, who wasn’t part of the study.

Marshall said the estimate helps scientists figure the preservation rate of T. rex fossils and underscores how lucky the world is to know about them at all. About 100 or so T. rex fossils have been found — 32 of them with enough material to figure they are adults. If there were 2.5 million T. rex instead of 2.5 billion, we would probably have never known they existed, he said.

Marshall’s team calculated the population by using a general biology rule of thumb that says the bigger the animal, the less dense its population. Then they added estimates of how much energy the carnivorous T. rex needed to stay alive — somewhere between a Komodo dragon and a lion. The more energy required, the less dense the population. They also factored in that the T. rex reached sexual maturity somewhere around 14 to 17 years old and lived at most 28 years.

Given uncertainties in the creatures’ generation length, range and how long they roamed, the Berkeley team said the total population could be as little as 140 million or as much as 42 billion with 2.4 billion as the middle value.

The science about the biggest land-living carnivores of all time is important, “but the truth, as I see it, is that this kind of thing is just very cool,” said Purdue University geology professor James Farlow.

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Follow Seth Borenstein on Twitter at @borenbears.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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Isiah Thomas will present fellow Chicago high school star Kevin Garnett.

There will be a big Chicago presence at next month’s Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame enshrinement ceremony.

Michael Jordan will present new Hall of Famer Kobe Bryant, and Isiah Thomas will present Kevin Garnett at the event in Springfield, Massachusetts. Jordan will also present Baylor women’s coach Kim Mulkey.

The late former Los Angeles Lakers star once called Jordan a “big brother” and said that “because we see things in a similar way in terms of our competitive spirit or fire or whatever the case may be, there’s an understanding that we have—a connection that we have.” Jordan called Bryant a “little brother” in a statement after Bryant’s death last year.

The hall waived its normal waiting period to induct Bryant with this year’s class.

Thomas and Garnett are both Chicago high school basketball legends. Thomas played at St. Joseph and Garnett starred at Farragut before becoming NBA legends.

Mulkey is a three-time national championship coach at Baylor.

The 2020 Hall of Fame Inductees and Presenters:

Patrick Baumann, presented by Russ Granik (’13), Vlade Divac (’19)

Kobe Bryant, presented by Michael Jordan (’09)

Tamika Catchings, presented by Alonzo Mourning (’14), Dawn Staley (’13)

Tim Duncan, presented by David Robinson (’09)

Kevin Garnett, presented by Isiah Thomas (’00)

Kim Mulkey, presented by Michael Jordan (’09)

Barbara Stevens, presented by Geno Auriemma (’06), Muffet McGraw (’17)

Eddie Sutton, presented by John Calipari (’15), Bill Self (’17), Sidney Moncrief (’19)

Rudy Tomjanovich, presented by Calvin Murphy (’93), Hakeem Olajuwon (’08)

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