Employing Nikita Zadorov last season gave the Blackhawks one of the NHL’s most intimidating physical presences, but they weren’t that physical of a team overall.

The Hawks finished 21st in the league with 1,214 total hits. Zadorov individually ranked seventh with 190, but the next-heaviest-hitting Hawk — Connor Murphy with 102 — ranked 66th. And the forward corps contributed very little: Ryan Carpenter led that group with 78 hits, followed by the diminutive Alex DeBrincat with 70.

The Hawks hope unheralded free-agent signing Jujhar Khaira changes that dynamic next season.

“There’s a lot of high talent and skill [on this team],” Khaira said. “I can bring a hard-nosed game out there. That’s going to be an asset, for sure.”

Khaira, a native of British Columbia but only the third-ever NHL player of Punjabi descent, measures 6-4, 212 pounds and proved more than willing to use that hefty frame during the past four years with the Oilers.

He has been credited with 587 hits over his 258 career games, and his rate keeps increasing. He racked up 151 in just 40 games last season, good for 14th in the league overall and eighth among forwards.

“[Jujhar] brings another element of size and strength to our team,” general manager Stan Bowman said Monday. “He has some versatility. He was used both as a centerman and a winger. We like his approach to the game. He plays competitively. [He provides] an element we don’t have a lot of, so we’re trying to bring some of that in to blend with some of the highly skilled players we have up front.”

AP Photos

The Hawks were only able to sign Khaira because the Oilers didn’t give the soon-to-be 27-year-old a qualifying offer, letting him become unrestricted. That decision was part of an altogether strange offseason of incongruent decisions in Edmonton, although Khaira himself wasn’t surprised by how it played out.

“It was one of those things that I thought there was a chance [the Oilers wouldn’t qualify me], but it was out of my control at that point,” he said. “That’s stuff that happens in this game.”

It’s up for debate how valuable adding physicality — especially physical players who don’t contribute equivalent offense such as Khaira, who scored only three goals last season — is in modern hockey. Teams like the Avalanche, Hurricanes and Maple Leafs in recent seasons have committed wholeheartedly to speed and skill, largely eschewed grinders and achieved great regular season — albeit not as much postseason — success.

But that’s an argument for another day. The Hawks clearly believe investing in size and physicality can help them.

They certainly followed that mentality during the draft, selecting four young prospects who already exceed 6-4, 200 pounds — including beastly 6-7, 236-pound defenseman Taige Harding.

“You’re always looking to get size,” Hawks scouting director Mark Kelley said afterward. “When we watch the league [and] how it’s going now, the big defenders are having a lot of success — or, I should say, the teams that have the big defenders are having a lot of success… To answer your question, size was attractive to us.”

At the NHL level, Riley Stillman and Jake McCabe will compensate, hit-wise, for Zadorov’s departure among the defensemen.

And Khaira and Mike Hardman, who accumulated a ridiculous 38 hits in eight Hawks games late last season after signing out of Boston College, should together fill that niche among the forwards.

“[The Hawks] seemed very interested,” Khaira said. “[And I wanted the] opportunity I think that I have with the organization. That was the biggest thing, just getting an opportunity.”

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When Billy Jennings was a young news photographer at WMAQ-TV, it hit him. He’d landed a big job in a big market with big on-air talent. He started to pace the newsroom floor.

Jennings remembers telling Jim Stricklin, a cameraman who’d covered everything from Chicago street gangs to prison riots, he was nervous.

“Let me tell you something,” he said Mr. Stricklin told him. “There are times you’re going to go out without a reporter — but they are never going to go out without you. You’re the tip of the spear. If you didn’t shoot it, it didn’t happen. Tell that story with your pictures, and you’ll be fine.”

After that, Jennings, who’s now WMAQ’s chief photographer, said, “I just kind of settled down.”

Mr. Stricklin, who was one of WMAQ’s first Black news photographers and won multiple Emmy awards during his 40-year career at the Chicago NBC station, died July 26 at Kindred Chicago Lakeshore Hospital of COVID-19, according to Marita Joyce Stricklin, his wife of 57 years. The Hyde Park resident, who was 88, became ill despite having been vaccinated against the coronavirus, she said.

Provided

“He had been just going along and enjoying retirement,” she said. “It’s so transmissible.”

WMAQ staffers said they’ll miss his humor and gift for getting good pictures. They said that, when news happened, it seemed he always had his camera rolling and ready to shoot.

They also said they’ll miss his support during labor disputes. Mr. Stricklin was a steward for the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, according to retired WMAQ anchor Art Norman.

“He represented the little guy,” Norman said. “He would fight for maternity leave, things like that. He would fight like crazy. He just looked out for everyone.”

“He wasn’t cowed or impressed by any star or any politician,” former WMAQ anchor Joan Esposito said.

If a fledgling reporter didn’t know the right questions, “He leaned over and told you what to ask,” WMAQ-TV political reporter Mary Ann Ahern said.

Mr. Stricklin grew up in Bronzeville. After graduating from DuSable High School, he served in the Army, assigned to work as a photographer in Paris, according to his wife.

He went on to get a design degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology but was “always aiming for filmmaking,” his wife said. He hung out at the South Side Community Art Center and met Gordon Parks, the first Black photographer for Life magazine and director of the film “Shaft.”

The Stricklins met at Jimmy’s Woodlawn Tap in Hyde Park. She was trying to look sophisticated by drinking Mogen David and ginger ale.

“It was really like pop,” she said. “He said, ‘I’m not going to order that. Nobody drinks that.’ “

But they hit it off, and he called her the next day.

In 1964, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. hired Mr. Stricklin to shoot footage on the rise of Chicago street gangs.

“The Blackstone Rangers gang, the gangs, were beginning to surface on the South Side of Chicago, and the CBC needed visual records of the gang activity,” his wife said.

His work brought him to the attention of WMAQ, which hired him.

In 1968, he was hospitalized for two days after being beaten by police while covering protests at the Democratic National Convention, according to a federal task force report. He’d been filming a police beating of another photographer when an officer struck him in the mouth with a nightstick, Mr. Stricklin said at the time: “The next thing I know, I was being hit on the head, and I think on the back, and I was just forced down on the ground.”

“They were in the middle of tear gas and violence several times,” said Brett Snodgrass, a son of the late WMAQ reporter Dick Kay, Mr. Stricklin’s close friend and sailing buddy.

Mr. Stricklin once covered an uprising at Stateville Correctional Center with WMAQ reporter Peter Nolan.

“This one inmate, all of a sudden, out of the blue, starts screaming,” Nolan said. “The only guy rolling [with his camera] was Stricklin, and we got the best stuff out of there. He had a feeling for when things were going to happen.”

“If we heard a fire engine in the middle of the night,” Mr. Stricklin’s wife said, “Jim would get out of bed and say, ‘I’ve got to call NBC.’ “

And during late election nights or long days waiting for a jury verdict, “He just was one of those guys who could make you laugh,” said Carol Marin, former WMAQ-TV political editor and a director of the DePaul University Center for Journalism Integrity & Excellence.

Mr. Stricklin also is survived by his son Nicholas Christophe Stricklin and two grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

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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 sunny with a high near 82 degrees. Tonight will be mostly clear with a low around 63. Tomorrow will be sunny with a high near 84.

Top story

Lightfoot: No regrets on Lollapalooza or concerns it will become super-spreader event

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said today she doesn’t fear a surge of coronavirus cases tied to Lollapalooza, in part because her public health commissioner “went incognito” to the music festival without valid proof of vaccination and was turned away.

During a live interview on WVON-AM (1690), Lightfoot said she is “well aware” of a video appearing to show young people being “waved through” the Lollapalooza gates by people who were supposed to be checking vaccination cards, but “weren’t even looking at” those credentials.

But the mayor offered a possible explanation. Once attendees were screened and showed credentials proving they’d been vaccinated, they were issued a wristband. So the video could have been people with wristbands being waved through, Lightfoot said.

Lightfoot said her confidence about the safety of Lollapalooza stems from the city’s vigilance in holding event organizers to their promised protocols and testing that system to make certain they did.

Attendees were required to either show their own vaccination card — and a valid ID proving they were the person whose name is on the card — or proof that they had tested negative for the coronavirus no more than 72 hours before the concert.

Lightfoot said she has “no regrets” about green-lighting the festival, a major money-maker for Chicago that filled hotels and restaurants.

Two days after it ended, the mayor remains confident Chicago’s premier music festival — the largest of its kind in the world this year — will not turn out to be a “super-spreader” event. She argued just the opposite.

Fran Spielman has more on where the mayor stands after Lolla here.

More news you need

1. Scoot over, Vautravers Building! A 127-year-old Lake View structure is on the move, literally, to get out of the way of a CTA track rebuilding project. The move 30 feet west and four feet south — as part of the CTA’s Red and Purple modernization — is set to wrap up today.
2. To cut down on long lines and long waits at Chicago-area driver services centers, the Secretary of State’s office will require appointments for many locations beginning in September. The state will also expand its remote renewal program for eligible drivers.
3. The Blackhawks finally committed yesterday to publicly releasing the findings of an ongoing sexual assault investigation. The probe stems from lawsuits claiming the Hawks grossly mishandled an alleged May 2010 sexual assault of an ex-player by a former coach.
4. The CDC’s latest guidance says people who are fully vaccinated should get tested three to five days after a potential exposure even if they don’t have symptoms. The guidance comes amid concerns of the contagious Delta variant, which now accounts for most coronavirus infections.
5. The Metro echoed those concerns in its announcement today that concert goers will need to show proof of vaccination in order to enter the Wrigleyville concert hall. Additionally, masks will be recommended for all fans.
6. Employees at the Art Institute are organizing a union and asking managers not to interfere with their campaign, potentially opening a new frontier in local labor activism. Organizers said they hope to unionize about 330 museum employees, some of whom were affected by furloughs and temporary pay cuts during the pandemic.

A bright one

For Rookie, Lollapalooza was a homecoming — and a dream come true

For the members of Chicago rock band Rookie, stepping on to the stage at Lollapalooza Friday felt like a dream, years in the making.

The five piece looked out onto the early afternoon crowd and swiftly jammed through their first few songs, letting their brand of 1970s-inspired roots rock blast through the festival grounds, enticing sleepy concertgoers to stop by.

For years Max Loebman (guitar/vocals), (guitar/vocals), Christopher Devlin (bass/vocals), Joe Bordenaro (drums/vocals) and Justin Bell (keys/vocals) each cut their teeth playing in the Chicago D.I.Y. scene. But after filling in for members in each other’s respective bands, the group decided to form Rookie in 2017.

Pat Nabong/Sun-Times

As a new unit, the band began making a name for itself throughout the following years, rising with the likes of fellow Chicago scenemates Twin Peaks and Beach Bunny.

But by the time they released their debut self titled album — a gritty, catchy album with soraing guitars and smart melodies — in 2020, all momentum had stalled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Tour dates were canceled — including a stint at Lollapalooza 2020 — venues shut down, and the band was tasked with figuring out what to do next.

So they did what they’ve always done — they got together and jammed.

More from my conversation with Loebman and Panoutsos at Lollapalooza here.

From the press box

Your daily question ?

NYC announced today it will require vaccination proof for indoor dining and gyms. Should Chicago do the same? Tell us why or why not.

Yesterday we asked you: Neil Steinberg says an S. Rosen’s bun is the true star of a Chicago-style hot dog. What’s your favorite part of a Chicago dog? Here’s some of what you said…

“I have to agree with him on the Rosen’s hot dog bun. However, the true star of a Chi-town dog is the hot dawg itself. It has to be a Vienna Beef hot dog. Plus, the bright green relish, diced onions, mustard, tomatoes, sports peppers and celery salt compliment the hot dog. There is no substitute.” — Vicki Trinidad

“Sport peppers cannot be substituted by anything.” — Jim Pabst

“All of it, but the neon relish is my jam.” — Nesha Williams

“The Vienna beef dog.” – Donald Lehner

“I relish to say, the mustard!” — Victoria Smith Farley

“Chicago relish and sport peppers.” — Jackie Ingram

“Relish, peppers and celery salt.” — Sanford Madnick

“It starts with a Vienna, Kosher-style hot dog.” – Lori Ellen

“My favorite thing is just visiting Chicago to have one.” — Jay Thrash

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The Bears spent the offseason investing in their top two quarterbacks.

Now they have to protect them.

Coach Matt Nagy claims he’s not nervous, but he’s definitely concerned. Both the Bears’ projected starting tackles — rookie Teven Jenkins and veteran Germain Ifedi — have yet to play during training camp because of, respectively, a lingering sore back and a hip flexor injured during the team’s conditioning test. Tuesday, Elijah Wilkinson — signed this offseason to be the team’s swing tackle — was not on the field for practice. The team hasn’t said why.

That leaves rookie Lachavious Simmons, who has played zero NFL snaps, on the right side and rookie Larry Borom, a rookie fifth-round pick, on the left. With their first preseason game looming — they host the Dolphins on Aug. 14 — the clock is ticking to make sure Andy Dalton and Justin Fields don’t get blindsided and injured because of a rookie mistake.

“It doesn’t give me anxiety,” Nagy said when asked about his injured tackles. “But it’s definitely something we need to focus on and make sure we get right.”

There is, he admitted, a sense of urgency. The team practiced with pads for the first time Tuesday and there’s a real concern that the Bears’ edge rushers could dominate the backup tackles and make it hard to run team drills the right way.

Quarterback Andy Dalton said this week he was eager to see his linemen in pads.

“The competition is real,” he said. “I think things will get solidified once the pads come on and we start playing some real football.”

The Bears put a “halo” around quarterbacks during practice, meaning defenders can’t touch them. That won’t exist Aug.14. The Bears can gameplan around it, helping the tackles with chips from tight ends and pass-blocking help from running backs. But that’s no way to learn whether their tackles can block.

“It’s going to be evident and obvious,” Nagy said. “If they can’t, they won’t be there. That’s where you go to the next part and the next part, you got to go through those steps.”

The next part, Nagy conceded, would be general manager Ryan Pace scouring the league for veteran help. Starters aren’t available, though, unless they’re overpaid or otherwise problematic.

The Bears’ best hope is for speedy recoveries by Jenkins and Ifedi. Jenkins, whom the Bears traded up to draft in the second round, worked out with trainer Andre Tucker on Monday afternoon and is “getting a little bit better,” Nagy said. Still, there’s no timeline for his return.

“The sooner the better for sure,” Nagy said. “I just can’t predict days or weeks.”

Once he comes back, he’ll need to ramp up to play in a preseason game. Until then, the Bears are left to see what they have in Borom, a rookie from Missouri who spent the offseason program playing on the right side.

“I think he’s really light-footed for being such a big man,” Nagy said. “I don’t know if he can play left tackle. That’s why we’re trying to put him there, to see. It’s not easy when you go from the right side to the left side, but I think now is the time to see, really, what he can do.

“It would be pretty cool to see that you find out, you draft a guy in the fifth round and then you end up having a guy that can do some big things for us. So we’re going to test him out.”

That’s not the Bears’ first choice. Or their second or third. But that’s where they stand, a week into camp.

David Culley, the new Texans head coach, gave Nagy a mantra when the two worked together for the Eagles and Chiefs. When Nagy would worry, Culley would say that “it will all play itself out.”

Nagy repeated that Tuesday, trying to will it to be true.

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LOS ANGELES — Rapper DaBaby offered another apology Monday while facing heavy backlash after he made crude and homophobic remarks at a recent Miami-area music festival.

The Grammy-nominated performer said he was misinformed for his comments about HIV/AIDS in the post, which came a day after the rapper was cut from Lollapalooza’s lineup in Chicago.

On Monday, New York City’s Governors Ball and Day N Vegas in Las Vegas each announced the rapper had been dropped from their lineups.

Da Baby, whose real name is Jonathan Kirk, apologized to the LGBTQ+ community for his “hurtful and triggering” comments.

“Social media moves so fast that people want to demolish you before you even have the opportunity to grow, educate and learn from your mistakes,” he wrote. “As a man who has had to make his own way from very difficult circumstances, having people I know publicly working against me – knowing that what I needed was education on these topics and guidance – has been challenging.”

It’s the second time DaBaby has apologized following his remarks at Miami’s Rolling Loud Festival.

While on stage, the rapper used crude language and asked attendees who weren’t gay men or people not affected by HIV or AIDS to raise their cellphone flashlights. He then incorrectly said the disease would “make you die in two or three weeks.”

DaBaby’s remarks caused an immediate firestorm for the rapper, whose song “Rockstar” was one of the biggest hits last year. He was nominated for a Grammy for record of the year.

In recent days, several artists including Madonna, Questlove and Elton John have denounced his remarks. Dua Lipa, who collaborated with DaBaby on the popular remix of her song “Levitating,” said she was “surprised and horrified” by his comments.

DaBaby’s representatives didn’t immediately reply to an email seeking comment.

Read More

The on-the-court upgrades the Bulls made on the first two days of free agency will be immediate.

A pure play-making point guard in Lonzo Ball, who understands how to run a team with pace, as well as having positional size and a willingness to defend to impact both ends of the floor, and then a pick-and-roll defensive expert in Alex Caruso, who understands winning and doing the dirty work that impact games.

Then on Tuesday, a sign-and trade with the Spurs to land small forward DeMar DeRozan for a cost to the Bulls of three years and $85 million, sending out yet another first-round future pick, veteran Thad Young and an expiring contract in Al-Farouq Aminu.

Throw the price tags for each out the window for now, however.

The last two days were about the Bulls becoming a better constructed team for how they want to play this upcoming season.

Bigger picture?

The organization is now better constructed in case of a Zach LaVine exit — whether the guard wants to leave on his own or his financial asking price forces the front office to break the glass in case of emergency. Do DeRozan, Caruso or Ball have the same skillset as LaVine? No, but they offer a safety net for possibly the next three-to-four years that at least gives the Bulls a second wave of talent to build off of.

Something the franchise didn’t have before the free agent period began.

In a perfect scenario, the timelines will mesh where the 31-year-old DeRozan, LaVine and Nikola Vucevic can start pushing the Bulls into the postseason with a new cast of characters this upcoming season, while forward Patrick Williams and Ball continue pushing towards high-ceiling trajectories they had in the evaluation process.

If it doesn’t work with LaVine, however, Plan B is still in-house.

Because of his unselfishness and willingness to be a defensive-minded presence, Ball should be an attractive Robin to a pure scorer that suffers from Batman syndrome.

Then factor in what Williams should start becoming as early as this upcoming season. This is still a league where two-way wing defenders rule the land, and with a skillset that could blossom into doing just that, the Bulls could be looking at a Williams-Ball future with even more excitement than the immediate LaVine-Vucevic model.

DeRozan is almost a bonus, lurking for the next three years after spending the first12 seasons being a career 20.1-points per game scorer, to go along with a 2020-21 season in which he also had a career-best 6.9 assists.

Either way it works out, executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas can at least sleep well at night knowing that he provided LaVine with the best team he’s ever played on not named Team USA, and at least gave LaVine something to think about when it comes times to make financial decisions on his own future.

Because of the three additions, any chance the Bulls had of clearing more cap space to give LaVine a raise for the upcoming season and then extend him at a higher number off of that went out the window.

Read More

Chicago Cubs: Anthony Rizzo fires back at Jed Hoyer by Vincent Parise

Monday night when NBA free agency opened up, the Chicago Bulls flew out of the gates running. Vice President Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley went to work in a hurry.

To get things going almost immediately as the bell rang at 5pm CST, the Bulls agreed to a sign-and-trade with the New Orleans Pelicans, sending point guard Lonzo Ball to Chicago. After bringing in Alex Caruso and netting themselves a trade exception by dealing Daniel Theis to the Houston Rockets, the Bulls were in prime position for another move.

Day 2 began with Bulls fans knowing that coveted trade exception could land a player like DeMar DeRozan, who was an unrestricted free agent coming off a few years with the San Antonio Spurs. The sign-and-trade has been a popular move this offseason and teams have made great use of it. This was yet another opportunity for the Bulls, and Karnisovas took full advantage.

Tuesday afternoon, the Bulls agreed on a massive deal with the Spurs which saw DeRozan sign with Chicago. The Bulls sent forwards Thaddeus Young and Al-Farouq Aminu to San Antonio, along with a future first rounder and a pair of future seconds.

The Bulls are sending the Spurs Thad Young, Al-Farouq Aminu and picks in the deal, source tells ESPN.

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) August 3, 2021

The DeMar DeRozan deal ensures these Chicago Bulls are serious about winning a championship.

This was a monster deal, not based off of the return to San Antonio but because of how much it means to Bulls fans everywhere. For the first offseason in over a decade, fans can look forward to winning basketball. For the first time in nearly two decades, fans can appreciate having an aggressive front office that cares about winning basketball.

The two underlying wins, here, are pretty incredible. The Bulls’ first-round pick that goes to San Antonio will be sent no sooner than 2025, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski. By then, there’s no chance the Bulls’ pick will mean much to the Spurs. If all goes according to plan, the Bulls will be picking far outside the lottery at that time.

Secondly, the Spurs took on the salary of Aminu, which added up to $10.2 million for this season. Young’s salary was a similar $10 million as well, but getting Aminu off the books was a crafty move by Karnisovas and Eversley.

Speaking of Eversley, his time with DeRozan in Toronto certainly helped the Bulls in their quest to sign the 31-year-old wing.

DeRozan may just be one of the most underrated players in the league today, mostly because he’s never played on a championship team. The Spurs have been less than competent since their legends broke up, but DeRozan has still put up strong lines.

Last year, DeRozan averaged roughly 21 points per game, nearly 7.0 assists and shot the ball at a 50 percent clip.

Related Story

Bulls: 3 players most affected by Lonzo Ball deal

Read now >>

These are not your Gar Forman and John Paxson-led Bulls, folks. The script has been flipped and Chicago can get genuinely excited about Bulls basketball once again.

Read More

Life is a TV Dinner

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New York City compassionate Democrat Mayor mandates vaxxed ONLY can work and eat indoors

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By Richard Davis,
today at 3:44 pm

From Politico:

NEW YORK — Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a new policy Tuesday that requires people to show proof of Covid-19 vaccination to dine inside restaurants, work out at a gym, attend a play or go out dancing.

This applies to employees and customers.

The number of deaths in New York City from Covid-19 yesterday, August 02, 2021, was seven. The average for 7 days is five. For reference, deaths from Covid-19 exactly a year ago, August 02, 2020: five dead, with a seven-day average of eight. So, on average, things were worse a year ago and there was only talk of vaccine passports. You can easily Google the data here. It’s from the New York Times — you know, that right-wing rag.

What changed? Why are the compassionate Democrats forcing mostly low-wage earners to give up their employment because they do not want to be injected with an experimental shot? Won’t these same Democrats argue “my body my choice” when it comes to abortion?

Why are the Democrats bringing back de facto segregation, Jim Crow? It is estimated that at least forty percent of black New York residents are unvaccinated.

I’ll let you ponder the answer to that question. If I were to hazard a guess it would be labeled a conspiracy theory.

###

What we have found out is that there is only about six months between a conspiracy theory and fact.

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NEW YORK — New York City will soon require proof of COVID-19 vaccinations for anyone who wants to dine indoors at a restaurant, see a performance or go to the gym, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Tuesday, making it the first big city in the U.S. to impose such restrictions.

The new requirement, which will be phased in over several weeks in August and September, is the most aggressive step the city has taken yet to curb a surge in cases caused by the delta variant. People will have to show proof that they have had at least one dose of a vaccine.

“The only way to patronize these establishments indoors will be if you’re vaccinated,” de Blasio said. “The goal here is to convince everyone that this is the time. If we’re going to stop the delta variant, the time is now. And that means getting vaccinated right now.”

The Democrat said some details still need to be worked out, including rules affecting children under 12, who are not yet eligible for any of the approved vaccines. The policy will go into effect on Aug. 16 but inspections and enforcement won’t begin until Sept. 13, the week that the city’s public schools reopen for the fall.

Vaccination cards will be accepted as proof of inoculation, along with state and city apps.

De Blasio has focused on getting as many New Yorkers vaccinated as possible while resisting calls to mandate masks indoors, as several cities and counties in California have done.

De Blasio said Monday he was making “a strong recommendation” that everyone wear a mask in public indoor settings but stressed that the city’s “overwhelming strategic thrust” remained getting more people vaccinated.

Asked Tuesday about a mask mandate, de Blasio said all options were on the table but reiterated that the city’s policy is “vaccine-centric.”

“Right now what we want to nail is people getting vaccinated, and, very bluntly, showing that life is much better when you’re vaccinated,” he added. “You can do so much more when you’re vaccinated. You have more freedom when you’re vaccinated, and you have a lot less, you have fewer choices, fewer opportunities if you’re not vaccinated.”

The mayor announced last week that city employees would be required to get vaccinated by mid-September or to face weekly testing, and he has offered a $100 incentive for city residents who get inoculated.

De Blasio said Tuesday that he did not think checking vaccination status should be too difficult for businesses, which already have to take tickets or show diners to a table.

Some restaurateurs disagreed.

Seongmin Jun, the manager of Dear Han Cafe, wondered how he would check vaccination cards while handling the periodic rush of patrons and serving as the cafe’s only barista.

“Will customers get offended for checking if they got COVID vaccinations? I mean I don’t know how to do that, or even if I will have time to do that,” Jun said.

The coffee shop opened just months before the pandemic spread early last year.

“They’re making it too hard for businesspeople,” Jun said, but acknowledged that something has to be done to get the outbreak under control. “I get what they are trying to say, but there must be another way to reduce the cases of COVID.”

Sean Ogs, manager of the nearby Woodside Cafe in Queens, said he was “floored” when he heard the news about the new vaccination mandate.

“We’ve already been in a struggle. I don’t know how I’m going to deal with it,” Ogs said. “It’s going to be extra work. It’ll make things impossible.”

Woodside Cafe customer Debbie McCarthy, who is unvaccinated, said she was turned away over the weekend from several establishments that had already begun requiring proof of vaccinations from patrons.

“I’m a little shocked they would do that,” said McCarthy, who said she recovered from COVID-19 a few months ago and believes her natural antibodies will protect from future infections. “Why are they so afraid of people who haven’t been vaccinated? I think we should have a choice.”

Scientists recommend vaccination for people who have had the virus, saying it’s unclear how long immunity without vaccination for those who have recovered would last.

Andrew Rigie, executive director of the NYC Hospitality Alliance, a restaurant group, said he supports the new policy.

“Mandating vaccine requirements for restaurant and bar employees and customers to work and dine indoors is a very difficult step, but ultimately may prove an essential move to protecting public health and ensuring that New York City does not revert to restrictions and shut down orders that would again absolutely devastate small businesses that have not yet recovered from the pandemic,” Rigie said in a statement.

Fitness studio owner Bill Zanker said he supports the newly announced policy as well, even though it comes as another hurdle after a long coronavirus shutdown.

“We’ve got to encourage people to get vaccinated. … We’re happy to enforce that,” said Zanker, the CEO of GRIT BXNG, a Manhattan studio that offers boxing-related workouts and a full bar. “Unfortunately, it will affect the business again.”

The studio had been open for just seven months before the pandemic shutdown began in March 2020. Since reopening this past May, GRIT has checked patrons’ vaccination status, offering some inoculated-only classes where people could go without masks, while unvaccinated people had to take other classes and cover their faces, he said. About 25% of the patrons are unvaccinated, he said.

Major performance venues including Broadway theaters and the Metropolitan Opera have already announced that vaccinations will be required for patrons.

About 66% of adults in New York City are fully vaccinated, according to official data.

On Monday, the U.S. reached President Joe Biden’s goal of getting at least one COVID-19 shot into 70% of American adults — a month late and amid a surge by the delta variant that is overwhelming hospitals and prompting renewed pandemic regulations around the country.

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Associated Press writer Jennifer Peltz contributed to this report.

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WASHINGTON — An officer died after being stabbed Tuesday during a burst of violence at a transit station outside the Pentagon, and a suspect was shot by law enforcement and died at the scene, officials said.

The Pentagon, the headquarters of the U.S. military, was temporarily placed on lockdown after gunshots were fired Tuesday morning near the entrance of the building, a Pentagon police officer who was stabbed later died, according to officials who were not authorized to discuss the matter and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

More details about the violence were expected at a Pentagon news conference. The connection between the shooting and the stabbing of the officer was not immediately clear. The authorities did not immediately provide details or the sequence of events.

The incident occurred on a Metro bus platform that is part of the Pentagon Transit Center and just steps from the Pentagon, according to the Pentagon Protection Force Protection Agency. The facility is just steps from the Pentagon building, which is in Arlington County, Virginia, just across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C.

An Associated Press reporter near the building heard multiple gunshots, then a pause, then at least one additional shot. Another AP journalist heard police yelling “shooter.”

A Pentagon announcement said the facility was on lockdown due to “police activity.” The agency responsible for security at the building, the Pentagon Force Protection Agency, tweeted shortly before noon that the scene of the incident was secure. The lockdown was lifted except for the area around the crime scene.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were at the White House meeting with President Joe Biden, at the time of the shooting.

In 2010, two officers with the Pentagon Force Protection Agency were wounded when a gunman approached them at a security screening area. The officers, who survived, returned fire, fatally wounding the gunman, identified as John Patrick Bedell.

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Associated Press writers Michael Balsamo, Eric Tucker and Colleen Long contributed to this report.

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