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Salukis fall five spots to No. 10 in latest Stats Perform pollon March 22, 2021 at 5:58 pm

Prairie State Pigskin

Salukis fall five spots to No. 10 in latest Stats Perform poll

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Salukis fall five spots to No. 10 in latest Stats Perform pollon March 22, 2021 at 5:58 pm Read More »

Genealogy is an electiveon March 22, 2021 at 6:14 pm

Retired in Chicago

Genealogy is an elective

©2021 CTMG – A Chicago Tribune website –
Crafted by the News Apps team

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Genealogy is an electiveon March 22, 2021 at 6:14 pm Read More »

Singer, Songwriter Leela James Releases Video For New Singleon March 22, 2021 at 11:02 pm

Just N

Singer, Songwriter Leela James Releases Video For New Single

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Singer, Songwriter Leela James Releases Video For New Singleon March 22, 2021 at 11:02 pm Read More »

CPD has always been under mayoral control. It’s time to try something newon March 22, 2021 at 10:31 pm

I cannot disagree with you more in your opposition to the establishment of an elected body to oversee the actions of the Chicago Police Department.

The CPD has always been under mayoral control, and what has been the result? Dozens of men, almost all men of color, have been wrongfully convicted due to faked “evidence” or, in the case of disgraced detective Jon Burge, have gone to prison based on confessions obtained through torture. Even worse, no one knows how many people have been killed by the police over the years.

The local case of LaQuan McDonald is a prime example here, but the only reason it came to light is because video evidence was available. Without that, no one would have heard of him. Although more people now have the means to record police actions on their telephones, one can safely assume that many more incidents take place with no witnesses or recording.

SEND LETTERS TO: [email protected]. Please include your neighborhood or hometown and a phone number for verification purposes. Letters should be 350 words or less.

There are two things that are often missing from the discussion of police misconduct. The first is that in the case of a crime having actually occurred, a wrongfully accused person facing trial may end up in prison while the actual criminal is still out on the streets. Secondly, in the rare cases when police misconduct is identified, the only realistic remedy, besides releasing the convicted from prison, is a cash payment. Over the last 10-12 years the City of Chicago has been paying out about $50 million dollars a year; a bill that we, the taxpayers, have to foot. And one can correctly assume that the size of those payments will rise dramatically due to the recent settlements reached in Minneapolis and Louisville with the families of George Floyd and Breanna Taylor.

Being a police officer is no easy task. I know a few police officers, active and retired, and I understand the difficulties and uncertainties of their job on daily basis. I know I would never want to take on the great responsibilities that they have. Sometimes mistakes are made despite good intentions, but when mistakes are made, attempts should be made to prevent them in the future. Instead, there exists a wall of silence that ignores the errors and allows things to go on as if nothing has happened. This is a disservice to the majority of police who are dedicated to trying to improve our lives by protecting us from criminal elements.

In part, mayoral control has led us to the current situation and it is time to try something new. I strongly feel that an elected police accountability council would be an improvement and I see nothing wrong with presenting the proposal to the voters and see if they agree. I hope the Sun-Times reconsiders its position.

George Milkowski, West Ridge

I expected this, racist crime. You had a president who clearly saw racist crimes and defended them saying, “there are good people on both sides.” Racists saw a go-ahead from that administration. They are going to push it as far as they can.

This is what happens when a racist administration opens the bag of devils and let’s them all out. The police need to nip this in the bud. We already have the killings and racist crimes ramping up. These are the real criminals.

We have to pass a law forbidding racist acts. You can think whatever you want, but not act on it. That has to be a punishable crime. Racism cannot be tolerated. There was a guy in the past like that, hated Jews, we all saw how devastatingly that ended.

That is the result of ignoring racist crimes. They all crawled out of the woodwork, now they can crawl back. Because what makes this country really great is the beautiful tapestry of people from all over the world.

Connie Orland, Plainfield

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CPD has always been under mayoral control. It’s time to try something newon March 22, 2021 at 10:31 pm Read More »

Racist, xenophobic comment directed at Illinois’ Kofi Cockburn after loss in NCAA Tournamenton March 22, 2021 at 8:51 pm

Another Big Ten men’s basketball player has shared racist social media comments directed at him after his team lost in the NCAA Tournament.

Illinois center Kofi Cockburn shared on Instagram a xenophobic and racist comment directed at him on an unknown social media post Sunday, not long following the No. 1-seeded Fighting Illini’s second-round loss to Loyola.

“Go back home ya bum,” the comment said. “(Expletive) lost to Loyola. Go sit your monkey (expletive) on the couch.”

Cockburn — who was born in Kingston, Jamaica, and moved to the Queens, New York, in 2014 — captioned the post: “I blame his parents.”

After Oral Roberts upset Ohio State in the first round on Friday, Buckeyes big man E.J. Liddell posted screenshots of vulgar messages and threats he has received.

Along with screenshots of the threats and insults, Liddell wrote “Honestly, what did I do to deserve this? I’m human.” And “Comments don’t get to me but I just wanna know why. I’ve never done anything to anyone in my life to be approached like this.”

The program planned on notifying the authorities.

Read more at usatoday.com

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Racist, xenophobic comment directed at Illinois’ Kofi Cockburn after loss in NCAA Tournamenton March 22, 2021 at 8:51 pm Read More »

The midwestern decadence of “Indiscriminate Sincerity”Micco Caporaleon March 22, 2021 at 3:40 pm


Patrick Wilkins’s exhibit celebrates humanity’s simplest pleasures with a perverse twist.

You could call Patrick Wilkins’s solo exhibition at Extase a sausage party—but his punny ceramic wieners are just a taste of this show’s irreverent joy. “Indiscriminate Sincerity” includes 16 hot dog sculptures divided into two sets of eight that flank both sides of a converted closet in the Humboldt Park apartment gallery.…Read More

The midwestern decadence of “Indiscriminate Sincerity”Micco Caporaleon March 22, 2021 at 3:40 pm Read More »

Lakers Hall of Famer Elgin Baylor dies at 86on March 22, 2021 at 7:03 pm

LOS ANGELES — Elgin Baylor, the Lakers’ 11-time NBA All-Star who soared through the 1960s with a high-scoring style of basketball that became the model for the modern player, died Monday. He was 86.

The Lakers announced that Baylor died of natural causes in Los Angeles with his wife, Elaine, and daughter Krystal by his side.

With a silky-smooth jumper and fluid athleticism, Baylor played a major role in revolutionizing basketball from a ground-bound sport into an aerial show. He spent parts of 14 seasons with the Lakers in Minneapolis and Los Angeles during his Hall of Fame career, teaming with Jerry West throughout the ’60s in one of the most potent tandems in basketball history.

“Elgin was THE superstar of his era — his many accolades speak to that,” Lakers Governor Jeanie Buss said in a statement announcing Baylor’s death.

Baylor’s second career as a personnel executive with the woebegone Los Angeles Clippers was much less successful. He worked for the Clippers from 1986 until 2008, when he left the team with acrimony and an unsuccessful lawsuit against owner Donald Sterling and the NBA, alleging age and race discrimination.

The 6-foot-5 Baylor played in an era before significant television coverage of basketball, and little of his play was ever captured on film. His spectacular style is best remembered by those who saw it in person — including West, who once called him “one of the most spectacular shooters the world has ever seen.”

Baylor had an uncanny ability to hang in mid-air indefinitely, inventing shots along the way with his head bobbing. Years before Julius Erving and Michael Jordan became international superstars with their similarly acrobatic games, Baylor created the blueprint for the modern superstar.

Baylor soared above most of his contemporaries, but never won a championship or led the NBA in scoring largely because he played at the same time as centers Bill Russell, who won all the rings, and Wilt Chamberlain, who claimed all the scoring titles. Knee injuries hampered much of the second half of Baylor’s career, although he remained a regular All-Star.

West and Baylor were the first pair in the long tradition of dynamic duos with the Lakers, followed by Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the 1980s before Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal won three more titles in the 2000s.

But Baylor’s Lakers lost six times in the NBA Finals to the Boston Celtics and another time to the New York Knicks. Los Angeles won the 1971-72 title, but only after Baylor retired nine games into the season.

Baylor arrived in the NBA in 1958 as the No. 1 draft pick out of Seattle University. He immediately set new superlatives for individual scoring, with a 55-point game in his Rookie-of-the-Year season before scoring 64 on Nov. 8, 1959 — then the NBA single-game record, and the Lakers record for 45 years until Bryant broke it.

Baylor became the first NBA player to surpass 70 points with a 71-point game Dec. 11, 1960, against New York. Chamberlain set the record of 100 points in 1962.

Baylor averaged 38 points in the 1961-62 season despite doing active duty as an Army reservist. He scored 61 points in a playoff game against Boston in 1962, a record that would stand for 24 years until Jordan broke it.

Baylor averaged 27.4 points and 13.5 rebounds during his 14-year career. He scored a total of 23,149 points in 846 games, and was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in May 1977.

Elgin Gay Baylor was born in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 16, 1934. He was named after his father’s favorite watch, an “Elgin” timepiece. Although he starred at two high schools, Baylor struggled academically and briefly dropped out, working in a furniture store and playing in local recreational leagues.

Baylor went to the College of Idaho because he was given a scholarship to play both basketball and football, but the school fired its basketball coach and cut several scholarships a year later. Baylor transferred to Seattle and played from 1956-58, averaging 31.3 points per game and leading the team to the 1958 NCAA championship game, where it lost to coach Adolph Rupp’s Kentucky Wildcats.

The year before the Lakers persuaded Baylor to leave college a year early, the club was near bankruptcy after finishing 19-53, falling far since their glory years in the late ’40s and early ’50s in Minneapolis with center George Mikan.

Baylor transformed the franchise with his scoring and style. Minneapolis beat the Detroit Pistons and the defending champion St. Louis Hawks in the 1959 playoffs to make it to the NBA Finals, losing to the fledgling Celtics dynasty.

Elgin Baylor stands next to his statueoutside Staples Center.
Elgin Baylor stands next to his statueoutside Staples Center.
Reed Saxon/AP

Baylor averaged 24.9 points, fourth in the league, and was third in rebounding with 15 a game. He was easily voted Rookie of the Year.

The Lakers moved west to Los Angeles in 1960, and Baylor became the centerpiece of their Hollywood revival. He averaged 34.8 points in the Lakers’ first season in Los Angeles, second in the league to Chamberlain.

Jerry West arrived from West Virginia in 1960, and they immediately clicked, averaging 69.1 combined points per game. Baylor played in only 48 games on weekend passes because his military service, but the Lakers still won the Western Conference by 11 games.

Baylor’s 61-point performance against the Celtics in Game 5 of the finals put the Lakers ahead 3-2 in the series, but they lost to the Celtics in overtime in Game 7 — the pinnacle of the Lakers’ suffering at Boston’s hands.

Frank Selvy missed a 10-foot jumper that would have won the game in regulation. In film of that moment, Baylor appears poised to get Selvy’s rebound, then disappears from the screen. Baylor contended he was pushed out of bounds by Boston’s Sam Jones.

“I’ve always felt that was our championship,” Baylor told the Riverside Press-Enterprise in 2000.

He never got closer to a ring.

The following season Baylor became the first to finish in the NBA’s top five in four different statistical categories: scoring, rebounding, assists and free-throw percentage. The Lakers reached the finals again — and lost to the Celtics again.

Knee problems that began in the 1963-64 season started a slow decline for Baylor. He never averaged more than 30 points a season again, though he remained a competent scorer.

Baylor played his last full season in 1968-69, and suited up only sporadically until retiring at 37 in the fall of 1971.

Baylor’s post-playing career never lived up to the magic of his on-court skills.

The expansion New Orleans Jazz hired him as an assistant coach for their debut season in 1974, and he eventually replaced Butch van Breda Kolff as coach during the 1976-77 season, going 86-135 in parts of three seasons. Pete Maravich’s Jazz never made the playoffs, and Baylor resigned after the 1978-79 season.

In April 1986, the Clippers hired Baylor as their vice president for basketball operations. The Clippers made the playoffs in 1992 and 1993, but the franchise became the modern model of sports ineptitude for most of his tenure with poor drafting, indifferent fans and skinflint financial dealings.

Sterling largely was blamed for the franchise’s ineptitude, while Baylor received both admiration for his tenacity and ridicule for his inability to fix the Clippers’ woes.

Their 22-year relationship ended abruptly in October 2008 when the club put coach Mike Dunleavy in charge of personnel decisions.

Baylor, then 74, filed a $2 million lawsuit against the Clippers, Sterling and the NBA in February 2009, alleging he was fired because of his age and race. Baylor also said the Clippers grossly underpaid him.

The Clippers denied the allegations and said Baylor had resigned voluntarily. A Los Angeles County jury unanimously ruled in the Clippers’ favor in March 2011, refusing to award any damages.

Besides his wife and daughter, Baylor is survived by a son and daughter, Alan and Alison, from a previous marriage, and sister Gladys Baylor Barrett.

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Lakers Hall of Famer Elgin Baylor dies at 86on March 22, 2021 at 7:03 pm Read More »

Being healthy, staying healthy all that matters to White Sox’ Yoan Moncadaon March 22, 2021 at 4:57 pm

GLENDALE, Ariz. — There are scrappy, noisy gritty-gutty types who make their mark and then there’s the quiet smooth of Yoan Moncada.

“Chill” comes to mind watching Moncada go about his day. Big, strong, fast and talented, he looks like that guy who’s pulse is low and steady whether he’s walking to the clubhouse kitchen for an omelette or standing in the batter’s box facing Shane Bieber.

Which begged a question. Does anything ever upset you, Yoan?

“As long as you don’t mess around with me I don’t care,” Moncada said in an interview with the Sun-Times. “If you do, things change.”

The coronavirus messed with Moncada last season, and now he has a score to settle. He says he is feeling completely normal again after playing through effects of the virus, which drained his strength. Exit velocities off his bat were down, and Moncada didn’t attempt a stolen base.

“I don’t have any lingering issues, I have no concerns health-wise,” Moncada said through translator Billy Russo. “I feel very, very good and strong.”

So things are probably about to change. That .225/.320/.385 hitting line with six homers in 52 games in 2020, which followed .315/.367/.548 with 25 homers and 79 RBI in 2019 when he was arguably the Sox’ best player, will be there on his Baseball Reference page forever. They won’t put an asterisk by 2020, but it might always be known as an aberration.

“I don’t really pay attention to the stats or those numbers, especially last year’s numbers,” Moncada said. “Everybody knows how difficult it was and the problems I had. It was tough. But you learn from the past. That situation I went through put me in a better position for this year. To be more prepared for different things. One of the reasons I’m in a better position now is because of what I experienced. Hopefully, with God’s grace I will be able to prove and show what I can do.”

The switch-hitting Moncada is having a good spring. Batting fourth on most days in new manager Tony La Russa’s Cactus League lineups, Moncada reached base in his last 12 Cactus League games and took a .313/.450/.438 hitting line into the Sox’ game against the Giants Monday.

He said he’s ready for the season to begin right now. His goal?

“Stay healthy,” he said.

To underscore this is to report that Moncada emphasized staying healthy throughout the conversation. Keeping his hamstrings issue-free has been a point of emphasis since he missed three weeks with a strain in 2019 — when he put up the aforementioned numbers in 132 games.

“In my years in the majors something has always bothered me, I haven’t had a full season without any problems,” Moncada said. “There is always something. So the key is to stay healthy, and if I do I will be able to show what I can do.”

Mainly a top of the order hitter before now, La Russa said he likes a switch-hitter fourth, and Moncada strikes him as one who will produce more if asked to produce more.

“He has the ability to rise to the occasion and that’s what you look for in the middle of the lineup,” La Russa said.

Moncada isn’t making a big deal of batting cleanup, a spot he’s been slotted in 32 times in his career. He said he’s open to anywhere but he’s comfortable there.

“I like that slot,” he said.

And the Sox lineup looks deep, so hitting fourth won’t carry inordinate weight.

“Our lineup is a powerful lineup, one that will scare a lot of people,” Moncada said. “We’re second to none around the league. We’re going to do some damage.

“Everybody is working toward the common goal of the postseason and of course to win a World Series. This team has a lot of energy, and we need to stay healthy to sustain that energy through the whole season, and into the postseason. That’s when you’ll really need it. We know if we stay healthy we have a chance to win it all.”

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Being healthy, staying healthy all that matters to White Sox’ Yoan Moncadaon March 22, 2021 at 4:57 pm Read More »

Mid-major programs are full of confidence in NCAA Tournamenton March 22, 2021 at 3:53 pm

In any other college basketball season, four upsets in the eight second-round games played at the NCAA Tournament would be a sign that something big is brewing.

Were those the opening shots in the long-rumored mid-major revolution? Have enough talented kids and smart coaches finally taken up residence at programs outside the Big Six to nudge the balance of power?

Hard to say. Because this one isn’t like any other season.

Just two of the teams that won Sunday qualify as mid-majors: eighth-seeded Loyola, which manhandled No. 1 seed Illinois from the get-go and won 71-58; and 15th-seeded Oral Roberts, which used a late run to squeeze past Florida 81-78. The other two upsets were No. 12 Oregon State fending off fourth-seeded Oklahoma State 80-70, and No. 11 Syracuse smothering third-seeded West Virginia just enough to win 75-72.

But it felt like the little guys’ day. After becoming only the second No. 15 seed to make the Sweet 16, ORU coach Paul Mills updated his numbers-don’t-mean-anything postgame speech from the upset over Ohio State.

“We,” Mills said bravely, since his Golden Eagles will face No. 3 Arkansas in the next round, “are not capitulating to anybody here.”

Meanwhile, four more of the 16 teams in action Monday can call themselves mid-majors, including overall top seed Gonzaga, and two more, Creighton and Ohio, who are playing each other. If Abilene Christian somehow manages to pull the rug out from under UCLA, that’s three more mid-majors for a total of five in the Sweet 16. Which would indeed be something big.

But it’s possible, too, that something a bit more subtle is going on.

Because of the pandemic, teams had to navigate a stop-and-start regular season, then slapdash conference tournaments and then get seeded by an NCAA selection committee that, lacking the usual comparisons, might as well have been playing “Eenie meenie miney mo.”

Mid-majors are used to being treated as an afterthought. In normal seasons, they don’t have the budget to smooth out all the rough spots, and because they’re always further back in the recruiting line, their players stick around because precious few are good enough to turn pro early. Nearly every time they venture out the conference, they do so as underdogs.

In normal seasons, those disadvantages are a chip on their shoulders. This time around, qualities like resilience and cohesion are turning what might have been moral victories into actual W’s.

“Nobody was really doing anything out of body or out of mind,” said Loyola center Cameron Krutwig, who delivered 19 points and 12 rebounds in the win over Illinois.

Krutwig looks like a bigger version of Dick Butkus, but moves just like Justin Timberlake and doesn’t rattle easily. “We just stuck to the game plan,” he added matter-of-factly.

For all that, plenty of the usual Big Six conference suspects are hanging around and a few are flexing.

No. 1 seed Baylor toyed with Wisconsin 76-63 and No. 5 Villanova methodically broke down North Texas 84-61. No. 2 Houston and No. 3 Arkansas both got close shaves, but outlasted Rutgers and Texas Tech, respectively.

Syracuse was handed an 11 seed, apparently because the selection committee forgot that a.) the Orange 2-3 zone defense is still rare enough in the game to befuddle teams that don’t see one all season; and b.) almost every time Syracuse starts the tourney with a double-digit seeding, it’s a lock to make the Sweet 16.

While it was only mildly surprising that the Orange slipped by No. 3 West Virginia to get there, the twist-of-fate this time around is that Buddy Boeheim, son of Hall of Fame coach, is driving the bus.

He scored 22 of his 25 points after halftime, including all but one of his six 3-pointers, and helped put the game away with three late free throws. Then he revealed what father told son during what looked like a heartfelt moment just after the buzzer sounded.

“He said, ‘Yeah, you missed that last free throw,” Buddy laughed.

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Mid-major programs are full of confidence in NCAA Tournamenton March 22, 2021 at 3:53 pm Read More »

During podcast, Barack Obama recounts talking to his daughters about toxic masculinityon March 22, 2021 at 4:43 pm

Barack Obama is reflecting on what he wanted his daughters and their friends to know about toxic traits of masculinity.

“So much of popular culture tells (boys) that the only clear, defining thing about being a man, being masculine, is you excel in sports and sexual conquest,” Obama told his podcast co-host Bruce Springsteen in Monday’s episode of “Renegades: Born in the USA.”

Springsteen added “violence” to the list of traits boys are taught to think of as masculine traits. Obama noted that “violence, if it’s healthy at least, is subsumed into sports.”

The former president, who served from 2009 to 2017, shares daughters Malia, 22, and Sasha, 19, with wife Michelle Obama.

In November, Obama shared his daughters felt “the need to participate” in the Black Lives Matter protests after the death of George Floyd last summer, in an interview with People. He said they didn’t join in the protests for the attention, but rather “they were very much in organizer mode” and did it of their own volition.

“I didn’t have to give them a lot of advice because they had a very clear sense of what was right and what was wrong and (of) their own agency and the power of their voice and the need to participate,” he said. “Malia and Sasha found their own ways to get involved with the demonstrations and activism that you saw with young people this summer, without any prompting from Michelle and myself, on their own initiative.”

Obama added: “I could not have been prouder of them.”

Speaking in Monday’s episode to Springsteen, both men reflected on how their fathers’ generation dealt with gender issues and how the next generation can do better.

“There were some qualities of the traditional American male… that are absolutely worthy of praise and worthy of emulating,” Obama said. “That sense of responsibility, meaning you’re womb to do hard things and make some sacrifices for your family or for future generations. The greatest generation showed that again and again. And that handling your business… that sense of responsibility of being an adult.”

He added:” But there is a bunch of stuff in there that we did not reckon with, and now you’re seeing with Me Too part of what we’re dealing with in terms of women still seeking equal pay, part of what we’re still dealing with in terms of domestic abuse and violence. … There was never a full reckoning of who our dads were, what they had in them… How we have to understand that and talk about that. What lessons we should learn from it. All that kind of got buried.”

Read more at usatoday.com

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During podcast, Barack Obama recounts talking to his daughters about toxic masculinityon March 22, 2021 at 4:43 pm Read More »