There’s that famous scene in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” in which the Black Knight scoffs at his injuries during a sword fight with King Arthur, even as his limbs are being lopped off one by one. By the time the cutting is done, the Black Knight is basically a jeering head atop a torso.
That’s how it feels in the sports world, with every day bringing some sort of reduction, thanks to the pandemic.
Nobody is cavalierly saying “Tis but a scratch” or “It’s just a flesh wound,” but leagues are trying to soldier on despite the steady drumbeat of bad news.
What many of us saw as inevitable, a COVID-19 outbreak, happened this week. Seventeen members of the Marlins organization, including 11 players and two coaches, tested positive for the virus. Somehow, that didn’t lead to what seemed like the inevitable other shoe dropping, the shutdown of an already shortened baseball season. Instead, Major League Baseball postponed six Miami games, hoping to beat back the flames with a paper plate.
You ask yourself why baseball would continue in the face of such a contagious disease and then you ask yourself if you’ve always been this naive. It’s money. TV money. Lots and lots of TV money.
And, in a way, we’re complicit with the owners. We want our games. But just because we want something doesn’t mean we should get it. More and more, it’s feeling like we shouldn’t be doing this.
We’re giddy because the games we love are trying to help us take our minds off the pandemic. That’s our emotional side reacting. Our clear-thinking side sees it as a fool’s errand of repeated setbacks.
One day, you have the Marlins announcing their outbreak, another you have Clippers guard Lou Williams breaking an NBA bubble regulation by going to a strip club that also sells chicken wings. He was there for the wings, he said. He’s in quarantine for 10 days. He should also be in time-out.
Because of the coronavirus, many universities have cut fall sports not named “football” — football being king and moneymaker. And even at that, college football feels like it’s hanging by a thread. Who thinks a bunch of kids on a college campus are going to obey Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines? And how does one keep a keg tap sterilized?
There’s steady news of athletes testing positive for COVID-19. White Sox manager Rick Renteria stepped away from his duties Monday because of “a slight cough and nasal congestion” and, admit it, you had him testing positive and watching the Decades channel while in isolation for two weeks. I did. But he tested negative and returned to the Sox bench Tuesday.
This is the death of sports by a thousand cuts. Or death by a thousand nasal swabs.
It might be better than nothing for the consumer, but with the threat of canceled seasons hanging over sports, how much better? As for the athletes – you know, the clump of people trying to stay apart from each other while the rest of us work from home – they have to worry about introducing a disease to their families and extended families. Talk about pressure.
Bears defensive tackle Eddie Goldman has opted out of the season due to concerns over the virus. Those concerns might have something to do with the fact that football players often have to tackle and block each other, both of which involve touching. Breathing on each other is also a distinct possibility. It’s why Goldman isn’t alone in the opting-out department.
Inside football question: Will coaches hold it against players who choose their health over their team? If I know football coaches as a group, and I think I do, somewhere in their DNA strands is a molecule or two that will believe those players quit on their teammates.
It feels like we’re watching a losing battle. We’re watching a sport called attrition-ball. Players opt out. Players disappear for two weeks. Players take a step or two outside the NBA bubble, a real out-of-bounds violation, and they’re quarantined. It’s not like watching glaciers calve. That’s spectacular. Watching teams shed players due to the virus is like watching a shunning. No fun.
The return to sports always felt rickety. Now that it’s here, it feels even less structurally sound. The coronavirus doesn’t care how much we need sports in our lives. It has its own plans. If we truly value life and limb, restarting sports in 2021 is the way to go.
It’s been five years since Pittsburgh instrumental duo Zombi released Shape Shift. In May, they whetted the appetites of their long-suffering fans with the single “Breakthrough & Conquer,” which features guitar solos from Trans Am’s Philip Manley, and this month multi-instrumentalist Steve Moore and drummer A.E. Paterra have officially slid back onto the scene with a new sixth album, 2020–a 40-minute joy of crunchy riffs and beautifully layered electronics. Zombi’s music tends to fall across a dichotomy between the aesthetic of 70s art-house horror films on one hand and muscular, sci-fi-inflected hard rock and space rock on the other. The chunky riffs of “Earthscraper” and “Family Man” wouldn’t sound out of place on a midperiod Blue Oyster Cult album; the trance-inducing keyboard intro to “XYZT” almost single-handedly redeems early Styx; and the monumental monster drums in the intro to “First Flower” support an elegant metallic melody in a way that recalls Rush. Though Zombi are good at bombast, they don’t need it to make their statements. The Euro-funky “Thoughtforms” closes 2020 with a cinematic haze that evokes the visuals of the 1981 animated movie Heavy Metal–when its power chords come in, they’re sublimely satisfying, and the song’s fadeout is also unusually gratifying, suggesting that Zombi’s journey continues long after the album’s final notes. I also like the use of fade-in on “Fifth Point of the Pentangle,” which feels like curtains being drawn aside on a ritual that’s already in progress. With 2020, Moore and Paterra have crafted a logical successor to Shape Shift that carries their sound into greater sophistication; the first half of the album has the rambunctious vibe of a hard-rock crowd pleaser, and throughout the B side the wizard shows his real colors and complexities. The whole record testifies to Zombi’s skill at weaving various threads of metal, electronic music, and prog into something that’s utterly true to their influences but also beast unto itself. v
This week’s gig poster advertises one of several livestreamed music festivals scheduled for this weekend. Terrell Davis created this image in support of the Diamond Formation URL online festival: a 13-and-a-half-hour lineup of music, performance, and multimedia that starts this Saturday afternoon at Smart Bar, organized by Chicago artists Ariel Zetina, Dutchesz Gemini (recently relocated to Minneapolis), and Miss Twink USA. The concert will feature 15 DJs, including DJ Stingray from Detroit, Akua from Brooklyn, and They/Them DJ from Los Angeles, along with live performance by Cae Monae, Darling Shear, and others. The entire shindig is free to watch at Smart Bar’s Mixcloud page, but donations will be accepted to benefit Smart Bar and Metro’s GoFundMe for their employees, Brave Space Alliance, Molasses Chicago, the Little Village Solidarity Network, and Afrorack.
The Reader continues to welcome submissions of gig posters for future concerts, be they virtual or in-person. We’d also love to keep receiving your fantasy gig poster designs.
To participate, please e-mail [email protected] with your name, contact information, and your original design or drawing (you can attach a JPG or PNG file or provide a download link). We won’t be able to publish everything we receive, but we’ll feature as many as possible. Your e-mail should include details about the real or fantasy concert and about any nonprofit, fundraiser, or action campaign that you’d like to bring to the attention of our readers.
Not everybody can make a gig poster, of course, but it’s simple and free to take action through the website of the National Independent Venue Association–click here to tell your representatives to save our homegrown music ecosystems. And anybody with a few bucks to spare can support the out-of-work staffers at Chicago’s venues–here’s our list of fundraisers. Lastly, don’t forget record stores! The Reader has published a list of local stores that will let you shop remotely.
The Chicago Blackhawks are officially back tonight as they take on the St. Louis Blues.
The Chicago Blackhawks are officially back tonight! The season came to a pause right after a big 6-2 victory against the San Jose Sharks on March 11th. COVID-19 became the biggest health crisis in the modern era of the world and it made sports come to an untimely pause. Well, with a lot of hard work and determination, the NHL has put together a return to play format that will allow the Stanley Cup to be awarded for the 2019-20 season.
The Blackhawks are going to have a series against the Edmonton Oilers as part of a play-in series which is going to be so fun to watch. The Hawks weren’t a great team this year so they are a bit lucky that they received an invite. The Oilers have a lot of offense much like the Hawks do so this should be a lot of fun.
Tonight, they are going to have a chance to fine-tune their game against an opponent wearing different colors. The St. Louis Blues were the team selected to play the Hawks as the NHL went with local rivalries for each exhibition game played despite being in a bubble. They are the defending Stanley Cup champions with a roster that absolutely feels they can go back to back.
Head coach Jeremy Colliton claims that he is going to use a full NHL lineup in the game vs St. Louis. He believes that the guys need a game to “get used to things”. That is the smart decision because this team hasn’t played any real games since mid-March. It feels like it was just yesterday but it was actually many months ago now, as you know. This is a good opportunity for the Hawks to use their best players against a really good team.
Last night we saw some of the other teams that had their one exhibition game use two of their goalies. The Hawks are only ever going to use Corey Crawford unless there is an injury so it will be interesting what decisions they make as far as how many minutes he will have in this game. Seeing guys like Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews, and Duncan Keith fine-tune their game should be a blast to watch as well.
This game is also an opportunity for players who were hot to end the year to try and reclaim that momentum and the players who were struggling feel better about themselves. An example of a player that was hot is Dominik Kubalik. This guy had a great year and hopefully, it can continue. It would be nice to see guys like Alex DeBrincat and Dylan Strome bounce back a bit before the real games begin. After all the struggles that we are going through as a nation, it is nice to have some hockey back in our lives!
Scottie Pippen picked the younger first three-peat Bulls over the second three-peat Dennis Rodman version.
Which three-peat Chicago Bulls team was better — the 1991-1993 Chicago Bulls with Horace Grant and a younger Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen? Or, the older more experienced 1996-1998 crew with Dennis Rodman? Scottie Pippen hesitated for a second before giving his answer.
“I would say the first one,” Pippen said. “We were younger, we were more athletic, it was a lot more fun, we were just more youthful, we sort of kinda had that chip on our shoulder.”
I agree. The 1991 Chicago Bulls have the best record of any Bulls team in the playoffs finishing 15-2. The two losses were both by two points apiece to Philadelphia in the Eastern Conference semifinals and then to the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA Finals.
The 1996 season was quite impressive and gets more acclaim due to the 72-win regular season. That Bulls team only lost three times in the playoffs, twice to Seattle and once versus New York. Jordan was extremely motivated coming off a loss to Orlando in the playoffs.
“I take nothing away from winning the second 3-peat,” Pippen said. “I think we were all going into our prime, I feel like I was. I felt like we were much more smarter from a mature standpoint that we played the game better from our shoulders up, whereas I felt like our early championships we were much better from our shoulders down.”
I quibble with Pippen that he was entering his prime during the second three-peat. It was more like the back end of it in 1996 — gone by the end of 1998. Pippen had ankle surgery in 1998 and grimaced through game six versus Utah with a bad back. He had lost a good portion of that incredible athleticism that made him a force on both ends of the court.
The ChicagoBlackhawks already knew they should be scared of Connor McDavid.
The Chicago Blackhawks still have their exhibition game tonight to fine-tune their game against the St. Louis Blues. It is going to be a wonderful chance to play against another team. Well, their upcoming Stanley Cup qualifier opponent, the Edmonton Oilers, played in their one exhibition game on Tuesday night and it was very telling. The game had a few things for the Hawks to go to school on so they can take advantage but there was also something to be concerned about.
The Oilers looked like they sat back after having a lead there for a while. That is something that the Blackhawks have the speed and skill to take advantage of if Edmonton tries to pull that stuff against them. That is the one thing that this game against the Flames can do to help them in a positive manner.
The thing that happened that should scare them is something that was already pretty obvious. Although things in sports might seem obvious at times, it never really hits you until you see it with your own two eyes. Well, the play of Connor McDavid in this exhibition game should absolutely scare everyone.
It was one of those nights that an opponent did a rather good job of containing McDavid. He didn’t have an even-strength shot until the third period. With that said, he still managed to have two goals. The problem is that his first shot that came in the third period was a goal. He also had a power-play goal earlier in the game. The Flames played well against him and he still figured out a way to burn them more than once.
Nobody is able to contain McDavid in the neutral zone. He has the ability to skate the puck through it with elite speed and create something for himself or a teammate once he is in the offensive zone. He is the best player in the world and we all knew it but it is even more apparent when you watch him play.
The Flames have a way better defense than the Hawks do so this could be bad. If he was able to score two against a team that played decent against him how is he going to do against a team with a brutal even-strength defense? It is exciting that hockey is back and the Hawks are involved but they better come up with a plan for number 97.
Another 1,076 people have tested positive for COVID-19, health officials said Tuesday, marking a full week of four-digit daily caseloads.
There’s a lot more going on around the city and state when it comes to the coronavirus pandemic. Here’s what happened Tuesday.
News
8:55 p.m. Need some COVID-safe entertainment? Drive-in music festival coming to Soldier Field
The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many of Chicago’s event curators to get much more creative when providing entertainment to the masses.
The Drive-In Fest, which is scheduled for Aug. 22 at Soldier Field (doors open at 6 p.m.), is the brainchild by five local Black promoters: Mike “Orie” Mosley (AFROTRAK); Ronald Platt, Bobby Burke, Charles Martin and Sigma Chris.
Concertgoers should expect feature performances from “a few of your favorite artists from the ’90s and early ’80s hip-hop/R&B era,” according to festival officials.
The festival lineup includes chart-topping singer-songwriter Lloyd, Pleasure P of R&B/hip-hop group Pretty Ricky, Atlanta-based singer Bobby V., and West Side hip-hop artists Do or Die.
8:08 p.m. Suburban districts flip-flop, nix in-person learning for fall after initially planning to reopen schools
School districts in some of Chicago’s largest suburbs had planned to kick off the fall with students back in classrooms at least part-time.
But with the start of school less than a month away and pressure mounting from anxious parents and teachers during a raging pandemic, some of those very districts have backtracked and will start the year fully remote.
Others plan to stick with a hybrid model to get students in school at least occasionally, and most districts, whether they’re planning to bring kids back on a limited basis or not at all, are pledging to improve the online learning experience from the end of last school year.
Online learning will include more live teaching sessions in Elgin Area School District U-46 schools, the second-largest district in the state after Chicago Public Schools. That includes teachers and students using a single digital platform and having teachers evaluate all student work to determine performance. The district’s decision to go fully remote came after it had initially been leaning toward a hybrid model.
Diana Martinez, 43, of Streamwood, will have children in kindergarten and high school at District U-46 schools this fall. Martinez, a single mother who lost two jobs due to the pandemic, said she had waited to find a new job until she knew her kids’ schedules. She even started training her younger son to get used to wearing a mask, in case his kindergarten class had an in-person component.
6:38 p.m. City will issue tickets for quarantine violations, ‘flagrant’ social activities spotted on social media
Ticketing is coming for Chicagoans who travel to any of the 20-plus states subject to Chicago’s 14-day travel quarantine, Dr. Allison Arwady, the city’s health commissioner, said Tuesday. Previously the city has relied on voluntary compliance to the order.
Arwady told reporters on a conference call that tickets can be issued during course of an investigation into COVID spread. She also mentioned the possibility of fining city employees who may not have abided by quarantine.
Tickets also may result from “social media examples” where people are “flagrantly posting social activities,” Arwady said.
The additions to the order — Wisconsin, Missouri, Nebraska and North Dakota were all announced Tuesday — bring the tally to 22 states now covered. Under the order, people traveling or returning to Chicago from one of those states are required to isolate for 14 days upon arrival.
When the order, in effect indefinitely, was announced, the city had offered no details on exactly how it would be enforced. But under the order violators are subject to city fines of $100 to $500 per day, up to $7,000.
There are exemptions, such as travel for medical care, or for essential workers who are required to travel to Chicago from a covered state, or travel from Chicago to work in one of the covered states.
The rest of the list: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Louisiana, Kansas, Mississippi, North Carolina, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Utah.
3:15 p.m. They call themselves the ‘Rona Quartet after the disease that has kept so many musicians apart
The music floats down a narrow, weedy gangway to a backyard on the North Side, where four French horn players sit, socially distanced, their instruments gleaming in the late-morning sunlight.
A cardinal somewhere up in the high branches of a huge silver maple adds its own accompaniment to the piece they’re playing, “Fripperies for Four Horns,” by Lowell Shaw. A middle-aged couple step out onto their deck overlooking the garden to listen.
“There are a lot of bees out here. What’s going on?” said Mary Jo Neher, swatting at the little insects buzzing around her ankles during a pause in the music.
It’s a small inconvenience for Neher, 42, and her fellow Chicago-area horn players, who are thrilled to be playing with other human beings after months of isolation at home.
“One of the things I’ve missed was the feeling of throwing my case on my back and going into the garage to go to work,” said Neher, a freelance musician. “There is so much in that moment: I have a purpose. I’m not just Mom, keeping everyone alive and teaching at home. I just yearn for that basic feeling.”
The Miami Marlins’ season was suspended by Major League Baseball amid an outbreak of COVID-19 cases that resulted in 15 players and two staff members testing positive from Friday to Tuesday, according to a baseball official with direct knowledge of the decision.
The official spoke to USA TODAY Sports on the condition of anonymity because it has not been officially announced.
The action is a remarkable but pragmatic pause, sidelining one of the 30 MLB teams attempting to play a 60-game schedule through a pandemic, with one potential outcome being that the Marlins — and their upcoming opponents — may not play the season in full.
The Marlins’ outbreak had already resulted in a handful of postponements Monday and Tuesday: Two Marlins games against the Baltimore Orioles in Miami, and a pair of Phillies-New York Yankees games in Philadelphia, site of the Marlins’ three-game weekend series.
Now, the Marlins will have up to seven games to make up: Four against the Orioles and three against the Washington Nationals, their weekend opponents in Miami.
1:55 p.m. State notches another four-digit COVID-19 caseload day, pushing total added over last seven days past 10,000
Another 1,076 people have tested positive for COVID-19, health officials said Tuesday, marking a full week of four-digit daily caseloads.
The Illinois Department of Public Health also announced an additional 30 deaths have been attributed to the virus, the most reported by the state in a single day in nearly three weeks.
The latest cases were confirmed among 28,331 tests received by the state, keeping the statewide testing positivity rate at 3.8% over the last week. But that number has climbed upward from 2.5% three weeks ago.
It’s all part of the gradual rise in cases over the last month that Gov. J.B. Pritzker has warned could lead to state interventions in areas where outbreaks have ticked upward.
11:45 a.m. Andrea Bocelli recovered from COVID but says lockdown made him feel ‘humiliated’
ROME — Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli, who had COVID-19, said the pandemic lockdown made him feel “humiliated and offended” by depriving him of his freedom to come and go as he wanted.
Bocelli spoke at a panel Monday in an Italian Senate conference room, where he was introduced by right-wing opposition leader Matteo Salvini, who has railed against the government’s stringent measures to combat the coronavirus outbreak.
The singer’s announcement in May that he had recovered from the virus came weeks after his Easter Sunday performance in Milan’s empty cathedral. At the time, Bocelli said that when he learned on March 10 that he had tested positive, just as the nation was going into lockdown, “I jumped into the pool, I felt well” and had only a slight fever. He apparently was referring to a private pool at his residence, as public gym pools were closed by then.
Bocelli told the conference at the Senate that he resented not being able to leave his home even though he “committed no crime” and revealed, without providing details, that he violated that lockdown restriction.
10:38 a.m. CPS parents — and teachers — bombard district officials with questions about classroom safety
The first of five community meetings hosted by Chicago Public Schools officials about a potential fall reopening featured hundreds of questions from parents and teachers, many of which were steeped in skepticism over whether in-classroom learning could be done safely in the middle of a pandemic.
Will there be more hand-washing stations at schools? What will happen when a student tests positive for COVID-19? Are teachers expected to move between “pods” of students? What type of instruction will students receive when they opt out of in-person learning?
Top CPS leadership, including CEO Janice Jackson, gave live answers to many questions — though they only got to a fraction in the 45 minutes set aside for a Q&A session, and there were many they couldn’t answer.
Responding to a question about potential cases at schools, CPS’ chief health officer Kenneth Fox said families will be expected to self-report to the district’s Office of Student Health and Wellness, providing their symptoms, noting when they first felt sick and other personal information.
The district would then gather information from that student’s school, such as which 15-student pod they were in, who else they had contact with and what part of the school they had been in. An entire pod would be sent home if one of its students tests positive, and anyone directly in contact with the positive case would be told to quarantine for 14 days.
8:04 a.m. Lightfoot showcases $33 million in relief for renters and property owners
Three months after unveiling a non-binding “Housing Solidarity Pledge” that appeased no one, Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Monday showcased $33 million in relief for renters and property owners bankrolled by federal stimulus funds and local philanthropies.
Shortly after the stay-at-home shutdown triggered by the coronavirus, Lightfoot offered 2,000 Chicagoans struggling to stay in their homes grants of $1,000 apiece. The $2 million was nowhere near enough to meet the demand from 83,000 applicants.
Now, those who struck out in Round One will be “automatically transferred” to a $25 million Round 2, “more than ten times” the initial investment made by the Chicago Department of Housing There is no need to re-apply.
Together with $8 million from the Department of Family and Support Services, Chicago is dedicating $33 million to “eviction and foreclosure prevention,” officials said.
“Thanks to this investment, more Chicagoans will be able to stave off foreclosure, eviction and homelessness and the pain and insecurity that comes with it,” Lightfoot told a City Hall news conference.
6:13 p.m. I’m a teacher and parent. Our schools aren’t ready to reopen and keep children and families safe.
With the start of a typical school year right around the corner, discussions are taking place about what the eventual return will look like. As an educator and a mom, I am torn between options: Full remote learning to ensure that children and students stay healthy; or a hybrid, with some in-person instruction.
But two major questions loom in the minds of every educator and parent: Can our nation keep children and families healthy, even with limited classroom teaching? If remote learning continues, will students lose too much educationally?
As a former teacher in three Chicago public high schools on the South Side, I think the answer to the first question is a clear “No.” Our nation can’t keep our kids and their families healthy without strong federal leadership, which is needed to have any chance of slowing the spread of coronavirus.
A case in point: One of my grossest days in CPS was the time a student threw up in the library entryway. It was flu season and only two janitors were working that day, so it took around six hours for one of them to clean up the vomit. The student went to the nurse’s office, but she wasn’t at our school that day, so he returned, still sick, for his library lesson. Meanwhile, students and teachers continued to fill the room.
4:45 p.m. Four must-haves in Congress’ next pandemic rescue package
No sooner did professional baseball return last week, after months of planning to make the games safe during the pandemic, than the entire season was thrown into doubt when COVID-19 swept through the Miami Marlins.
There is a lesson in that not only for professional sports, which we’re really feeling the loss of right now, but also for lawmakers in Washington who are crafting a massive new pandemic relief bill:
All our man-made plans are doomed if designed for a wished-for world.
At the core of almost every disagreement between Democrats and Republicans about how big the federal relief bill should be — and what it should include — is a fundamentally different view about how long it will be before life in the United States can return to normal.
Democrats, listening to the scientists, think it could be many more months or even years. They are proposing a $3 trillion relief bill. Republicans are leaning hard into that wished-for world. They are pushing a $1 trillion bill.
With that in mind, here are four provisions of any relief bill we’d like to stress:
2:45 p.m. If we’re in hell, we might as well read Dante
John Took’s new book Dante is very heavy lifting. From the first sentence — “Exemplary in respect of just about everything coming next on the banks of the Arno over the next few decades was the case of Buondelmonte de’Buondelmonti on the threshold of the thirteenth century.” — it is a waist-deep slog through the muddiest of academic creeks.
Pressing forward, I grew to hate him. Just for taking something so valuable and rendering it into turgid academic blather. Grew to hate Princeton University Press for foisting this upon a trusting public. Hate the scholars who blurbed it. “A beautiful book that reflects decades of thinking and teaching,” begins literary critic Piero Boitani.
Maybe he meant the cover. It is indeed a beautiful cover.
And I grew to hate myself for buying the book, impulsively, because, heck, it has such a nice cover and it is about Dante. For insisting on grimly, joylessly grinding through it, page after page, trying to glean some shred of knowledge from this field of chaff. I blame my own cheapness. I bought the thing, paid, geez, $35 for it. I have to read it. It grew to feel like penance, a hair shirt. Enduring a homebound summer in a brainless era during the realm of an imbecile? Here’s some grist for the mill, perfesser. Chew on this!
8:43 a.m. Marlins outbreak sobering, scary for NFL teams on eve of camp
On the eve of training camp, the NFL was visited Monday by its worst nightmare. Dressed in Marlins blue and black, the Ghost of Coronavirus Yet to Come showed the worst-case scenario: a season on the brink of cancellation before it really gets started.
At least 13 Marlins players and coaches have tested positive for the coronavirus, according to national reports. It’s a full-blown outbreak, after only three games.
Major League Baseball postponed the Marlins’ game Monday against the Orioles. The Phillies-Yankees game also was called off because the Phillies had hosted the Marlins for three games. Baseball will be play-the-Lotto lucky if that’s the only damage done. A growing crisis would lead to the cancellation of the season.
Even in the best of circumstances, the virus presents a new reality that baseball must cope with every day. White Sox manager Rick Renteria woke up with a cough and nasal congestion Monday, went to a Cleveland hospital for tests and, out of caution, stayed away from the ballpark. He reportedly tested negative for COVID-19 and is expected to be back with the team Tuesday.
The undefeated Jeep Wrangler has reigned for many years now (over a decade), once the Bronco left the scene some 25 years ago. Best known, unfortunately, for the vehicle in which O.J. Simpson outran the police in 1994, this iconic off-road truck is one its way back.
It appears that we have the “Bronco Underground” to thank for continuing to stick to their vow to bring the Bronco back. Working weekends on their own time, the crew never let up. In their free time, without any approval from the bosses at Ford, the group sketched and modeled a new and better Bronco than the 1960s original. They wrote business plans and begged for space in factories, all in an effort to convince management the Bronco could succeed once again.
This was no small undertaking in the wake of recessions, fluctuating fuel prices and changes in consumer taste. No question more and more Jeep Wrangler’s were flying out of the dealership, as other retro SUV’s took over. It remained difficult to convince the higher ups at Ford that taking a chance on somewhat of a niche vehicle could be a win.
As all big business operates, Ford needed to have a ‘broader’ strategy.’ This strategy could include putting the spotlight on other offerings, for instance, the F-150 truck.
Keeping at it on their own time, the Bronco Underground kept insistent. Introduced on July 13, the ‘new’ Bronco has a removable roof and doors, bucking horse emblem on its tailgate, a dashboard with mounts for cameras/phones, and rubberized floors with drain holes so the sure-to-be muddy interior can be cleaned.
Ford stopped production of the Bronco in 1996 and in 1999, the Underground group came up with a secret program to begin again. They planned to design a new, less boxy design. The program, led by Moray Callum in the Dearborn, Michigan studios, was code-named U260 (U for Utility and 2 for two-door, and 60 from a separate code name T6 for Ford’s small Ranger pickup).
The mechanical underpinnings were provided from the Ranger, to keep the costs down. The team developed both two-and-four-door versions, aiming the Bronco at younger buyers, keeping low pricing and minimalist design in mind. Painting the two-door version red, the team asked Jac Nassar to give it a look. He liked it immediately. The next step was introducing the idea to potential buyers.
Their marketing efforts were delayed due to the faulty Firestone tires episode. A massive recall and congressional investigation followed, leading to lawsuits and losses. Nassar was fired, budgets came under pressure and Ford killed the program.
All involved in the project were deeply disappointed. At that time then chief designer J. Mays stepped in and took another shot at the project. He asked his styling studio to design the Bronco of their dreams. Then in 2004, Ford introduced the silver Bronco concept at the Detroit Auto Show. It was a hit. Ford’s response to the popular Hummer, the proposed Bronco, however, had no platform to be built on. As a concept car, it had no real future. What its introduction confirmed, however, was that there was a market for a new Bronco.
What some execs at Ford knew, as did the Underground, though was that there was plenty of people out there who wanted a ‘true sport-utility vehicle.’ In 2006, designer Melvin Betancourt reworked the concept Bronco to fit the underpinnings of the Ranger sold overseas. He was successful in getting a Ford factory in South Africa making the Ranger to build a new Bronco on their assembly line. That new Bronco would be shipped to the U.S. Ford wasn’t buying it. Then came the 2009 recession, as big auto manufacturers came close to bankruptcy. All discussion about any new Bronco was forbidden.
The next bit of bad luck came when Ford realized it had to use the name Bronco or it would lose it. They came up with the idea to put the emblem on the Expedition to keep the trademark alive.
In 2015, Ford decided to bring back the Ranger pickup to America, GM small truck sales ramped up and new small trucks were being designed and sold. The next hurtle involved the need for another vehicle to be built beside the Ranger so that using the plant could be justified. Bingo, back came the idea of the Bronco.
After intensive consumer research, Ford wanted to make sure the name Bronco didn’t have a bad rap after the O.J. fiasco. Luckily, the subjects most associated with the word “Bronco” were wild and free. The name “Bronco” would stay.
Ford planned a big debut, but with the COVID pandemic decided instead to make it a televised debut on July 13.
The director of advanced product marketing, Mark Grueber kept pushing for the Bronco, when ‘so many people doubted’ them. Now the ‘new’ Bronco is a reality and will be in dealerships in Spring 2021. Two and four door models and the Bronco Sport will be available.
As all icons, the Bronco is a vehicle all its own. The acronym GOAT (Go over any terrain), has stuck all these years, and 200 songs have been written about the Bronco. Who says the days of loving an automobile are over?
Building esteem for women (and men) through passion for the sports car. Brought to you by a certifiable car nut by night and weekends, who happens to be a veteran psychotherapist by day.
Olivia de Havilland, the last surviving star of Hollywood’s Golden Age of the 1930s and ‘40s, passed away over the weekend at the age of 104. Most of the headlines went something like this one in the New York Times:
“Olivia de Havilland, a Star of Gone With the Wind, Dies at 104”
If your knowledge of de Havilland’s work begins and ends with that four-hour Civil War epic, it’s your loss. As I found out for myself when I saw her in 1949’s “The Heiress,” her second Oscar-winning role, opposite Montgomery Clift.
De Havilland made dozens of films in her distinguished career and rocked the Hollywood studio system in the process. With her passing, Old Hollywood finally passes into the history books.
It’s ironic that in what are probably her best-known films, GWTW and The Heiress, she plays a plain, dowdy character. The woman was drop-dead gorgeous, and a fashion icon no less. Check out some of her glam publicity shots above and below. Check out the shot of her with legs draped over the chair: Who else could make smoking a cig and drinking a beer look this classy?
I had always thought that she was way, way too pretty to play the character of Melanie Wilkes in GWTW. Even styled as she obviously was to be “dressed down.” The novel describes her character as hopelessly plain, mousy and unfashionable. But she was juxtaposed against Vivien Leigh’s mesmerizing Scarlett O’Hara, and no one can compete with that.
Still, de Havilland more than held her own and immortalized her reserved, “steel magnolia” character in the process. You could even argue that she was the real heroine of GWTW. And to think she was just 23 when she performed the role. She earned her first Oscar nomination, for Best Supporting Actress, but lost to the groundbreaking Hattie McDaniel from the same film.
Awhile back I caught “The Heiress” on Turner Classic, a film she made about a decade after GWTW, in which she also plays a Civil War-era Plain Jane. In this film, she is much more “uglied up” by the stylists. Still, her radiance shines through as she grapples with a tour-de-force of hope, love, romance, and eventually heartache and bitterness. Watching her carry out her revenge on Clift’s scheming character was one of the most gratifying film climaxes I’ve seen.
I realized that instead of watching Gone With the Wind for about the 25th time, I probably should have been watching de Havilland’s catalogue of roles instead. Like undoubtedly many others born decades after Margaret Mitchell’s classic came to the silver screen, I had always defined her as Melanie and tucked her away in that little box.
If you ever get the chance to see The Heiress on TCM or somewhere else, you won’t regret it. I really hope one of those classic-movie channels does a retrospective tribute to de Havilland in the coming weeks. I want to see her in the role of the spellbinding beauty that she was.
I’m an Illinois-licensed attorney hoping to break down timely legal stories for a general audience in terms they can understand. My goal is to report some of those overlooked legal cases and issues that fly under the radar of most of the general news media, but that still might be of interest and consequence to average people. Thanks for reading!
Planted in fear. Your roots now buried deep with years of toxic absorption. There has been growth because that is what happens with time. On the surface you have sprouted. You have expanded your branches and have formed leaves. But below the surface your roots multiple in search for something new.
The uptake of dysfunction and pain over the years has created deficiencies. The trunk of your existence is weathered. Your leaves left unpruned now bear weight on your branches. The tree needs to be stripped bare to see and appreciate the sacrifices it took to survive. To uncover the beauty in its imperfections.
The fear kept you small. It stole your energy. That same energy that was meant for your branches to stretch to new heights. Upward in strength as you reach for the sun, shining in your light. The flow that keeps you nourished on cloudy days. The flow that keeps you hydrated during a drought.
But what if you were to dig out you roots and replant them? What would that look like to you? And in this process you learn healthy ways for your roots to reach new depths allowing your soul to feel anchored. The replanted roots now covered and protected by radical love and acceptance. Roots that thrive with nutrients of self-love and healing. Abundant rays of gratitude shine upon you. And consistent watering from people that fully support you.
Fear kept you surviving. And sometimes turning turbulent weather survival is what it takes. And that is okay. But you are meant for more than survival. You are vital. You are life. You are an essential part of this ecosystem of humanity. Do not minimize the importance, power, and gifts that are ingrained in the inner barks of your soul.
As you grow new leaves, you are able to let go of the ones that no longer serve you. You do not need to hide. You do not need to pretend. Let the parts of your soul you kept from this world be exposed.
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