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Red Sox notebook: Daniel Bard reflects on long, unlikely journey back to Fenway Park

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

When Daniel Bard last stepped off the mound at Fenway Park, it looked like his big league career was all but over.Ten years later, he returns to Boston as one of baseball’s most unlikely success stories.Now 37 and in his fourth season with the Colorado Rockies, the former Red Sox reliever is playing at Fenway Park for the first time since 2013, when he began what wound up being a seven-year journey through the baseball wilderness.“It’s wild, man. It’s definitely a little bit surreal, in a good way,” Bard said. “I always wanted to come take my kids to a game here when they got a little older, I didn’t think I’d be playing in it, I thought I’d just be taking them as a fan.”Bard’s last appearance in Boston came on April 27, 2013, when he walked two and allowed a run without recording an out during the eighth inning of an eventual 8-4 win over the Houston Astros. Coming off a disastrous 2012 and starting the year in Doubl...

Pat Sajak announces ‘Wheel of Fortune’ retirement, says upcoming season will be his last as host

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Pat Sajak is taking one last spin on “Wheel of Fortune,” announcing Monday that its upcoming season will be his last as host.Sajak announced his retirement from the venerable game show in a tweet. “Well, the time has come. I’ve decided that our 41st season, which begins in September, will be my last. It’s been a wonderful ride, and I’ll have more to say in the coming months. Many thanks to you all,” the tweet said.Sajak, 76, has presided over the game show, which features contestants guessing letters to try to fill out words and phrases to win money and prizes, since 1981. He took over duties from Chuck Woolery, who was the show’s first host when it debuted in 1975.Along with Vanna White, who joined the show in 1982, Sajak has been a television mainstay. The show soon shifted to a syndication and aired in the evening in many markets, becoming one of the most successful game shows in history. Sajak will continue...

Bartender fighting for life after hit-and-run while walking to work

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A 47-year-old man is fighting for his life in the hospital after he was hit while walking to work in University Heights Saturday.Friends and family have identified the pedestrian as Josh Gilliland, a longtime University Heights resident and beloved bartender at Cheers on Adams Avenue.According to police, the pedestrian was standing near the bus lane, east of the crosswalk on El Cajon Boulevard when he was hit. Police said he was "unconscious at the scene and suffered from a laceration to the back of the head, right shoulder fracture, scattered brain bleeds, and minor abrasions." The vehicle was described as a dark-colored Honda Civic or BMW 3 series that was traveling north on Park Boulevard, turning right onto El Cajon Boulevard when the driver hit the pedestrian. Police says "fault is yet to be determined." Billionaire Stan Kroenke joins sports arena development group as majority investor According to Gilliland's longtime companion, Scott Moore, Gilliland had walked...

Former city leaders urge council to vote against homeless encampment ban

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- Former San Diego mayor Kevin Faulconer along with former police chief Shelley Zimmerman and Alpha Project founder Bob McElroy gathered Monday to urge the San Diego City Council not to pass a proposal that would ban camping on public property.“We need to combine a camping ban with a clear mandate for the city to construct sufficient shelter bed capacity,” Faulconer said outside of the Alpha Project bridge shelter on Newton Avenue in East Village. "That's what we're talking about -- capacity at scale, scale what we see right behind us here at Alpha Project.”According to the latest report released last week by the San Diego Regional Task Force On Homelessness, there been a 32% increase in the number of homeless in the city of San Diego, a staggering 3,300 people, and an all-time high 2,100 of those living on sidewalks and in vehicles just in downtown neighborhoods.    Welcome to Slowjamastan: Southern California’s own ‘micronation’ “This is a humanitarian crisis that sh...

Where to watch July 4th fireworks in San Diego

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

SAN DIEGO – It’s almost that time of year to celebrate the birth of American independence.The Fourth of July brings Americans outdoors to view parades, attend barbeques and of course, watch fireworks light up the night sky.FOX 5 compiled a list of firework shows planned across San Diego County this Independence Day:SAN DIEGOBig Bay BoomMultiple locations along San Diego Bay9 p.m.SeaWorld San Diego 4th of July Fireworks500 SeaWorld Drive10:50 p.m.CORONADO4th of July Celebration in CoronadoFireworks display over Glorietta Bay9 p.m.NORTH COUNTYRed, White and Boom!LEGOLAND California – One Legoland Drive in Carlsbad8:30 p.m.San Diego County Fair Fireworks SpectacularDel Mar Fairgrounds at Corona Grandstand Stage9 p.m.Oceanside Fireworks ShowSoCal Sports Complex - El Corazon Park, 3302 Senior Center Dr.9 p.m.Escondido Fourth of July FireworksGrape Day Park - 321 N. Broadway9 p.m.An Old Fashioned Fourth of July & FireworksOld Poway Park - 14134 Midland Road in Poway6 p.m. - 10 p.m.The...

Jill Biden says ‘it’s a little shocking’ many Republicans support Trump after indictment

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Jill Biden warned Democratic donors Monday that the 2024 election presents a choice between what she described as the “strong, steady leadership” of President Joe Biden or “chaos and corruption, hatred and division” of “MAGA Republicans.” The first lady, making her first solo outing of the 2024 campaign, commented on the federal indictment of former President Donald Trump, a subject her husband has tried to avoid speaking about. She expressed surprise that Trump, who is set to appear in a Florida court on Tuesday, had not lost support within his party after the indictment. Jill Biden, speaking in New York City, said she had seen a headline before her flight landed that described a majority of Republicans in a poll saying they were still planning to vote for Trump. “They don’t care about the indictment. So that’s a little shocking, I think,” she said.The first lady, making a campaign swing on the East and West coasts after a grueling six-day trip abroad, was at times ...

Chicago-St. Louis Amtrak travel getting upgraded from current 90 mph to 110 mph

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

CHICAGO (AP) — Amtrak travel between Chicago and St. Louis is about to get 15 minutes quicker thanks to a high-speed rail project allowing trains to reach speeds of 110 mph (177 kph), Gov. JB Pritzker said Monday.The higher speeds take effect June 26 and will reduce the duration of the trip from the current five hours and 13 minutes. Trips from St. Louis to Chicago are a few minutes shorter, according to Amtrak timetables.Existing maximum speeds on the route are 90 mph (144.8 kph). In addition to increasing speeds, the $1.96 billion project also provided safety improvements at 212 grade crossings, Pritzker said.“The railway has always been a vital component of our state’s infrastructure, but today we are taking a major step in modernizing rail services,” U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin said. Funding for the project includes $1.66 billion in federal funding, primarily through an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grant awarded that year, and $300 million in state and non-federal funds. The...

McCarthy and conservatives reach a truce to allow House to move forward on bills

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker Kevin McCarthy appeared Monday to have resolved, for now, an impasse with some of the more conservative members of his caucus who had brought the chamber to a standstill last week.McCarthy met with nearly a dozen lawmakers in his office in an effort to quell a revolt and jumpstart various priorities that had stalled last week amid the GOP infighting. He called it a productive meeting where “everybody’s attitude was, ‘How do we find where we all work together?’” McCarthy promised more meetings with last week’s holdouts and a focus on reducing federal spending in the weeks ahead.“We’ve got a lot more victories for the American people we want to fight for, and we’re only able to achieve it if we stick together,” he told reporters.Last week, barely a dozen Republicans, mainly members of the House Freedom Caucus, shuttered House business in protest of McCarthy’s leadership. Votes on a pair of pro-gas stove bills important to GOP activists...

Hundreds of tribal members, mostly Navajo, living on Phoenix streets amid fake sober home crackdown

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

PHOENIX (AP) — Navajo law enforcement teams made contact with several hundred Native Americans from various tribes who are living on the streets in the metro Phoenix area, after the state cracked down on Medicaid fraud and suspended unlicensed sober living homes, Navajo Nation Attorney General Ethel Branch said Monday. Teams that included Navajo police officers reported making contact with more than 270 Native Americans, the majority of them Navajo, Branch said.Many tribal members accepted offers to stay in motel rooms or other temporary housing for a few days before moving to legitimate facilities, while others agreed to return home to their reservations, Branch said. The teams worked with local police agencies and Community Bridges, Inc., a nonprofit that provides services for people with addictions.“Unfortunately, many of our relatives when they came out of these facilities didn’t have cell phones,” Branch said, adding that Navajo police officers allowed the people they fou...

Movie review: Ezra Miller speeds back to the future in ‘The Flash,’ fueled by calories and cameos

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:31:59 GMT

“It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature,” went a famous ’70s commercial catchphrase. But we learn in “The Flash” — the much awaited, long gestated new DC Studios offering — that it’s Father Time one musn’t cross. Because trying to change the past can really mess you up when you get back to the future and realize you’ve inadvertently changed that, too.But of course, we already knew that. We learned it from Marty McFly, immortalized by Eric Stoltz in “Back to the Future.”Relax! Of course it was Michael J. Fox, though Stoltz was initially cast in the role. But in “The Flash,” Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) realizes just how badly he’s messed up the space-time continuum when he arrives back from changing the past — just one teensy little thing, really — and learns that in his current world, Fox never replaced Stoltz. “I’ve destroyed the universe,” he frets in a laugh-out-loud moment.If only the whole film, directed by Andy Muschietti and written by Christina Hodson, felt this breezily cle...