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Pac-12’s downfall came after it could not adjust to changing media landscape

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

Larry Scott boasted five years ago that the Pac-12 Conference would be able “to adapt, react and take advantage of this new world media order that’s coming in a way others can’t.”As it turns out, Scott’s statement instead ended up reflecting what rival conferences and commissioners did.Scott didn’t have a chance to negotiate a second Pac-12 media deal. He stepped down as commissioner in 2021 and his successor, George Kliavkoff, didn’t land the deal the conference needed.Last week’s Pac-12 collapse, which saw five of the remaining nine members announce they were leaving the “Conference of Champions” for either the Big Ten or the Big 12, drove home in a dramatic way two points: football drives college athletics and there are limits to what the media market will pay for content.“I think this was a factor of timing and potential media partners not being willing to provide the right fees that the conference and the institutions wanted,” said Tag Garson, senior vic...

Biggio’s homer sends Blue Jays to 3-1 win over Guardians after Ryu exits with knee injury

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

CLEVELAND (AP) — Cavan Biggio hit a two-run homer to break a scoreless tie in the eighth inning after Toronto lost starting pitcher Hyun Jin Ryu to a knee injury, lifting the Blue Jays to a 3-1 victory over the Cleveland Guardians on Monday night.Biggio’s 415-foot drive to center field came off reliever Enyel De Los Santos (4-2) and scored Daulton Varsho. Toronto had been held to one hit over the first seven innings by Guardians rookie Gavin Williams, who struck out a season-high 12.Ryu was struck on the right kneecap by Oscar Gonzalez’s line drive that turned into the final out of the fourth, forcing him to exit with a bruised knee in his second start since undergoing Tommy John surgery in June 2022.The 36-year-old left-hander tossed four hitless innings but was removed to start the fifth.Cleveland pulled to 2-1 in the bottom of the eighth when Bo Naylor singled in Brayan Rocchio, but Toronto answered in the ninth with George Springer’s RBI single that scored Brandon Be...

The Tory heartlands where Liz Truss’ name is mud and ‘Boris’ is a dirty word

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

ST ALBANS, England — For decades they were U.K. Conservative heartlands; the prim, middle-class shires of southern England which voted Tory come what may.But such has been the ruling Conservatives’ slump in popularity following a prolonged period of chaos at Westminster that strategists believe this so-called Blue Wall of Tory seats may at last be about to fall.“We’re in a situation where approval of the government’s performance, and views of the Conservative party as a whole, are so negative that many of these seats — a good number of which saw 10,000-plus majorities in 2019 — are easily in play,” said Philip van Scheltinga, a pollster for Redfield and Wilton Strategies.During a week spent touring these true-blue Conservative seats, POLITICO spoke to MPs on the ground about the local and national pressures that will feed into the next general election, expected in 2024.The disastrous final stages of Boris Johnson’s premiership — followed by the brief Liz Tru...

Ukraine declares war on Russia’s Black Sea shipping

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

Russian ports and ships on the Black Sea — including tankers carrying millions of barrels of oil to Europe — could justifiably be attacked by the Ukrainian military as part of efforts to weaken Moscow’s war machine, a senior Kyiv official warned Monday in the wake of two recent attacks on Russian vessels.“Everything the Russians are moving back and forth on the Black Sea are our valid military targets,” Oleg Ustenko, an economic adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, told POLITICO, saying the move was retaliation for Russia withdrawing from the U.N.-brokered Black Sea grain deal and unleashing a series of missile attacks on agricultural stores and ports. “This story started with Russia blocking the grain corridor, threatening to attack our vessels, destroying our ports,” Ustenko said. “Our maritime infrastructure is under constant attack.”Over the weekend, Ukraine declared the waters around Russia’s Black Sea ports a “war risk area” from August 2...

Drug-resistant killer bugs linked to air pollution, top scientists say

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

As if air pollution wasn’t deadly enough.Now new research suggests tiny airborne pollutants may be linked to higher rates of drug-resistant lethal bacteria.In the study, researchers from Zhejiang University, China and the University of Cambridge, England, concluded that air pollution is one of the leading factors driving antimicrobial resistance (AMR) after compiling data from 116 countries between 2000 and 2018, with more than 11.5 million lab test results covering nine bacterial pathogens and 43 types of antibiotics. The world is battling to combat the growing threat from antimicrobial resistance — a phenomenon caused by bugs such as bacteria, fungi and parasites evolving to survive against drug treatments. Without effective antibiotics, routine operations and previously minor infections, for example, could once again turn deadly. “Our analysis presents strong evidence that increasing levels of air pollution are associated with increased risk of antibiotic resistance,” said the au...

Stick with net zero, Tory voters tell Sunak

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

LONDON — Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has been under pressure ever since he watered down government rhetoric on net zero targets — from campaigners, industry leaders, and his own warring MPs. Now he faces a challenge on another front: his own voters. Even as the Tories prevaricate on key climate policies, new polling shows that voters planning to support the Conservative Party at the next election overwhelmingly back the government’s target of reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050.Around two thirds of all voters support the 2050 deadline, with support among Conservative voters slightly higher at 73 percent, according to a poll from the research company Focaldata, alongside the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) think tank. The data comes as the government continues to shift its tone on green policies, more than a fortnight after the Conservatives narrowly clung onto their Uxbridge seat in a by-election by campaigning against the expansion of an anti-air pollution sc...

Brazil’s Lula pushes end to deforestation, stumbles on fossil fuels

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

Under pressure from the EU to rein in deforestation or face trade restrictions, Amazon countries must figure out how to bring prosperity to the region without destroying the forest. And that’s proving difficult.At a two-day summit starting Tuesday, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is looking to corral countries to speed up efforts to stop deforestation and decide on a common strategy to save the rainforest. But it’s likely to be an uphill climb, with countries disagreeing on whether they should commit to a zero deforestation goal and on whether oil and gas drilling should be banned in the region. The summit comes as the EU is rolling out new rules to ban commodities’ imports driving deforestation abroad and is asking countries to police their supply chains against environmental and human rights violations. That’s increasing pressure on the Amazon region — and particularly on Brazil, one of the largest exporters of agri-food products to the EU and home to 60...

Pablo Reyes’ walk-off grand slam propels Red Sox to victory

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

Looking to snap a 4-game losing streak, Red Sox clubhouse manager Tommy McLaughlin decided an extreme makeover was in order.So, it was the Yellow Sox who greeted and defeated the Kansas City Royals 6-2 at Fenway Park on Monday evening.“In case of emergency, wear yellow,” Alex Cora joked pregame.Since debuting their City Connect uniforms in April 2021, the Yellow Sox are 21-4 in their banana-and-blue outfits, which pay homage to the Boston Marathon and Patriots Day. The squad entered Monday with a 9-game winning streak in the unorthodox ensemble, dating back to July 28 of last year.Make that 22-4, thanks to Pablo Reyes.It was a solid night for Brayan Bello, too, though he had to get himself in and out of several jams.“Kind of grinding through it early,” his manager said.For the first time since the All-Star break, he recorded an out in the seventh inning. He walked off the mound with two outs in the seventh, having allowed six hits, two walks, and striking out...

Scooter rider seriously hurt in trolley crash

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A 29-year-old man riding a scooter collided into a trolley train in the Logan Heights neighborhood Monday, law enforcement said.The crash occurred around 3:06 p.m. at 3100 Commercial Street, Officer Robert Heims with the San Diego Police Department said in a news release. Authorities say the man was riding a 2016 Vespa scooter eastbound on Commercial Street when for unknown reasons he lost control of the Vespa and hit the back of a trolley traveling westbound on Commercial Street. Suspect killed after allegedly shooting police dog identified The man was taken to the hospital with life-threatening injuries, police confirmed. Alcohol was not a factor in the collision.Anyone with information related to the above incident is encouraged to call the listedCommand handling the investigation or Crime Stoppers at 888-580-8477.

Volunteers head off plastic waste crisis by removing tons of rubbish from Hungarian river

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:00:36 GMT

TISZAROFF, Hungary (AP) — Thousands of muddy plastic bottles, chunks of Styrofoam and other waterlogged pieces of rubbish are piled onto a flatbed trailer on the banks of the Tisza River in Hungary — a metric ton of waste that was removed by hand from the waterway and its floodplain in a single day.It’s the haul of volunteers participating in a 10-day competition that draws over 150 people, life-jacketed rivergoers of all ages that pile into dozens of canoes to scour Hungary’s second-largest river for trash that has flowed downstream.Since its start in 2013, participants in the annual Plastic Cup competition — which offers a prize for those who collect the most trash each year — have gathered more than 330 tons (around 727,000 pounds) of waste from the Tisza and other Hungarian waters.Zsolt Tamas, the Plastic Cup’s competition director, says the effort aims not only to improve and preserve Hungary’s natural environment, but to interrupt a growing global ecological crisis by preventi...