Have shares ofChipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) finally bottomed?
Those holding shares of the fast-food chain or who have been waiting for a chance to buy in, no doubt hope so. Since an E.coli outbreak sickened hundreds of Chipotle Mexican Grill customers a year ago, the stock has nosedived some 42%.
That includes a 9% drop last Wednesday to $368.02, after the company reported its fourth straight quarter of year-over-year sales declines. The stockis down another 1%-plus percent on Monday.
What gave investors indigestion? In the third quarter, the 2,178-store chain saw its sales plunge 14.8%, to $1.04 billion, missing the $1.09 billion consensus forecast.
Same-store sales dove 21.9%, way worse than the 18.9% drop analysts expected, despite a new loyalty program and enhanced marketing. Adjusted earnings slumped 88%, to 56 cents a share, a full dollar below consensus forecasts.
The question for investors is this: Is the worst over, or is Chipotle Mexican Grill still a stock to avoid?
To be sure, the chain is far from the first to fall victim to a food safety scare. Jack in the Box,McDonald"s,Yum! Brandsand others have been tripped up by food safety issues in the past and all have recovered.
But with Chipotle Mexican Grill there are other factors at play both inside and outside its business that suggest that the company"s turnaround is still a long way off, if it happens at all.
Management"s recovery plan includes a move into selling burgers and pizza using the same fresh, hormone-free ingredients for which Chipotle Mexican Grill is known. The company opened itsfirst burger outlet, called Tasty Made, in Lancaster, Ohio, on Thursday.
Standing Rock: Police Arrest 120+ Water Protectors as Dakota Access Speeds up Pipeline Construction
Scores of people marched on the Army Corp of Engineers in Northeast Portland on Monday to show their support of the ongoing protests of the Dakota Access Pipeline on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation in North Dakota.
Tweets and photos from the protests show peaceful demonstrators singing and chanting while holding up signs that say "Water = life" and "People over pipelines."
People on the scene estimated there were between 100 and 300 people at the protest, which began at Holladay Park and ended at the Army Corps of Engineers Building, nearby.
Several people tweeted pictures and video from the event.
Near the end of the protest, a group of children brought a black snake into the Army Corps building.
According to an alert tweeted out before the event, the protest was staged at the Army Corps of Engineers office because "the Army Corps office in Portland is in fact the location that has the power to make the decision to stop the Dakota Access pipeline. The Portland and Seattle offices share employees and hold federal jurisdiction over the Missouri River."
The person who answered the phone at the Army Corps office acknowledged that the Portland office does hold jurisdiction over the Missouri River but said the decisions over the Dakota Access Pipeline are being made at the office in Omaha.
We reached out to the Omaha office but a call had not been returned at the time we published this story.
Zach Miller"s 21-Yard Grab Sets Up Jordan Howard"s TD Run! | Vikings vs. Bears | NFL
This story appears in ESPN The Magazine"s November 14 Pain Issue. Subscribe today!
THE MEN WHO agree to talk about what happened do so reluctantly. Their eyes invariably drift to the spot in question: the grass practice field, somewhere near the 30-yard line, right hash. It happened with the offense heading north, 22 men on the field, no contact allowed.
They won"t talk about what the injury looked like, out of respect. These are men who long ago came to terms with the inhumanity of their game. They laugh about concussions and broken bones as a defense mechanism, the way an electrician might laugh with his buddies about getting a jolt from a faulty circuit. Occupational hazard.
But this is different. They close their eyes and wince, the image flashing in their minds. They shake their heads reflexively, as if they can dislodge the memory and evict it from their brains. They watched Teddy Bridgewater go down on that field on Aug. 30, his left leg separating at the knee, during the first minutes of a Vikings preseason practice. Every time they think about it, every time they stand near this field and close their eyes, they see it again.
INJURIES IN THE NFL are commodified, sloganized, reduced to transactions. They"re interchangeable, disposable, devoid of pain. They"re dehumanized, disembodied, such an expected part of the game that they"ve got their own capitalized catchphrase: Next Man Up.
Check the injury report, adjust your fantasy team. See how easy this is? How painless? One goes down, another pops up.
"I hate that exact saying -- "Next man up,"" Vikings guard Alex Boone says. "That"s f---ed up because it makes it sound like we"re barbarians. Like we don"t care: "F--- it, he"s hurt, move on." It"s terrible to say that. A guy gets hurt and all of a sudden everyone is like, "Oh, who was that guy?" "
In a sense, Next Man Up is an essential and ordinary part of the lexicon. In a sport with so many injuries, a coach has no choice but to rely on a cut-rate, impersonal slogan to motivate and distract. While he"s telling his players to step up, team personnel are scanning the waiver wire, pulling up reports on practice-squad players and making calls on trades. It"s impossible to ignore statistics like this one: In 2015, NFL players missed 1,639 games -- almost 100 per week -- because of injury. Those three words -- Next Man Up -- have become such a vital part of the culture that many players hear it with the same anesthetized indifference.
"Even when we watch other games, it gets lost," Vikings safety Harrison Smith says. "We react the same way. There"s a human part of it that gets lost."
But sometimes an event changes all that. Whether through proximity or sheer gruesomeness, the collective pain of a group of men rises up to relegate Next Man Up to a heartless clich.
"It was very surreal," Boone says of Bridgewater"s injury. "Sometimes you forget how brutal this game can be."
Minnesota"s coach, Mike Zimmer, canceled practice. NFL teams never cancel practice. The game never stops. In a way, it"s a repudiation of Next Man Up to send everyone home -- an acknowledgment that some injuries transcend the transactional. Sometimes, even in such a brutal world, circumstances dictate that the next man can"t reasonably be expected to step up, at least not right away.
"It happened at the beginning of practice, and obviously Coach made the right call to cancel," Vikings quarterbacks coach Scott Turner says. "We weren"t going to get anything done that day."
At his first news conference after the injury, a still-shaken Zimmer said his team would mourn for a day and move on. If anything, this meant his players needed to recommit to the mission. "No one is going to feel sorry for us, or cry," he said. "I"m not going to feel sorry for us either." He said he"d spoken with his mentor, Bill Parcells, for advice on how to deal with the trauma his team experienced. He said he spoke with his deceased father "in spirit." As he continued, the coach in him drained from his eyes. He transformed from functionary to human being, and when he was asked a question about grieving -- a question that somehow seemed utterly appropriate -- Zimmer paused and looked down. After a deep breath, he looked to the sky as his lower lip quivered. "My wife passed away seven years ago," he said. "It was a tough day. The sun came up the next day, the world kept spinning, people kept going to work. That"s what we"re going to do."
Bridgewater in training camp this summer, before the injury.Zach Tarrant/Minnesota Vikings
HARRISON SMITH WAS running downfield with his back to the play, making sure he didn"t get beaten on a deep route. Even in a practice, and a noncontact drill, that"s important. It"s six weeks later, and he"s standing next to that field running the calculus through his head. He concludes that he must have been the person farthest from the injury. He pauses a moment to give thanks. When it happened, he heard a scream from a receiver who had turned back toward the play. It was an expletive that carried an unmistakable pitch: pain.
You play this game long enough, you learn to recognize it.
He must have pulled a hammy, Smith thought.
Smith swung around to the receiver and saw that he was looking toward the backfield. He was reacting to someone else"s pain. Smith followed his eyes to see helmets flying and teammates jumping away like the grass was on fire. He heard them screaming, and Bridgewater screaming, and he saw powerful men rendered powerless.
EARLIER IN THE summer, a barbecue at Boone"s house. Bridgewater arrived two hours late, and Boone confronted him.
"I"m so sorry," Boone said. "The food"s overcooked."
Bridgewater laughed. "Dude, don"t worry about it. I"m two hours late."
"No, it"s my fault," Boone said.
Boone mocks himself now, apologizing for something that wasn"t his fault. "I remember thinking, "Yeah, you were late. Why am I apologizing?""
Bridgewater"s coaches, from Charlie Strong at Louisville to Zimmer in Minnesota, consider the quarterback an honorary son. The worst thing his teammates can say about him is that he"s the closest thing the locker room has to a teacher"s pet. They laugh at the way he tends to parrot Zimmer"s philosophy.
"I swear he"s the nicest guy I"ve ever met in my life," Boone says. "He"s a sweet guy -- and that"s not a word you usually associate with football players, but he really is. His genuine sincerity toward everything is just ... you"re like, "Wow, he"s really a good person." He never says a bad word, he"s never mad."
Wide receiver Adam Thielen says, "Across this league, everyone has respect for Teddy," and he cites Sam Bradford as proof. Bradford texted get-well wishes to Bridgewater the day after the injury -- about the same time the Vikings" front office started asking tight ends coach Pat Shurmur, once Bradford"s offensive coordinator in St. Louis and Philadelphia, for a detailed scouting report on his former quarterback. Three days after that, Minnesota traded a first-round and a conditional fourth-round pick to the Eagles to turn Bradford into its Next Man Up.
Nobody knows when Bridgewater will play again. The team says he"ll be back next year, but there"s no guarantee. His knee dislocated, and the impact tore multiple ligaments connecting the patella to the tibia and fibula. When the Vikings traded for Bradford, back when nobody expected Minnesota to start the season 5-1, it was noted that Bridgewater is under team control through 2017.
"Everyone still loves Teddy," Bradford says. "Teddy"s the guy. There"s no moving past Teddy. That"s just how it is, and how it should be."
Vikings coach Mike Zimmer speaks to reporters for the first time after Bridgewater"s injury.Carlos Gonzalez/Star Tribune/AP Photo
MATT ASIATA WAS maybe 10 yards away from the 30-yard line, right hash, when he heard a burst of noise he couldn"t identify. He looked back and saw Bridgewater on the ground, and saw the bodies scatter, and saw the helmets popping off his teammates" heads like so many bottle caps. They all remember the scattering bodies and the flying helmets, no matter where they were. The next thing Asiata heard was the voices, all the voices, people going crazy, with Bridgewater"s a few registers above the rest.
Asiata couldn"t quite comprehend it. He had just seen him in the huddle, had lined up behind him at running back for a play in a noncontact drill. Nobody ever gets badly hurt in a noncontact drill. Asiata listened to the screams and thought: He must be faking it. It"s a prank, something Teddy thought up with the linemen. This can"t be real.
But the noise kept coming, and the trainers filled the void left by the scattered bodies. Asiata ran back toward Bridgewater and then veered off. He and a couple of teammates took a knee and said a prayer. They closed their eyes to pray for their teammate. They closed their eyes so they wouldn"t have to see.
"Everything happens for a reason," Asiata says, without much conviction.
YOU"RE PHOTOGRAPHED WALKING into a store and driving through an intersection and standing in an elevator. There"s video of you paying for gas and boarding a plane and ordering a burrito. Someone goes missing, there"s always a photo from a last known location. Have you seen this person? Someone commits a crime. Help find this man.
There are no available images of Bridgewater"s injury. They exist, no doubt -- every NFL team records every second of practice, from the moment players begin stretching until they leave the field. And yet it seems nobody outside the organization has seen the moment Bridgewater went back to pass in a noncontact 11-on-11 drill, tripped in some fashion and landed in a way that caused his left leg to dangle in an anatomically impossible way nobody wants to talk about.
What remains is an incomplete, and reluctant, oral history.
"It was kind of a freak deal," Thielen says. "He was dropping back and got tripped up and just awkwardly stepped on his knee. It"s hard to talk about. It was bad."
Running back Jerick McKinnon shakes his head slowly when asked to describe what he saw that morning. He looks toward the practice field, to the 30, right hash.
"I saw it all," he says. "I ain"t going to go into it. I don"t have any words to describe it."
Three weeks after Bridgewater"s injury, Vikings running back Adrian Peterson tore a meniscus in his knee during the team"s Week 2 game against Green Bay, possibly ending his season. Peterson left the field with the help of trainers, partially under his own power, and the route to the locker room took him past a field-level restaurant at the Vikings" slick new U.S. Bank Stadium.
Those in the Delta Sky360 Club (which, in 16,455 square feet, "elevates the sports bar concept to a magnificent VIP experience") were forced to witness a man"s private agony. It disturbed the reverie, intruded on the fantasy that we are somehow not complicit in the game"s brutality. A player goes down while you"re watching on TV and they cut to a commercial. When they come back, he is miraculously gone, and the attention moves to the inadequacies of his replacement.
Or, in more serious cases, a player gets wheeled off, strapped to a gurney, to polite applause. Usually, the player raises a hand, maybe gives a thumbs-up, and the cheers rise with a mixture of happiness and relief. He can move, the applause says, therefore our guilt is assuaged. We understand the bargain, but we"d feel really bad if someone died for our amusement.
Injury reports are transmitted to fans at U.S. Bank Stadium through two huge video screens that hover above each end zone. A generic model of the human anatomy appears below a player"s name and number. The body rotates to create the illusion of three-dimensionality while a target circle wanders the body to create suspense -- where will it land? -- until it rests on the spot of the injury. The injured player is off somewhere, safely out of sight. Words appear:
Brandon Fusco, Concussion, Will Not Return.
It"s the great injury game show, sponsored by Twin Cities Orthopedics.
Bridgewater signing autographs just a few weeks before he got hurt.John Minchillo/AP Photo
HE JUMPED AWAY, scattering with the rest of them. He thinks he threw his helmet, but his memory isn"t trustworthy on this subject. Alex Boone"s first thought was, Holy f---, did that really happen? It felt like an electrical surge traveled up his spine, the way you feel when helplessness collides with empathy. He yelled. Everyone who was in Bridgewater"s immediate vicinity yelled, and the yells emanated outward, to the linebackers and receivers and defensive backs, like echoes. The ones closest looked down and saw Bridgewater"s left leg bent at an unnatural angle and let their screams mingle in the summer air, right along with his.
Boone"s second thought was, There"s my friend. My friend is in pain. He considers this now, how the people close to the sounds and the pain didn"t see it as a transaction or a line on an injury report. "I didn"t think, "Our quarterback"s injured," " he says. "It was, "My friend is injured." " A thousand thoughts swirled through his mind. He thought about the barbecue, and how protective he"d become of Teddy, on and off the field. He thought about Bridgewater"s mom. It sounds crazy, but he did. His mom. Boone looked at the helmets popping off heads and spinning into the air, and he heard someone yelling to call 911, and he thought about how nobody ever calls 911 for an injury at an NFL practice, and then he looked down at Bridgewater"s left leg and thought, Who"s going to tell his mom?
Boone saw that the human scattering served a practical purpose: It cleared a path for the trainers and first responders, the people who could do more than scream and swear and think about Bridgewater"s mom. They went to work the way they"re supposed to: quickly and with expertise. The buzz up the spine, the helplessness, dissipated some. When a knee dislocates and the ligaments tear free of the bones, leaving the fibula and tibia to their own devices, the next concern is nerve damage that might lead to amputation. In the coming days, after Bridgewater undergoes extensive surgery, the Vikings" trainers and the local first responders will be credited for saving his leg.
The Vikings walked quietly to the locker room and gathered as a team to say a prayer.
THE INJURED MAN recedes, quietly and respectfully. One minute you"re the man, rounding into your prime, bonding with your receivers and fighting through overcooked meat at a lineman"s barbecue, and the next it"s Sam Bradford"s time.
The screams wax and wane. The injured man Dopplers in and Dopplers out.
Bridgewater is around the facility, they all say. He helps Bradford understand the offense. He is upbeat, working out, still a part of the team. Perhaps his car is parked in one of the reserved for injured player spots in the team lot, not more than 50 yards from the grass practice field where everything in his life suddenly changed. His presence is mostly spectral. He is not visible when the media are allowed in the locker room, and he does not watch the games from the sideline. He has not spoken publicly. To the outside world, he is invisible.
It"s what passes for decorum inside a merciless culture, a way of ensuring a peaceful transition of power. It seems there"s a corollary to Next Man Up: the necessary disappearance of the Last Man Down.
Samhain - November-Coming-Fire [full album, HQ, HD]
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Today is when many modern Pagans celebrate Samhain. This holiday marks the start of winter and the new year according to the old Celtic calendar. It is a time when the ancestors are honored, divination is performed, and festivals are held in honor of the gods. Samhain is also recognized as the final harvest before the long winter ahead. It is perhaps the best-known and most widely celebrated of all the modern Pagan holidays.
Samhain- colored pencil on linen [Susan Korsnick, 2016]
During this season, other celebrations and festivals are also being held such as Velu Laiks (the time of spirits) by Baltic Pagans, lfablt or the Scandanavian Sacrifice to the Elves, Winter Nights by satr, Foundation Night in Ekklesa Antnoou, Allelieweziel by the Urglaawe tradition, Fete Gede by Vodou practitioners, Da de los Muertos for followers of Santeria and several indigenous religions in Mexico and Latin America, Diwali for Hindus (beginning Oct. 30 this year, it runs for five days) and the astrological Samhain on Nov. 6 for some Witches and Druids. Finally, in the Southern Hemisphere, many Pagans are currently celebrating Beltane.
Here are some thoughts shared by Pagans and polytheists about this time of year:
On this day, the world of our physical reality and the world of our spiritual reality come together and communicate. It is a time of connecting with our ancestors and offering gratitude for their part in our lives. I always incorporate a knotting/braiding activity in my ritual. I take three pieces of red yarn or ribbon about 20 inches long and begin braiding them and knotting in groups of three, with each knot, I invite and say aloud the name of the ancestor to my ritual celebration. I recount how they have positively impacted my life and offer gratitude for their presence in my life now and when they were alive. When I am done, I place the braid on my altar for the year to represent how they are woven into my life and to keep that energy alive. Katie Pifer, What is Samhain?
In Urglaawe, the Wild Hunt is Holle gathering up the souls of the Dead, and then on Walpurgisnacht she grinds them in her mill so they can go on to the next life. I like that better than the idea of Vallhalla, which I always thought seemed too Christian-influenced. The thing is, once youre ground in the mill, what is left of you? Is it anything recognizable as being you anymore? The person you were still becomes just a memory. Amanda the Conqueror, Celebrating Allelieweziel this year
I got up early and before going to work I shaved my head, as I often have on this day as well. I like hair on ones scalpmine and others (other hair? Not so much!), and so I didnt want to do it, and in fact I really dont like doing it (and I like doing it even less on-my-own/without assistance), but it wouldnt be a sacrifice (in the modern colloquial sense) if it werent difficult. But, it is an important sign of mourning, an important aspect of Egyptian sacerdotal practice (though I am not entirely hairless at the moment, like they were), and it also ends up giving me a small pile (and smaller every year, sadly) of materials to give in offering at various places in the future. P. Sufenas Virius Lupus, Sacred Nights of Antinous 2016Death of Antinous
Samhain Altar [Wilhelmine, DeviantArt]
And, Siobhan Johnson suggests 10 things to do on Samhain.
Many people who have been active members of our collective communities have crossed the veil this past year, including:Carl Llewellyn Weschcke, Marc Pourner, Scott Walters, Richard Reidy, Daniel Kaufman, Jean Williams, Crystal Tier, Morgan McFarland, John Belham-Payne, A.J. Gooch, JD Taylor, Gavin Frost,Lydia Miller Ruyle, David Babulski, Nikki Bado, Michael Wiggins, Scott Symonds, Lady Epona, John Ravenmoon, Charlie Murphy, Margarian Bridger, Tisha Gill, Fallon Smart,Seb Barnett, Lady Flora, Bryan David Zell, Carole Kitchenwitch. There are also many otherswho have not been not named here but who have touchedour individual lives, our practices, and our communities. What is remembered, lives.
May you have a blessed Samhain. May peace fall upon you and your beloved dead during this season. Let this be a new cycle of quiet joy and renewed blessings for all of you.
Gottlieb: Patriots trade Jamie Collins to the Browns
The Cleveland Browns have acquired linebacker Jamie Collins from New England, a person with knowledge of the trade tells The Associated Press.
The person spoke on condition of anonymity Monday because the deal has not officially been announced. Tuesday is the NFL"s trade deadline.
A second-round draft pick in 2013, Collins has been one of the Patriots" better defensive players for just over three seasons, but his rookie contract ends after this season. The Patriots will get a conditional third-round selection for Collins, 27.
Collins missed one game this season with a hip injury. He has 43 combined tackles and two interceptions.
At 0-8, the Browns certainly can use an infusion of talent, and Collins immediately becomes their best linebacker.
Earlier this year, the Browns sent linebacker/defensive end Barkevious Mingo to the Patriots.
Titans: Wide receiver Andre Johnson retires
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Star wide receiver Andre Johnson is retiring after 14 seasons in a career mainly spent with the Houston Texans.
The 35-year-old Johnson is a seven-time Pro Bowl player now with Tennessee. Titans general manager Jon Robinson said in a statement Monday that Johnson "in my opinion is one of the best to have played the game."
Johnson ranks among the top 10 receivers in NFL history in career catches and receiving yards. He had 1,062 catches for 14,185 yards and 70 touchdowns.
After 12 seasons with the Texans, Johnson played for the Indianapolis Colts last year before joining the Titans this season. He had nine catches for 85 yards and two touchdowns this year.
Katie Talks Beer Pong And "Grease" With Anthony Rizzo
Donna Torres and Laurie Rizzo, both longtime Broward County residents, have spent decades attending their sons" baseball games, first traveling all over South Florida and in recent years all over the country to do so.
Until this week, though, they hadn"t been to too many of the same games.
Torres" son is Cleveland Indians first baseman Mike Napoli, a Hollywood-born Flanagan High alumnus. Rizzo"s son is Chicago Cubs first baseman Anthony Rizzo, a Parkland native and former Douglas High standout. The pair of Broward boys are facing off in the World Series, tied 1-1 as it shifts to Chicago for Game 3 on Friday.
"To watch him play as a small child in T-ball and now he"s in the major leagues and has gone to the World Series three times, I"m pinching myself constantly," Torres said. "If this is a dream, don"t wake me up."
Both families have temporarily abandoned Broward to spend much of the month on the road. For the Rizzos, it has been mostly Laurie and Anthony"s father John, with brother Johnny and his family including 9-month-old Vincent, Anthony Rizzo"s nephew jumping on board for the World Series. Vincent, by default one of the youngest members of the long-suffering Cubs fan base, has already been to Opening Day and the World Series (and four major league stadiums in all).
Napoli has a rotating contingent of 8-10 family members coming to watch parents and stepparents and siblings and cousins and it"s become something of an annual tradition. Napoli has made it as far as the ALCS in 2009 with the Los Angeles Angels, the World Series with the Texas Rangers in 2011, and the World Series again with the Boston Red Sox in 2013 with shorter playoff stints mixed in before this one.
Throughout his years as a ball-playing vagabond, Napoli has developed a certain reputation: fun-loving off the field and baseball-mashing on it, blending in seamlessly to any clubhouse he walks into.
In fact, the description Tyler Munro the Flanagan coach in the late 1990s and early 2000s offers of a teenage Napoli mirrors the one you might hear today of the 34-year-old version: a natural leader who was really good at baseball and really good at cutting loose. Oh, and he had a more legitimate beard than pretty much anyone else in the dugout, coaches included.
Munro coached Napoli for two years before the Angels drafted him as a catcher in 2000. Between those seasons, Munro asked Napoli to shed some weight. Napoli showed up for his scholastic swan song as a "svelte 205" pounds, as Munro put it, and batted leadoff something Munro wanted him to do after opponents pitched around Napoli too often the season prior.
That spring, Napoli totaled twice as many stolen bases (30) as he did home runs (15) as the Falcons won their first district championship.
In May of Napoli"s senior year one month before he went pro the movie "Gladiator" came out. The Flanagan baseball team went to see it as a group. It struck Munro that one of his players was a lot like Russell Crowe"s character, Maximus, who was forced to fight to the death in Roman gladiator arenas.
"We had the Gladiator," said Munro, who now teaches and coaches in Colorado. "Napoli would grab the bat to be his weapon, and everybody else would follow."
Seven years later and a few minutes up the road, Rizzo put the finishing touches on his sparkling Douglas career. His last two years of high school, before the Red Sox took him in the sixth round of the 2007 draft, Rizzo decided he wanted to give up football to focus on baseball.
Elliot Bonner, then and now a coach for the Douglas football and baseball teams, understood.
"When he told me he wanted to go from one to the other and stick with baseball [it made sense]," Bonner said. "Obviously, I was a baseball coach. I could see he could play."
Rizzo"s decision was a good one. In the nearly decade since graduating, he has beaten cancer, gotten traded to the San Diego Padres, established the Anthony Rizzo Family Foundation to support cancer research, been traded to the Cubs, and emerged as the first of Chicago"s many cornerstone pieces.
Now, he is competing against Napoli, the two continuing a recent trend of Broward first baseman playing in the World Series.
Last season, Eric Hosmer (American Heritage in Plantation) won with the Kansas City Royals. The year before that, Hosmer"s Royals lost to the San Francisco Giants and Michael Morse (Nova High in Davie), a part-time first baseman. The year prior to that, Napoli won it all with the Red Sox.
Even aside from the first basemen, this World Series has a decidedly South Florida flair.
On the Cleveland side, reliever Andrew Miller among the stars of these playoffs is a former Marlin, part of the return in the Miguel Cabrera/Dontrelle Willis trade with the Detroit Tigers in 2007. Reliever Dan Otero is a Miami native and Ransom Everglades High product, while catcher Yan Gomes played at Miami Southridge High and Barry University.
For the Cubs, outfielder Albert Almora Jr. is from Hialeah and suited up for Mater Academy Charter. Another outfielder, Chris Coghlan, was the 2009 NL Rookie of the Year with the Marlins.
Several other players on the teams have ties to other areas of Florida.
After the series, Napoli and Rizzo will both eventually return to Broward. Napoli has tended to bounce around in recent offseasons, but his mother said he never misses a Christmas.
Rizzo still calls Parkland home during the winter, with all three Rizzo clans the parents, Johnny"s family and Anthony living within one mile of each other.
That"s just how Mom likes it.
"The old Italian way," Johnny Rizzo said.
For now, though, more baseball and more travel. And more bits of Broward on baseball"s biggest stage.
"We"ve been going to baseball games since he was little," Laurie Rizzo said. "And we"re still at baseball."
Dak Prescott"s 31-Yard Pass to Jason Witten & TD Pass to Beasley! | Bengals vs. Cowboys | NFL
FRISCO, Texas -- The last time Jason Witten did not start a game for the Dallas Cowboys, rookie running back Ezekiel Elliott was 11 years old.
Just let that thought linger for a little bit.
On Sunday, Witten will make the 203rd start of his career when the Dallas Cowboys take on the Green Bay Packers, tying Ed Too Tall Jones for the most in team history. Jones would have had more if not for his one-year foray into boxing, but his starts spanned 1974-78 and 1980-89 seasons.
Witten has already played in more consecutive games than any player in team history (Sunday will be his 209th). When the Cowboys play the Philadelphia Eagles on Oct. 30, he will equal Lee Roy Jordan"s team mark for most consecutive starts at 154.
He has already started more consecutive games than any tight end in NFL history.
When it was mentioned that this will be the 203rd start of Wittens career, fellow tight end Geoff Swaim gave an incredulous laugh.
Thats unreal, Swaim said. Two-hundred-and-whatever games, no matter how you get them, is unbelievable. But hes been able to do that with the amount of bumps, bruises and injuries that go undisclosed. Thats crazy. Its a testament to how hard he works and then his level of toughness and how much he cares to be on the field for his guys. Unbelievable, man. Hes a leader, a guy you look up to. I dont know if youre ever going to get to that level of that toughness but you certainly aspire to be some of the player he is definitely.
Cowboys coach Jason Garrett said of veteran TE Jason Witten: "He"s exactly what you want in an NFL football player and his approach is like nothing I"ve ever seen."Matthew Emmons/USA TODAY Sports
The last time Witten did not start a game, Bill Parcells was the Cowboys coach. It came Dec. 10, 2006 when the Cowboys opened in a four-wide-receiver formation against the New Orleans Saints with Terrell Owens, Terry Glenn, Patrick Crayton and Sam Hurd.
Two days after that game, Wittens teammate for the last six years, Tyron Smith, turned 16.
Witten has played in 10 Pro Bowls in his 14 seasons. He is one of 13 players with 1,000 receptions in NFL history. He is the Cowboys all-time leading receiver and needs 458 yards to pass Hall of Famer Michael Irvin for the top spot in receiving yards in team history.
But being there every week has mattered most.
I dont want to make it bigger than it is, Witten said. Its not like Im Hercules or something. I think its just, I love to play football and I think anybody thats ever been my teammate ... understands how much I love that. And so when you break your collarbone or you do something like that, thats out of your control. Youre put on the shelf for a few weeks. For me, Ive been lucky from that standpoint, and then when you have injuries you just grind it out ... I couldnt imagine not being out there whether we were Week 16 and out of the playoffs or whether were playing for a championship.
His name was added to the injury report this week because of a chest injury, but he has not missed a practice. He missed one game in his career, as a rookie because of a broken jaw. In 2012, he suffered a ruptured spleen in the preseason but returned to play in the season opener. A year ago he suffered sprains to both ankles, including a high and low sprain on the same ankle, and could not walk back to the locker room on a Monday after getting examined. He practiced two days later.
Different guys at different positions will always have numbers that are impressive whether its passing yards or touchdowns or completions or receptions or sacks, whatever those things are. Theyre always very impressive, but the stuff that I think draws the most respect from people inside of football is the starts, coach Jason Garrett said. Sometimes that requires some good fortune, but I also think the guys that are able to play week in week out are the ones who are most respected. Witts just a rare individual. Hes a great football player; 14 years, 10-time Pro Bowler, arguably the best all-around tight end of his generation. But what he does each and every day is an example to the rest of us, coaches, players, guys he plays with, guys he plays against, he just does it the right way and hes done it the right way for a long, long time. Hes exactly what you want in an NFL football player and his approach is like nothing Ive ever seen. He deserves every bit of recognition he gets.
Travis Frederick has started every game he has played since joining the Cowboys in 2013. To match Wittens current streak, he would have to play in every game until 2025.
Its ridiculous to me but completely shows the person that Jason is, Frederick said. Hes a tough guy thats going to go through anything to do what he can for the team. Theres been some situations he easily couldve said, Hey, Im not going to play this week. Ive got an ankle, or Ive got a knee. Hes a guy thats going to give it all every single time. I cant imagine starting 203 games.
Witten is 34 and is signed through 2017. He is second on the team with 24 catches for 232 yards this season. He has played in all 347 offensive snaps through five games.
As a kid, you just want to play football, Witten said. For me one day it will end, but until the end I love getting the opportunity to go out there and play at a high level.
