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MLB playoffs 2023: Rangers sweep into ALCS, 3 games Wednesday as Astros, D-backs look to advance

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

In his first season with Texas, veteran manager Bruce Bochy has guided the Rangers into the AL Championship Series.Yordan Alvarez and the Houston Astros are one win from making it a Lone Star State affair.Corey Seager and Adolis García homered early, Nathan Eovaldi pitched seven smooth innings in another playoff clincher and the Rangers completed a Division Series sweep of the Baltimore Orioles with a 7-1 victory Tuesday night in Game 3.The Rangers, whose loss at Seattle on the last day of the regular season made them a wild-card team instead of the AL West champion, have since won all five of their postseason games. They are going to the ALCS for the first time since 2011.“I saw a team that was really motivated,” said Bochy, who managed San Francisco to three World Series titles from 2010-14. “The offense, everybody was doing something to contribute.”In Minneapolis, José Abreu hit a three-run homer in a four-run first inning against Sonny Gray and piled on with a two-run shot in th...

Golden Knights raise Stanley Cup championship banner before season opener

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

LAS VEGAS (AP) — The Golden Knights raised their Stanley Cup championship banner in the most Las Vegas way possible.Captain Mark Stone placed the Stanley Cup next to an oversized slot machine on the ice Tuesday night before the season opener against the Seattle Kraken and pulled the lever. Three Cups representing the jackpot came up, and then the banner began to emerge from the slot machine as the capacity crowd roared and players looked on just before they beat Seattle, 4-1.“It’s not easy, we had our ring dinner a few nights ago, went to the Raiders last night, so you get a lot of things going on in your life and you’re trying to enjoy what we accomplished but also prepare for a season so you try to balance both,” Vegas forward Jack Eichel said. “It’s an amazing experience to watch a banner go up and you want to enjoy every moment. But in the back of your mind, you’re preparing for a game as well.”Before the players came on the ice, a video played in T-Mobile Arena going through th...

Fiscalía de Paraguay abre causa penal tras declaraciones de testigo que acusa al expresidente Cartes del homicidio del fiscal Pecci

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

(CNN Español) — La Fiscalía de Paraguay abrió este lunes una causa penal para determinar la veracidad del testimonio de Francisco Luis Correa Galeano, testigo clave en el caso del homicidio del fiscal Marcel Pecci, que acusó al expresidente Horacio Cartes de ser uno de los autores intelectuales del crimen.Galeano, quien se encuentra detenido y fue condenado por el asesinato del fiscal antidrogas paraguayo, hizo un recuento cronológico de cómo se planeó y ejecutó el crimen y mencionó al expresidente Horacio Cartes así como al presunto narcotraficante Miguel Angel Insfrán, alias Tío Rico, indicó el Ministerio Público.Tras la declaración del testigo, Cartes rechazó las acusaciones a través de su cuenta oficial en X, antes Twitter. “Inmensamente indignado por una acusación infundada, claramente montada con el afán de perjudicarme”, escribió.La Fiscalía de Paraguay abre una investigación contra el expresidente Horacio Cartes y el actual vicepresidente Hugo Velázquez por presunta co...

Bedard has assist in NHL debut, Blackhawks beat Crosby, Penguins 4-2 on opening night

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Top draft pick Connor Bedard had an assist and dazzled occasionally with his skating in the his NHL debut, helping the Chicago Blackhawks beat Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins 4-2 on Tuesday night.The 18-year-old Bedard played over 21 minutes in the opener, often sharing the ice with Crosby, one of his idols. Bedard had five of Chicago’s 35 shots.Crosby began his 19th season by scoring his 551st goal, a shot into an open net off a pass from Jake Guentzel midway through the second period for a 2-0 lead.The Blackhawks roared back behind a goal from Ryan Donato — with a secondary assist from Bedard — in the second period. Cole Guttman tied it midway through the third, and Jason Dickinson gave Chicago the lead with 4:31 remaining. Nick Foligno’s empty-netter with 1:33 to go sent most of the sellout crowd that came to watch one of the NHL’s brightest stars take on one of its newest.Petr Mrazek stopped 38 shots for the Blackhawks.Bryan Rust also scored for...

Australian prime minister says Chinese-Australian journalist detained in China for 3 years has returned to Australia

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australian prime minister says Chinese-Australian journalist detained in China for 3 years has returned to Australia.Source

Column: MLB’s playoff format is penalizing top seeds with all that time off

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

The Baltimore Orioles won an AL-leading 101 games during the regular season. The Los Angeles Dodgers also reached triple digits in victories. Those impressive accomplishments earned both teams a bye in the opening round of the playoffs.Clearly, the time off did them no good.Tossing in the 104-win Atlanta Braves and the defending World Series champion Houston Astros, baseball’s four top seeds went a combined 2-6 on their home fields to start the best-of-five division round.Which begs the question: Is it time to say goodbye to the bye?The Orioles lost their first two games at home to the Texas Rangers, who finished off the sweep with a 7-1 win at home Tuesday night. The Dodgers were on the verge of elimination after dropping two straight to the Arizona Diamondbacks.The Astros split their first two games in Houston with the Twins before pulling ahead in the series with a 9-1 rout at Minnesota. The power-hitting Braves needed an improbable comeback to even their series with the Ph...

Keir Starmer ‘bomb-proofing’ Labour pledges as he tries to unseat the Tories

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

Labour leader Keir Starmer said he’s “bomb-proofing” the party’s pre-election promises to the public, as he defended a lack of new policies in his big address to the U.K. opposition party’s annual conference.Starmer — who current polls suggest is on course to become Britain’s next prime minister — delivered a more personal address than usual to the party faithful on Tuesday.He touched on his background, aimed to tap into anxiety about the cost of living, and pitched Labour as offering hope after 13 years of Conservative government.But he faced criticism in some quarters for not offering more policy meat. Starmer promised a major shake-up of Britain’s planning system to spur housebuilding, but his speech was absent the traditional “rabbit out of the hat” policy moment party leaders sometimes use to add drama to a conference speech. The left-wing Momentum campaign group said Starmer had been relying on “vague promises of refo...

Howie Carr: The moment is too big for Biden

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

What is the Biden administration’s latest “existential” threat to humanity today?Is it the weather?Or is it tradesmen in F-150 pickup trucks wearing red MAGA hats?Is it gas stoves, or the genocidal decision by the Supreme Court to force deadbeat hippies to start repaying their student loans?Or is it “traditional” Catholics going to a Latin Mass? Or the refusal of some Americans to follow CDC orders to wear a mask out in public?Or is the greatest crisis facing the planet this news cycle angry parents complaining to their local school committees about transgender recruiting of kindergarten kids in the public schools?These are some of the non-issues that the Democrats have been trying to gin up their shiftless base with since January 2021, while simultaneously funneling billions of dollars in armaments and cash to Muslim terrorist states since ousting Donald J. Trump from the White House.Elections have consequences, and stolen elections….The audacity of this mob of appeasers and fellow...

A Chinese Australian journalist detained for 3 years in China returns to Australia

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A Chinese Australian journalist who was convicted on murky espionage charges and detained in China for three years has returned to Australia, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Wednesday.Cheng Lei, 48, worked for the international department of China’s state broadcaster CCTV. She has reunited with her two children in Melbourne, Albanese said.Albanese said Australia had traded nothing with China for Cheng’s release.“Her release follows the completion of judicial processes in China,” he said.China’s Ministry of State Security said that Cheng had been approached by a foreign organization in May 2020 and provided them with state secrets she had obtained on the job in violation of a confidentiality clause signed with her employer. A police statement did not name the organization or say what the secrets were.A court in Beijing convicted her of illegally providing state secrets abroad and she was sentenced to two years and 11 months, the statement s...

Malaysia’s wildlife department defends its use of puppies as live bait to trap black panthers

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:12:33 GMT

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysia’s Wildlife Department defended its use of puppies as live bait to capture black panthers spotted at a Malaysian village after animal rights groups protested the method and appealed to the government to use other means.The department resorted to using puppies after earlier attempts to lure the panthers with a goat failed. It’s standard procedure to use live animals, Wildlife Department Director General Abdul Kadir Abu Hashim said in remarks published Tuesday, noting that the puppies were not physically harmed in the process.“In this particular case, there was indication that the panther had attacked dogs (before), so we used the puppies for their barking and scent to attract the panther,” he told the Free Malaysia Today online news portal. Farmers in a village in southern Negeri Sembilan state were terrified after spotting a panther near their home in September. Villagers lodged a complaint with the Wildlife Department after a panthe...