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It’s early, of course, and there are a lot of games left. The Bulls are not getting any taller, barring a trade, and they miss their big guy, Nikola Vučević, who is absent for the current five-game trip after a positive COVID-19 test but still is communicating from Chicago on group chats.

From there Richard, a night security guard, re-commits to his plan, and director Reinaldo Marcus Green (”Monsters and Men,” “Joe Bell”) recommits to his movie’s familiar blueprint for success. The chapters flip by, efficiently. With constant reminders of the value of the “open stance” from Richard, the girls flower under their first professional coach Paul Cohen (Tony Goldwyn). Then, an impasse, followed by a relocation of the family to Florida. There, coach Rick Macci (Jon Bernthal, amusingly exasperated) becomes a family friend, though Richard’s calling the shots. The debates are intense: With Venus getting all the initial focus, should she go pro? Wait a few years?

There’s a key phrase in that question: eight games remaining. That’s a lot of time and should provide plenty of additional evidence about the team’s direction. It can’t be ignored, even amid the excitement Fields is generating, that Nagy’s teams have suffered losing streaks of at least four games in three consecutive seasons and, including the playoffs, have lost 14 of their last 20 games. It can’t be disregarded that the only NFC team the Bears are ahead of are the winless Detroit Lions. It shouldn’t be overlooked that the side of the ball Nagy prides himself in overseeing ranks 31st in yards per game and dead last by a wide margin in passing offense. The Bears are also one of only seven teams through Week 10 with a point differential worse than minus-70. Most of the others — the New York Jets, Houston Texans, Lions, Jacksonville Jaguars, Atlanta Falcons and Miami Dolphins — are NFL punchlines. Ten months ago, McCaskey and Phillips made vague pleas for progress in 2021 but steered away from publicly declaring the benchmarks they’ll be using to evaluate Nagy and Pace. Said McCaskey: “All four of us will know whether there’s been sufficient improvement or sufficient progress to continue past 2021.” To this point, it’s impossible to say the Bears have made sufficient progress. They do, however, have eight games remaining to change that conversation.

“There were some big outliers there, especially in particular that San Francisco game, where, boy, they were really running the ball well against us and had some long drives and yards per rush attempts was high,” Bears coach Matt Nagy said. “I really have thought that for most of the season we’ve done a good job at being able to stop the run until a few outlier games. That’s where we’ve got to reel it in and say, ‘OK, hey, guys, why? What is that?’ So Sean (Desai) and those guys, they give their reports. We go through it as a staff a million different ways in all three phases. We really focus on the outliers.

Ohio State leads the FBS in total offense, averaging 550.4 yards. Freshman TreVeyon Henderson headlines the running game, while quarterback C.J. Stroud is finding receivers Chris Olave, Garrett Wilson and Jaxon Smith with a passing attack averaging 353.6 yards, tops in the Big Ten and sixth nationally.

Ron Matz, 8, of Chicago, from left, Jackie Frederick, 12, of Morton Grove, and Smitty Newson, 12, of Wheaton, mingle with players Luis Aparicio, Juan Pizarro, and Minnie Miñoso (from left) in the White Sox dugout on Sept. 21, 1961. The three children are all afflicted with cystic fibrosis, a childhood disease. (Chicago Tribune historical photo)

Syndergaard was traded by the Blue Jays, alongside Travis d’Arnaud, to the Mets in 2012. He made his major-league debut in 2015, helping the Mets make their run to the World Series that year and most notably pitching an inning of relief against the Dodgers in NLDS Game 5. Syndergaard enjoyed an All-Star season in 2016 and finished eighth in Cy Young award voting, as he led MLB in FIP (2.29) across 183.2 innings. He struggled with injuries in 2017 and ‘18, posting a combined 32 starts in those two seasons. Then, in a healthy 2019 season that featured Syndergaard accumulating 197.2 innings, he recorded a career-worst 4.28 ERA across 32 starts and allowed the most earned runs (94) in MLB.

Last month, the Cleveland Guardians roller derby team, which was formed in 2013, filed its lawsuit alleging the baseball team’s switch from Indians to Guardians infringed on its trademark and employed deceptive trade practices, violating a state law.

Caruso didn’t take his first shot until almost four minutes into the third quarter, a miss that turned out to be his only attempt of the night. But on a night when DeRozan, LaVine and Ball were all on fire, the Bulls didn’t need Caruso to do anything but play solid defense and share the ball. He had five assists, one of four players with five or more assists.

“Receiving it from you, Killer, is a very special moment with our history,” Wilson said. “When you take a look at our greatest players, whether it be Mr. (Bobby) Orr, Mr. (Gordie) Howe, the standards they set for us to aspire to is their love of the game, their humbleness. They don’t think they’re bigger than the team or bigger than the game. It inspires us.