Today we take a dive into Masons and the strange case of William Morgan… Link To Morgan’s Book http://utlm.org/onlinebooks/captmorga…
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It’s been a month. I know you have questions. And I hope I’ll have the answers soon. For now, I have to figure out what is happening, Please… Wait for me.
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Rick Cleveland
Jake Mangum answers reporters’ questions in a somber Mississippi State locker room after Bulldogs were eliminated from the College World Series last June.
Today is Memorial Day. It’s sunny. Warm. Guys should be playing baseball. We should be watching baseball.
Jake Mangum needs to be playing baseball.
For Mangum, who turned 24 on March 8, time is of the essence. Twenty-four is a ripe age to be entering your first season of professional baseball. He’s on the clock, and he knows it.
“I just want to go play baseball,” Mangum said Thursday morning, before taking some swings in the batting cages at Jackson Prep. “Actually, I don’t just want to be playing, I need to be playing.”
Rick Cleveland
The 2020 baseball season is on hold. Mangum’s career is on hold. If you know Jake Mangum, you know how hellish that is for him. He absolutely loves the sport and plays it as hard as it can be played. He’s on the field before anyone else and his uniform is dirty before anyone’s. He plays fast. He can’t stand to be idle.
He began this spring at the New York Mets’ Major League camp as an invited non-Major League roster player. He got his first hit against Major League pitching on Feb. 22. He had hoped to begin this season with the Mets’ Port St. Lucie ballclub in high Class A League baseball.
And now he knows there might not be any minor league season at all. And so he spends his days working out, taking swings, lifting weights, making himself stronger.
“When they call and say it’s time to play, I am going to be ready,” he says.
He looks ready. Actually, he looks noticeably bigger – broader in the shoulders and upper body. He has put on 15 pounds of mostly muscle and now weighs 195 pounds. That’s more than his dad, John Mangum, weighed when he played nine years of cornerback for the Chicago Bears.
Jake Mangum says he is hitting the ball harder and farther. At Mississippi State, he became the Southeastern Conference’s all-time hits leader with 383, but only five of those were home runs. And while he’s never going to be a home run slugger, some of his line drives could become gappers and some of those singles could become doubles and triples.
He has tinkered with his swing, working with both his father and with Mets hitting instructor Trey Hannam. His swing, he says, is now more level instead of swinging down at the ball. The early results have been promising, Mangum says.
Brooklyn Cyclones
Mangum, hitting for the Brooklyn Cyclones, last summer.
After State’s 2019 season ended June 20 in the College World Series, Mangum spent the rest of the summer playing for the Mets’ rookie league team, the Brooklyn Cyclones, in the New York-Penn League. He hit .247 with 45 hits and 17 stolen bases in 53 games.
“I had a good summer. I felt like it was a good start,” he says.
But he felt like he made much more progress last fall when he went to the Mets’ Dominican Republic baseball academy and produced nine hits in 12 at bats during limited game action. “Big strides there,” he said. “I really hit it well.”
All that – and the added muscle – had him more than eager to begin his first full year of pro baseball, which is currently in a holding pattern.
Major League owners and players are squabbling, of course, over how this season will unfold and how the reduced revenue will be divided. There are safety concerns, of course. And there are indications we could learn much more this week. A scheduled meeting between the two sides Tuesday hopefully will resolve some issues.
Nothing in minor league baseball will be decided until Major League baseball comes up with a plan. There could be a reduced season. There could be no minor league season.
Mangum waits and says he can see both sides of the issue.
He just wants to play.
Meanwhile, he has begun a new podcast “The Jake Mangum Show” on Apple Podcasts.
“This seemed a good as time as any to pick up a new craft,” Mangum says.
Yes, he said, a career in broadcasting is something he has considered, post-baseball, which he hopes is in the distant future.
Said Mangum, “I’m going to play until they rip the jersey off my back.”
The post Jake Mangum is a fast-forward baseballer with his career currently on pause appeared first on Mississippi Today.
Color your way through Mississippi with me! Click below to download a coloring sheet of Friendship Cemetery in Columbus.
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Whether schools will resume in-person classes this fall is a question that affects nearly every aspect of life for Mississippians. Reporters Kelsey Davis Betz and Kayleigh Skinner discuss the latest on those decisions.
The post Ep. 107: Will colleges and public schools resume class in the fall? appeared first on Mississippi Today.
Last year at South By Southwest, author and entrepreneur Rohit Bhargava spoke to a packed auditorium about trends that, though they may not be obvious, are playing a serious role in shaping the future. Each year Bhargava spends untold hours figuring out which trends are going to be the most relevant and impactful, then puts out a book on them as part of his “Non-Obvious” series.
He was planning to speak about 2020 trends at this year’s SXSW festival—but like every other large in-person event, it was canceled. And like every other thing in our lives, the pandemic has turned most of Bhargava’s 2020 trends on their heads.
But not all of them. In fact, a select few trends that were already on the rise have been amplified by Covid-19, and now they’re even more significant. In a virtual SXSW session streamed from his home last week, Bhargava talked about these trends, how we can make the most of them, and how to find meaning amid chaos and confusion.
We’re in a time of extreme disruption—that much is obvious. The places we’re used to going, which are normally full of people, are empty. We’re all at home trying to figure out how to pass the time productively. And we all have big questions about how the new normal—even once our states and cities start to reopen—is going to change the way we do everything. Will students go back to school in the fall? Will we be working from home indefinitely? Will we always have to wear a face mask to go to the grocery store? What’s safe and what isn’t?
Bhargava emphasized that he’s not here to predict the future. Rather than being focused on where the world will be 5 to 10 years from now, he said, “I focus on trying to observe today to figure out what to do today.” Also, tech on its own doesn’t intrigue him as much as the human response to tech and how it’s impacting our lives. “I’m more interested in how human behavior is evolving,” he said.
But how do you figure that out when there’s so, so much information coming at us from all sides? “The big problem right now is that we just don’t know what to believe, and so we don’t believe anything,” Bhargava said. “The world seems untrustworthy and we don’t know what to pay attention to.”
Parody videos and articles have popped up poking fun at the confusion around coronavirus, but it’s disconcerting to realize how much misinformation has been flying around, and how little we know about this virus even after two and a half months of lockdowns.
Misinformation is, of course, not a new problem. And it’s impossible to consume all the information out there to try to figure out what’s real. Instead of attempting to digest and make sense of all the news, tweets, memes, podcasts, articles, shares, retweets, and videos out there, Bhargava said, we should devote more time to trying to understand people. “How do we become people who understand people?” he asked. “What motivates them to believe something, what gets them to act, what engages them?”
Bhargava’s own people-understanding process involves what he calls the haystack method. Rather than searching for a needle in a haystack, he gathers ‘hay’ (ideas and stories) then uses it to locate and define a ‘needle’ (a trend). “It’s really easy to read the same media that reinforces what you already think over and over,” he said. But a key part of gathering valuable information is looking for it in places you wouldn’t normally think to look. That means taking in media that’s targeted to different demographics than those you fall into.
Once you look across a wide variety of channels, common themes emerge. Bhargava groups those themes together and tries to elevate them into a bigger idea; that’s where his trends come from.
He defines a non-obvious trend as a “unique curated observation of the accelerating present.” “We’re in a moment now where the present is accelerating even faster,” he said. Here are the four trends he’s pinpointed that have been amplified by the current situation—and how we can make the best of them.
Overwhelmed by technology and a sense that life is too complex, people seek out simpler experiences that offer nostalgia and remind them of a more trustworthy time; we revive habits, media, or connections we find comforting or reassuring. This trend was already in place before the pandemic; Bhargava included a variation of it in his 2019 SXSW talk. The breakneck speed of technology made many of us want to slow down and reconsider the role we want our phones and computers to play in our day to day lives.
But now, Bhargava said, revivalism is gaining even more momentum; if the world seemed complex and overwhelming before, that sense has multiplied by an order of magnitude now that we’re in a global health crisis. Rather than drowning in too much conflicting information, people are consciously cutting back on the amount of news and social media they consume each day (not least because it’s just. so. depressing.) and seeking out forms of entertainment that were cast aside long ago: books, puzzles, classic video games, board games. We’re reconnecting virtually with friends or relatives we haven’t spoken to in a while. We’re trying out old family recipes in the kitchen since we can’t go to restaurants.
It’s time, Bhargava said, to rediscover the analog; “We can do these things outside of technology.” Now that we’ve been forced to find substitutes for many components of our daily routines, maybe we’ll learn that we don’t need to be as dependent on our devices as we thought.
The second trend is essentially a more nuanced variation of the first. Tired of technology that isolates us from one another, people are seeking out and placing greater value on physical, authentic, and imperfect experiences delivered by humans. In a time when we can’t hug our friends and families or even speak to store clerks without masks and plastic dividers, we’re craving empathetic, human experiences big-time.
The aforementioned dependence on digital devices as a way to interact with other people seems reprehensible now that we don’t even have the in-person option. Before the pandemic we relied on social media to connect us, texting to communicate with each other, “like” buttons to share our opinions and preferences, and algorithms to streamline and improve our shopping, transit, and other experiences.
While all of that isn’t going to go away—and may double down in a world where physical contact is now perceived as dangerous—we’re realizing how crucial and irreplaceable our human connections are. “We need to focus on empathy first,” Bhargava said. “An empathetic approach (whether in business or simply with our families and friends) is most likely to provide value to people in the current situation.” And probably always.
Have you picked up some new skills during lockdown? Tried your hand at some fancy recipes? Learned hard pieces on the guitar or piano? How likely is it that the skills or habits you’ve picked up will persist after this is all over?
As we consume bite-sized knowledge on demand, Bhargava said, we benefit from learning everything more quickly but risk forgetting the value of mastery and wisdom. It’s become really easy to watch a YouTube video to learn just about anything; during the pandemic, views of cooking tutorial videos have skyrocketed, and it’s likely the same has happened for instructional videos of all types (including how to cut your own or your partner’s hair!). Since we now have access to information more readily than ever before, we expect to be able to learn things faster. But it still takes a lot of time and dedication to get really good at a skill or become an expert in a given field.
While it’s great to learn new skills quickly, let’s not forget to zoom out and look at the bigger picture. Bhargava recommends finding ways to connect people with knowledge to inspire beliefs, expanding our worldviews and building towards a greater vision—whether for ourselves, our families, or the collective future.
The lines between industries are eroding, leading to a continual disruption of business models, distribution channels, and consumer expectations. This was happening before Covid-19 broke out; Apple was getting into financial services, banks were opening coffee shops, Crayola started making makeup, and Taco Bell opened a hotel (I know right- WHAT?! It’s true though).
Now that everything is closed and we’re confined to our homes, businesses are having to adapt in ways they never imagined—and those that can’t adapt are, unfortunately, in trouble. “Everything about how we do business is shifting,” Bhargava said. And that disruption is happening at an unprecedented pace. Even once the economy opens again—which for many states in the US is happening this week—we won’t go back to how things were in 2019. The only way forward is to adapt.
“We don’t know what’s coming next,” Bhargava said. “But we know that people who can adapt best are non-obvious thinkers who pay attention to what’s happening and try to continue to change.”
Image Credit: Rohit Bhargava by Brian Smale
Good Tuesday morning everyone! Temperatures are currently in the low 70s under partly cloudy skies this morning. This afternoon we will have a 40 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Otherwise it will be mostly sunny, with a high near 85! Winds will be southeast 10 to 15 mph.
TONIGHT: We will have 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms after midnight. Clouds will increase with a low around 67.
☔Grab the umbrella as you head out the door just in case and have a pleasant Tuesday!!
In a different universe there lies a nearly identical version of our fair town of Tupelo. But this version is a bit darker, a bit more mysterious. Strange happenings are just under the shadows, around the corner, and down the stairs.
Sarah Locke, a local who has a history of speaking out about things no one else sees has decided to document her observations. Follow her down the rabbit hole into what may prove more than just her own mind playing tricks.
Produced by OurTupelo. Recorded and Edited by Samantha McLarty and Joshua Ballard.
Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today
Yvonne Moore collects specimen for COVID-19 testing outside of the Aaron E Henry Community Health Services Center in Clarksdale, Miss., Wednesday, March 29, 2020.
As state leaders continue to relax statewide safety measures and businesses reopen, Mississippi reported its highest ever weekly count of COVID-19 cases.
The state health department recorded 1,956 new cases this week, the most total cases for a week in Mississippi. Daily new cases have remained steady all week, whereas prior weeks have shown more day-to-day variability in new cases numbers. The past week is the first to have only one day reporting less than 200 cases: Monday’s 136 cases.
The startling weekly statistics come days after Gov. Tate Reeves announced additional safety restrictions would be relaxed. Reeves has kept a “safer at home” recommendation in place, which suggest that Mississippians stay socially distanced and avoid public places. But his previous orders that closed many businesses across the state have largely been retracted. As of Monday, the only businesses that remain closed because of executive order are indoor entertainment venues such as theaters and museums.
Sundays and Mondays traditionally show lower case counts due to weekend reporting lags from labs. But even with the lags, this week’s numbers have remained high, averaging 279 daily cases, the highest rolling average for any week since the pandemic began. At last count, the health department estimated 69 percent of all cases had recovered, meaning about 3,500 are considered actively contagious.
More than a month ago, officials said the state was likely in a new case plateau, though they warned there was no way to know for sure. Both Gov. Tate Reeves and State Health Officer Thomas Dobbs said that the state has successfully “flattened the curve,” meaning prevented cases from spiking as to not overburden the health care system.
Though hospitalizations have risen over the week, they have remained mostly stable. However, number of new cases are distinct from hospitalizations, and those trends could reverse if cases don’t flatten and continue to spread, especially to those most vulnerable.
Testing has increased over the week, averaging 5,300 daily diagnostic tests over the last four days, potentially accounting for increased cases. Mississippi is now reporting COVID-19 diagnostic tests separately from its reported antibody tests, which look for past infections. Antibody tests account for growing proportion of all COVID tests in the state — now at 6 percent, up from 3 percent mid-week. Since a handful of states have separated out the two tests, their total testing numbers have declined, recovering from the artificial boost of the antibody test inclusion.
Thursday, the Sun Herald reported that the state health department has been aggregating antibody tests and diagnostic tests since antibody testing came online last month, confounding public health experts who question both the reasoning and effect of the unusual methodology decision. At least seven other states and even the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have since admitted the same.
“It does indicate infection, it’s just past infection, so it does give us historical perspective about the total number of cases, so there’s value in it,” Dobbs said Thursday in a press briefing. “We could separate them out. That’s not a big deal. I don’t think it’s an inflation of numbers. It’s just a different mechanism of identifying an infection.”
Dobbs has been emphatic in the past that antibody testing could be useful for understanding how widespread the disease is, but that there are unknowns about its medical value and should be distinct from diagnostic testing.
The two tests measure different snapshots of COVID infection. Viral tests — performed by a DNA nose swab — diagnose a current infection. But serology tests, a blood draw, show the presence of antibodies that the immune system develops to fight off infections, suggesting a former infection.
Antibody tests caught on quickly in the month since they have been available, though experts have warned against reading too much into the tests as it’s not clear what former infections mean for immunity other than helping to identify a true prevalence of the disease. The Food and Drug Administration, which regulates the tests, has warned against reading too much into the tests and recently increased previously lacking standards for the tests.
Quest Diagnostics has performed 975,000 antibody tests nationally as of Monday and offers the test direct-to-consumers, bypassing state health systems. As of Sunday, Mississippi reported 9,057 antibody tests.
The problem with lumping in the two different counts is two-fold. First, it could inflate testing numbers, like is the case in Georgia, if the cases identified through antibody tests are not added to the tally of confirmed cases. Mississippi says they are including antibody-identified cases in the total case count, so the artificial boost in tests should be countered by adding in the cases found.
Dobbs has said antibody tests have shown a 2 percent positive rate, though the health department has not updated the antibody case-identification rate since Thursday. If the 2 percent figure is still accurate, 181 cases in the state have been identified this way over the month, accounting for just 1 percent of the more than 13,000 confirmed cases in the state and 2 percent of the new cases over the past month.
However, adding in those cases begets its own challenge — those 181 reflect previous infections, and don’t help identifying active cases. Because diagnostic and antibody tests measure different things, they are not helpful in the same way to the public or to scientists. At worst, it can be misleading, and at best, it identifies overall disease prevalence but does not aid case-tracing for current infection or help stop active spread by isolating cases.
Despite the inclusion of antibody tests, diagnostic testing alone has ramped up over the week after slowing in previous weeks. The state’s lab reported its most ever single-day tests this week, averaging 730 daily tests. Mississippi has had a consistently high rate of tests compared to other states, ranking 18th in the U.S. — accounting for diagnostic tests only — as of Friday, according to Mississippi Today’s analysis of the COVID Tracking Project’s national data.
The state announced universal testing for long-term care facilities in mid-May, which partially accounts for both the testing increase and the case increase. However, long-term care cases have only slightly edged up over the week — by 204 cases, or 14 percent — less than they increased the week prior at 25 percent.
The post As officials relax safety measures, Mississippi reports highest weekly average for coronavirus cases appeared first on Mississippi Today.
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