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Health April 11, 2017

Civilians With Severe Burns Treated At Texas Military Hospital

Physician assistant James Williams, right, describes the treatment of burn patients as “a very tactile type of medicine.”

Wendy Rigby/TPR

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Wendy Rigby/TPR

The burn unit at the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research in San Antonio, Texas, is hot. Sometimes, it gets up to 102 degrees in there, among the patients.

People with severe burns can’t regulate their own body temperatures well, so the air has to keep them warm.

“We see a lot of gruesome stuff,” says physical therapist Melissa Boddington. At the height of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, more than one thousand wounded service members were flown to the hospital.

The burn center’s mission is to treat members of the military for burns from fire, explosions, chemicals or radiation. The treatments can include skin grafts, amputations and inpatient rehabilitation to regain mobility or learn to live with a body that has changed dramatically.

Rehabilitation often takes months for patients at the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research Burn Center in San Antonio, Texas.

Wendy Rigby/TPR

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Wendy Rigby/TPR

More than 15 years of war have led to major advances in burn care. In one case, a roadside bomb blast in Afghanistan burned more than 97 percent of one Marine’s body. He was flown to San Antonio, and survived.

Thousands of U.S. troops are still in war zones, but with the end of major combat missions in Iraq and Afghanistan and fewer soldiers coming home badly burned, the military burn center is treating more civilians.

Col. Booker King, the director of clinical services, says burn specialists also work with orthopedists, eye doctors or kidney specialists because people who come in with burns often have other serious injuries as well.

Most of the patients treated at the burn center right now are civilians who were burned in car wrecks, house fires, cooking incidents or workplace accidents in the oil industry. Because the hospital is on a military base, Fort Sam Houston, a special dispensation from the Secretary of the Army allows them to be treated there.

Therapists spend much of their time stretching patients to keep them limber as they heal.

Wendy Rigby/TPR

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Wendy Rigby/TPR

70-year-old Marty Wender spent 90 days in the intensive care unit at the burn center after he fell while he was taking a hot shower. He either passed out or hit his head. By the time his wife found him unconscious, he had burns over 20 percent of his body.

“When EMS showed up, they thought I was dead,” he says. “It was across my chest. The biggest burn was on my back and on my right arm and my two hands.”

The staff at the burn center helped Wender recover from his injuries. He lost two fingers.

“It keeps everybody honed, ready to get the job done,” says James Williams, a physician assistant in the burn unit. “It’s a very tactile type of medicine. If you’re not using your skills, you can lose them.”

“[We] treat a 17-year-old who got burned from throwing gas on the grill the same as we would treat a soldier who may have gotten injured in combat,” he explains.

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Sports April 11, 2017

Major League Baseball Implements Rule Changes To Speed Up Play

Major League Baseball announced some rule changes to speed up game play. More radical changes could be coming, but it’s not yet clear whether these new rules will actually work.

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

Major League Baseball is stuck between centuries. Just about everyone agrees that games drag on far too long for the distracted, modern audience. The average major league game takes about three hours and postseason games are much longer. But purists balk at any changes to the game.

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

And a lot of those purists are the players themselves. Commissioner Rob Manfred wanted to really shake things up for the season, like setting time limits between pitches and limiting how often a manager can visit the pitcher’s mound. But the players didn’t agree. A frustrated Manfred spoke to the press back in February.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

ROB MANFRED: I believe it’s a mistake to stick our head in the sand and ignore the fact that our game has changed and continues to change. I’m firmly convinced that our fans, both our avid fans and casual fans, want us to respond to and manage the change that’s going on in the game.

CORNISH: There were some rule changes. The intentional walk is a lot snappier now. Instead of throwing four straight balls to put a dangerous batter on first base, teams now simply signal for the walk.

SHAPIRO: The Chicago Cubs were the first team to do this in a regular season game when they gave a free pass to St. Louis Cardinals star Yadier Molina.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

UNIDENTIFIED ANNOUNCER: Well, remember of course, if there is an intentional walk, there’s no more four pitches. And Molina’s going down to first. They just said to him, we’re going to walk you. So Molina takes off the shin guard, hands the bat, got a little smirk on his face. This is the way it’s going to be done now.

CORNISH: While players and apparently broadcasters try to wrap their heads around the no-pitch intentional walk, Jonah Keri says it won’t impact the game much at all.

JONAH KERI: I think you save 39 seconds per major league game.

SHAPIRO: Keri covers baseball for Sports Illustrated. Commissioner Manfred can make unilateral changes without a blessing from the players’ union next year. But Keri says even the most drastic rule changes aren’t really going to make the game more appealing to younger fans.

KERI: You know, if we’re sitting here talking about, should it be four pitches for an intentional walk, I think that by then, the – you know, the horse is kind of already out of the barn. You’ve got to really go to work on younger fans where they live. You’ve got to figure out, what are their digital tendencies? What do they do for entertainment? And you have to try to get in there and be a part of that conversation.

CORNISH: Yes, change comes slowly to a game steeped in tradition and statistics and the way it’s been played for generations, especially if baseball wants more fans. Perhaps Rob Manfred can get an intern to show him how to make a meme to post on his Twitter feed.

Copyright © 2017 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

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Entertainment April 10, 2017

Today in Movie Culture: Darth Vader vs. Alien vs. Predator, the Sounds of 'Star Wars' and More

Here are a bunch of little bites to satisfy your hunger for movie culture:

Mashup of the Day:

In the latest amazing mashup from Antonio Maria da Silva, Darth Vader fights the Predator, a Xenomorph and his younger self:

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Supercut of the Day:

Art of the Film celebrates the award-winning sound design of the Star Wars movies in this supercut of isolated sound effects:

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Vintage Image of the Day:

Daisy Ridley, who turns 25 today, sits with the rest of the director and main cast of Star Wars: The Force Awakens in an April 2014 photo that feels so much older than it is:

Film Trivia of the Day:

With The Fate of the Furious out in theaters this week, here’s a bunch of trivia about the Fast and the Furious franchise from CineFix:

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Blooper Reel of the Day:

Speaking of The Fate of the Furious, check out some bloopers and B-roll footage from the making of the new sequel:

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Genre Studies Lesson of the Day:

See the evolution of sci-fi cinema in this montage from Pedro Besteiro chronicling the path from The Trip to the Moon to Interstellar:

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Filmmaking Lesson of the Day:

For Frame by Frame, Kyle highlights why Logan is the best Marvel movie ever and why it’s going to look great in black and white:

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Character in Close-Up:

Speaking of Logan, here’s a montage paying tribute to Wolverine’s 17 years on the big screen from fan Oleg Alabin:

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Movie Food of the Day:

In the second episode of Fandor’s Film to Table, Jason Roberts shows us how to make a Cubano sandwich from Chef:

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Classic Trailer of the Day:

Today is the 25th anniversary of Newsies. Watch the original trailer for the cult classic musical below.

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and

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Sports April 10, 2017

U.S., Canada And Mexico Declare Combined Bid To Host The World Cup

U.S. Soccer Federation President Sunil Gulati (center), Canadian CONCACAF President Victor Montagliani (left) and Mexican Football Federation President Decio De Maria present their unified bid for the 2026 World Cup at a news conference in New York City on Monday.

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What’s the best way to bolster your country’s bid for the World Cup?

The U.S., Canada and Mexico have settled on an unprecedented answer to that question: just combine forces. The chiefs of the three countries’ national soccer organizations broke the news in New York City on Monday, announcing their joint bid to host the 2026 men’s World Cup.

“When our nations come together as one, as we will for 2026, there is no question the United States, Mexico and Canada will deliver an experience that will celebrate the game and serve players, supporters and partners alike,” U.S. Soccer Federation President Sunil Gulati said at a news conference.

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Though it would not be the first time countries have split hosting duties (see: the 2002 World Cup), it would be the first time three have done so.

Under the proposal the U.S. would host 60 matches, with Canada and Mexico taking 10 apiece — expanding the slate of venues to accommodate an expanded slate of competitors: Beginning in 2026, FIFA is raising the number of teams to 48 from 32.

The 1994 (U.S.) and 1970 (Mexico) World Cups have two of the four highest average attendances in World Cup history. #WC2026pic.twitter.com/eng30MRhMc

— Paul Carr (@PCarrESPN) April 10, 2017

Given the growth in countries competing — and thus the number of matches they’re competing in — ESPN reports the joint bid is now the odds-on favorite to win. The BBC also notes that because of a rotational policy, European and Asian countries will be barred from bidding for 2026, since Russia and Qatar have already won the right to host the 2018 and 2022 tournaments, respectively.

ESPN explains the next steps:

“All bids must be submitted to FIFA by December 2018. The bids will be evaluated over the next 15 months, with that phase being completed by February 2020. The host or hosts will be chosen in May 2020, before the next U.S. presidential election.”

Asked how the joint bid is viewed by President Trump, who has promised to build a border wall between the U.S. and Mexico, Gulati said at the news conference that Trump was “fully supportive.”

“We don’t believe sport can solve all the issues in the world, but — especially with what’s going on in the world today — we believe this is a hugely positive signal and symbol of what we can do together in unifying people, especially in our three countries,” Gulati said.

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Business April 10, 2017

Have An Airline Complaint? Don't Call The Airline — Tell The Dept. Of Transportation

Passengers at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport wait in line for security screening in May 2016. A study released Monday found that U.S. airline quality is higher than ever, but air travelers may disagree.

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An annual study of airline quality in the U.S. gave airlines the highest scores in the 26 years the rankings have been published.

You may be wondering: How is that possible?

Especially since a story dominating news headlines has to deal with a passengers being forcibly removed from a United flight over the weekend because the airline had overbooked.

Topping the Airline Quality Rating for 2016 were Alaska Airlines, Delta and Virgin America. At the bottom were Frontier, Spirit and ExpressJet. The rankings are based on performance numbers the airlines must report to the U.S. Department of Transportation, as well as complaints made by the public to the DOT about the airlines.

The survey compiles data on four factors: on-time arrivals, involuntary denied boardings, mishandled baggage and customer complaints in 12 categories.

The data show that in 2016, airlines improved on-time arrivals and baggage handling, while reducing denied boardings and consumer complaints.

But the rankings reveal a few details worth examining.

In 2016, 81.4 percent of flights arrived on time, compared with 79.9 percent in 2015. Great news, right? Well, maybe not.

“While [the airlines] aren’t delaying too many flights, they’re canceling a lot of them,” says Brent Bowen, one of the report’s authors and professor and dean of the College of Aviation at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

And it turns out that while airlines have to report their percentage of delayed flights to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, they aren’t required to similarly disclose canceled flights.

Instead, those canceled flights are only captured (if at all) in customer complaints to the DOT.

Still, the survey’s authors give the greatest weight in the rankings to on-time arrivals, because consumers have said that’s what’s most important. “If you do that, you’re good,” says Bowen. “If you don’t, you’re bad.”

But perhaps you find flight delays less annoying than the array of aggravations that fall under the “complaints” rubric — such as fares, canceled and oversold flights, and problems with ticketing. Then you might want to avoid two airlines in particular: Spirit and Frontier. While both airlines had complaints go down since 2015, complaints about those two airlines are significantly higher than the industry average.

Which brings us to the biggest lesson from this survey: If you’re mad at an airline, don’t complain only to the airline. Complain to the Department of Transportation, too.

Only complaints lodged with the DOT are included in surveys like the Airline Quality Rating. So if you call Spirit or Frontier to complain about a litany of fees or a canceled flight, only the airline hears about it. Complaining to the DOT, meanwhile, can potentially lead to bigger changes:

“All complaints are entered in DOT’s computerized aviation industry monitoring system, and are charged to the company in question in the monthly Air Travel Consumer Report. This report is distributed to the industry and made available to the news media and the general public so that consumers and air travel companies can compare the complaint records of individual airlines and tour operators.

These complaints are reviewed to determine the extent to which carriers are in compliance with federal aviation consumer protection regulations. This system also serves as a basis for rulemaking, legislation and research. Where appropriate, letters and web form submissions will be forwarded to an official at the airline for further consideration.”

So what about all those angry calls, emails and tweets that travelers make to airlines each day?

Complaining to the airline “gets the traveling public nothing,” says Bowen. “There is no AAA, no AARP of airline passengers. Travelers don’t have an advocacy with the airlines.”

And without that prominent advocate, conditions for air travelers may not improve.

As NPR’s David Schaper reported in October, the Obama administration proposed new rules aimed at helping air travelers. One rule would require airlines to refund a traveler’s checked baggage fee if luggage is “substantially delayed.” A second would require travel-booking websites, which often rank airlines higher or lower based on undisclosed payments or other business incentives, to disclose any financial links to airlines. A third would require regional carriers such as Allegiant or Air Wisconsin to also report their on-time performance data.

But last month the DOT, now under the Trump administration, suspended the public comment period for those proposed rules, saying, “The suspension of the comment period will allow the President’s appointees the opportunity to review and consider this action.”

2017 Airline Quality Rankings

  1. Alaska Airlines
  2. Delta Air Lines
  3. Virgin America
  4. JetBlue
  5. Hawaiian Airlines
  6. Southwest Airlines
  7. SkyWest Airlines
  8. United Airlines
  9. American Airlines
  10. ExpressJet
  11. Spirit Airlines
  12. Frontier Airlines

2016 Total Complaints to the Department of Transportation for U.S. Airlines, per 100,000 passengers

Alaska: 0.50

American: 2.49

Delta: 0.68

ExpressJet: 0.51

Frontier: 5.94

Hawaiian: 1.16

JetBlue: 0.75

SkyWest: 0.49

Southwest: 0.47

Spirit: 6.74

United: 2.27

Virgin America: 1.85

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Health April 10, 2017

How U.S. Health Care Became Big Business

The current health care system focuses too often on financial incentives over health or science, says Elisabeth Rosenthal in her new book, An American Sickness.

Bill Diodato/Getty Images

Health care is a trillion-dollar industry in America, but are we getting what we pay for? Dr. Elisabeth Rosenthal, a medical journalist who formerly worked as a medical doctor, warns that the existing system too often focuses on financial incentives over health or science.

“We’ve trusted a lot of our health care to for-profit businesses and it’s their job, frankly, to make profit,” Rosenthal says. “You can’t expect them to act like

On the ways the health-care industry stands to profit more from lifetime treatment than it does from curing disease

If you’re a pharmaceutical manufacturer and you have a problem like diabetes, for example, if I invented a pill tomorrow that would cure diabetes — that would kill a multi-billion dollar business market. It’s far better to have treatments, sometimes really great treatments … [that] go on for life. That’s much better than something that will make the disease go away overnight.

On how prices will rise to whatever the market will bear

Another concept that I think is unique to medicine is what economists call “sticky pricing,” which is a wonderful term. It basically means … once one drugmaker, one hospital, one doctor says “Hey we could charge $10,000 for that procedure or that medicine.” Maybe it was $5,000 two months ago, but once everyone sees that someone’s getting away with charging $10,000, the prices all go up to that sticky ceiling. …

What you see often now is when generic drugs come out … the price doesn’t go down to 20 percent of the branded price, it maybe goes down to 90 percent of the branded price. So we’re not getting what we should get from a really competitive market where we, the consumers, are making those choices.

On initiating conversations early on with doctors about fees and medical bills

You should start every conversation with a doctor’s office by asking “Is there a concierge fee? Are they affiliated with a hospital? Which hospital are they affiliated with? Is the office considered part of a hospital?” In which case you’re going to be facing hospital fees in addition to your doctor’s office fees. You ask your doctor always … “If I need a lab test, if I need an X-ray, will you send me to an in-network provider so I don’t get hit by out-of-network fees?” …

Often that will be a little hard for your doctor, because they may have to fill out a different requisition, but it’s worth asking. And any doctor who won’t help you in that way, I think, isn’t attuned to the financial cost that we’re bearing today.

On getting charged for “drive-by doctors” brought in by the hospital or primary doctor

You do have to say “Who are you? Who called you?” and “Am I going to be billed for this?” And it’s tragic that in recovery people have to think in this kind of keep-on-your-guard, somewhat adversarial way, but I think if we don’t push back against the system in the way it bills, we’re complicit in allowing it to continue.

On how to decipher coded medical bills

Don’t be alarmed by the “prompt payment discount.” Go back to the hospital and say, “I want a fully itemized bill. I want to know what I’m paying for.” Some of it will be in codes, some of it will be in medical abbreviations. I’ve discovered you can Google those codes and find out what you’re being charged for, often, and most importantly, you might find you’re being charged for stuff that obviously you know you didn’t have.

Elizabeth Rosenthal is editor-in-chief ofKaiser Health News,an editorially independent news program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and a partner of NPR’s. Neither KFF nor KHN is affiliated with Kaiser Permanente. Radio producer Sam Briger and web producers Bridget Bentz and Molly Seavy-Nesper contributed to this story.

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Sports April 9, 2017

Sergio García Bests Justin Rose To Win Masters, His First Major Championship

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Sergio García of Spain reacts after making his birdie putt on the 18th green to win the Masters golf tournament after a playoff against Englishman Justin Rose on Sunday in Augusta, Ga.

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Matt Slocum/AP

Golfer Sergio García of Spain slipped on the green jacket after a dramatic finish over Englishman Justin Rose at the 81st Masters in Augusta, Ga., on Sunday.

Before the sudden-death playoff, García trailed Rose by two shots with six holes remaining.

The Associated Press reports:

Rose sent his first playoff drive into the trees on 18 and managed to punch out before failing to sink a 15-foot par putt.

That opened the door for García to win the title by two-putting from 12 feet out.

García wasted no time wrapping up the Masters, sinking a birdie putt before crouching in disbelief while hearing chants of “Ser-gee-oh! Ser-gee-oh!” from the gallery.

Rose patted his opponent on the cheek before they embraced.

García and Rose began the final round tied for the lead before carding 3-under 69s to finish at minus-9.

“I’m going to enjoy it for the rest of my life,” García said after winning his first major championship.

Rose said, “If there’s anyone to lose to, it’s Sergio. He deserves it. He’s had his share of heartbreak.”

NPR’s Tom Goldman tells our Newscast unit:

An ecstatic García forever crossed off his name from the list of best golfers never to win a major.

Thirty-seven-year-old García is in the top-10 in career prize money, but he played in 70 major tournaments as a pro without a victory.

Several years ago he said he wasn’t good enough to win a major — that changed Sunday after García and Rose battled to the end.

García is the third Spaniard to don a green jacket, joining the late Seve Ballesteros and José María Olazábal.

The final round duel also was notable for its sportsmanship.

Several times García and Rose applauded each other for great shots.

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Business April 9, 2017

Farmers Look For Ways To Circumvent Tractor Software Locks

Farmers are lobbying for the ability to buy software to fix their equipment, and some are hacking their way around the problem.

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Seth Perlman/AP

A new tractor often costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, but one thing not included in that price is the right to repair it. That has put farmers on the front lines of a battle pitting consumers against the makers of all kinds of consumer goods, from tractors to refrigerators to smartphones.

Modern tractors, essentially, have two keys to make the engine work. One key starts the engine. But because today’s tractors are high-tech machines that can steer themselves by GPS, you also need a software key — to fix the programs that make a tractor run properly. And farmers don’t get that key.

“You’re paying for the metal but the electronic parts technically you don’t own it. They do,” says Kyle Schwarting, who plants and harvests fields in southeast Nebraska.

He previously ran auto shops fixing cars and trucks. So when he started farming, he thought he’d be a natural to do the mechanical work himself.

Even a used combine like his Deere S670 can cost $200,000 or $300,000. As he lifts the side panel on this giant green harvester, he explains that the engine is basically off limits.

“Maybe a gasket or something you can fix, but everything else is computer controlled and so if it breaks down I’m really in a bad spot,” Schwarting says. He has to call the dealer.

Only dealerships have the software to make those parts work, and it costs hundreds of dollars just to get a service call. Schwarting worries about being broken down in a field, waiting for a dealer to show up with a software key. If he had that key, he could likely fix the machine himself.

Schwarting says some farmers want this software so badly, they’re using a pirated version from Europe to basically hack their way into their own tractors.

Kyle Schwarting farms near Ceresco, Neb. As a former auto mechanic, he was surprised to learn the software needed to fix tractors isn’t available like it is for cars.

Grant Gerlock /NET News

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Grant Gerlock /NET News

“You know, without getting too self-incriminating there’s countries out there that have this software,” Schwarting says and laughs. “You got to keep going when you got to keep going and guys are going to find a way no matter what they have to do to do it.”

Gay Gordon-Byrne heads The Repair Association, a group advocating for consumers to be able repair the products they buy. While she didn’t know farmers were hacking tractors she isn’t surprised.

“It’s not extreme,” she says. “I mean, if you have something and you can’t fix it and you get on the Internet and find a way to fix it, I don’t blame anyone for trying it.”

But she says there should be an honest way to do it. Eight states, including Nebraska, Illinois and New York are considering bills requiring manufacturers to sell repair software. Not only for tractors but also phones, computers and appliances.

Car makers started selling repair software after a similar law passed in Massachusetts. The U.S. Copyright Office says it is legal for consumers to repair most products, but Gordon-Byrne says manufacturers can get around that with user agreements. Inside those end-user license agreements that we sign, “there’s things like you won’t open the case, you won’t repair,” she says.

Andy Goodman of the Iowa-Nebraska Equipment Dealers Association says there’s a good reason for that: farmers could damage the machines, like bypassing pollution emissions controls to get more horsepower. That could put dealers in a difficult position.

“When we resell that machine we have guaranteed to someone that it’s going to perform within certain standards,” Goodman says. “Those that are stated by the manufacturer but also those that are required under law.”

Of course, equipment dealers have also cornered the repair market. And as tractor sales slump, their businesses rely even more on service calls.

Schwarting says when the farm economy was strong a few years ago, farmers could afford to call the dealer and share the wealth. But it’s lean times for most farmers now.

“Guys can’t afford to do that anymore,” he says. “Three-dollar corn doesn’t buy new combines very fast. So, guys are going to have to work on them.”

Because when a farmer spends hundreds of thousands of dollars for a tractor, he’d like to save some money on the repair bill.

Grant Gerlockis a reporter at NPR member NET News. Thisstory comes to us fromHarvest Public Media, a reporting collaboration focused on food and agriculture.

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Business April 8, 2017

Fresh Express Recalls Batch After Dead Bat Found In Prepackaged Salad

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Fresh Express announced a recall of a “limited distribution” of its prepackaged Organic Marketside Spring Mix, after two people from Florida found an unwelcome organism in one container.

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An unwelcome discovery by a couple of salad eaters included a sordid new ingredient.

On Saturday, the company Fresh Express announced a precautionary recall of some of its prepackaged salad mixes, after two people in Florida say they found a dead bat in their leafy greens.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the two had eaten some of the product before finding the decomposed organism in a 5-ounce clear container of the Organic Marketside Spring Mix.

But “out of an abundance of caution,” Fresh Express says in a statement, all Organic Marketside Spring Mix salads from that production lot are subject to the recall.

The mix in question was distributed exclusively to Walmart stores located in the Southeastern region of the U.S. Walmart has since pulled the product from its shelves, the company adds, and no other Marketside salads are included in the recall.

Florida health officials, the FDA and the CDC have launched an investigation into the matter.

Due to the animal’s decayed condition, the CDC couldn’t immediately rule out whether this particular bat carried rabies, but recommended the two people who ate the contaminated salad receive treatment for the disease.

“Both people report being in good health and neither has any signs of rabies,” the CDC says.

The deadly rabies virus is endemic to bats across the U.S., but is rarely contracted by humans. And, as the CDC points out, transmission through consuming an infected animal is “extremely uncommon.” The agency adds that it hasn’t heard of any other cases of bat material found in packaged salads.

“People who have eaten the recalled salad product and did not find animal material are not at risk and do not need to contact their health department,” the CDC advises.

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Sports April 8, 2017

Saturday Sports: Baseball's Back And Golden State Warriors On Winning Streak

NPR’s Scott Simon speaks with Howard Bryant of ESPN.com about spring season beginnings for baseball and the NBA playoffs.

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

It’s time for sports.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SIMON: Springtime and birds chirp, flowers bloom and the Cubs are back in blue, and everyone else is suddenly coming for them. Howard Bryant of espn.com and ESPN The Magazine joins us as always. Howard, thanks so much for being with us.

HOWARD BRYANT: Oh, good morning, Scott. I am – I’m afraid of that mesmerizing, intimidating voice of yours right there. They are coming for the Cubs, aren’t they?

SIMON: Yeah. Well, it’s one of the first…

BRYANT: It’s not something you get to say very often.

SIMON: (Laughter) I’ve – not in 108 years. All right. What are you looking forward to in this baseball season?

BRYANT: I’m looking forward to seeing how the Cubs respond. They are the best team in baseball. They’re the world champions, as we finally get to say after all this time. They were the best (unintelligible)…

SIMON: I’m sorry. I – we had a bad connection. Could you say that again?

BRYANT: (Laughter) Say that again.

SIMON: Yeah.

BRYANT: The World Champion Chicago Cubs.

SIMON: Oh, now I hear it. Go ahead, Howard, yes.

BRYANT: And so actually for the last two years, they’ve been the best team in baseball and now in a third. It’s one of the things that is very, very difficult to do in the National League especially, which is to win a championship after winning a championship – repeating. It hasn’t happened in 40 – more than 40 years. The last team to do it was the Big Red Machine, 1975 and ’76.

SIMON: Wow.

BRYANT: In the American League, we’ve seen it. The Yankees have done it. The Toronto Blue Jays have done it. But in the National League, very, very difficult. So to see how the Cubs respond, to see how they deal with being champions, to see if that fire is still there and all the luck that happens too that you need to win, the Cubs are going to be – they were a story last year, and they’re going to be a story again this year.

SIMON: Yeah. My family and I are going to be at the game in Wrigley Field, first game, home game, on Monday night. And if Joe Maddon is listening, I’m ready. OK, Joe? Just signal me in the stands. I’m ready any day. You know, I can pitch, I can pinch hit, whatever.

BRYANT: Angling to get on the field yet again, Scott Simon.

SIMON: Yes, absolutely. Let’s go to basketball. In the East, the Cleveland Cavaliers took apart the Boston Celtics. In the West, the Golden State Warriors have won thu, thu, thu, thu (ph) 13 games in a row. Kevin Durant should return tonight. Are we looking at another Cleveland-Golden State matchup down the road?

BRYANT: Well, it looked pretty bad for a while for the Cavaliers because they hadn’t been playing well. They hadn’t been doing the things that they had done. But then again, who do they have? They’ve got the best player in the game. They’ve got LeBron James. And when you have LeBron James on your team, suddenly all of your ailments can go away in a night. And they went out to Boston last Wednesday, and they destroyed the Celtics, who were tied with them for first place in the East. And you have the Warriors who didn’t even have Kevin Durant because he was injured, and they go out and win 13 in a row without him. And now he’s back tonight, and once again, it looks like the question is going to be what it’s been the last two years. Can anybody beat these two teams four times before they meet each other? It’s never happened in the NBA history before where you’ve got two teams that meet for a championship three straight years. So this is pretty remarkable.

It’s no question that the best team in the NBA is the Golden State Warriors. And they are the team to beat. But LeBron James has been to the NBA Finals six straight years, and he’s doing something that Michael Jordan never did. He’s doing something that only Bill Russell had done before, to go to the finals this many times. It’s a fascinating matchup because you would like to think that somebody could challenge these two teams. But right now, they are head and shoulders above everybody else. In the West, it’ll be fun to see what happens. In the East, I think that once LeBron starts to go into that playoff gear, I don’t think anybody can beat him.

SIMON: He’s kind of been saving himself, hasn’t he?

BRYANT: Well, he has to. He’s got a lot of miles. You forget that he’s been in the game since 2003, and yet, he still keeps carrying the franchise. I want to see it. I think everybody wants to see it, unless you’re in San Antonio, but Warriors Cavaliers three will be fantastic.

SIMON: All right. Howard Bryant of espn.com and ESPN The Magazine. Thanks so very much, Howard. Talk to you soon.

BRYANT: My pleasure.

(SOUNDBITE OF COREY HENRY’S “TELL YA MAMA NEM”)

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