TYLER, Texas (KETK) – The Miracle League, which offers opportunities for young athletes with physical limitations to participate in baseball, is coming to Tyler.

The Miracle League is partnering with the City of Tyler to open up a field at Faulkner Park. The field is expected to open on June 14 and will feature an exhibition game along with a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by former MLB players.

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The field will be tailored to allow athletes with a number of different kinds of physical limitations to enjoy baseball. In order to make the field more accessible, the bases are flat and smooth, preventing tripping hazards. The field is also designed to allow athletes in wheelchairs or other kinds of physical disabilities to compete on the field.

The games will also be conducted on a buddy system as they will pair each athlete with a ‘buddy’ who will help them navigate the game. Each player’s ‘buddy’ will be an athlete from a local high school or college who will make sure the players are safe and having a good time while allowing parents to set back and enjoy the game while getting to know other parents.

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The process of bringing the Miracle League to Smith County began in 2020. The project was headed by Casey Bryans, the President of the Miracle League of Tyler. The Miracle League is especially meaningful to Bryans due to his own son participating in the league during his youth.

After getting the opportunity to watch his son compete in the Miracle League, Bryans now wants to provide that opportunity to East Texans.

“Our desire is for every child who can play on a traditional baseball field to play on our field,” Bryans said. “There are literally thousands of kids in Smith County who can play on our field.”

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Bryans emphasized how the league will strive to create a sense of community in Tyler for families who want to provide their children with a chance who may not have the opportunity in the past to compete in youth sports and be a member of a team.

“This is about an opportunity for kids who may not have had the opportunity to be in a team in the past,” Bryans said. “An opportunity for them to come together and make friends. An opportunity for parents to come together and watch their kids have fun.”

The league hopes to provide more than just baseball to the athletes. It wants to provide them with purpose and fulfillment while also raising awareness across East Texas.

“Baseball is great, and we were so excited we were going to play baseball, but there is so much more than that,” Bryans said. “We have the opportunity to build friendships, relationships and just bring awareness to athletes in Texas.”

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Those who want to look into signing their children up for the Miracle League or seeking to volunteer can learn how the Miracle League website.

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The North Country spent part of the Memorial Day weekend gathering hundreds of athletes for race day around Cumberland Bay.

The Lake City Running Festival returned for its third straight year. Close to 400 athletes from around Northern New York gave it their all to complete the course from start to finish.

“Mentally, I told myself I was going to do this the past year,” said Peter Reynolds from Chateaugay, N.Y. “It was a really good feeling to say I finally did, and now I’ve done one bucket list item to cross off.”

Participants got to run or walk in a 5 kilometer (KM), 10 kilometer (KM) or half marathon. Everyone started and finished at the Plattsburgh City beach, while running right alongside Lake Champlain. Those who participated in the half marathon ran as far as the U.S. Oval Park before finishing their 13.1-mile loop back to the city beach.

Julia Ennis, a participant from Plattsburgh, N.Y., participated in the 10 KM run and said she enjoyed taking in all the sights the course had to offer.

“Overall, a lot of fun,” Ennis said. “The trial, everything along the water was awesome … I really enjoyed all the bystanders cheering us along the way.”

While the fans brought their energy to the athletes, the Lake City Running Festival knew the importance of also keeping the energy levels of their runners high. Volunteers were scattered across various mile markers providing Gatorade and water to keep everyone moving. One team who dedicated their time to support was the Lake Champlain Waves, a local youth swim team which features middle and high school athletes from all over Clinton County, N.Y.

“We’re here to support our local runners,” said Maddison Mero, one of the volunteers from the Lake Champlain Waves Swim team. “It’s super important. We don’t want anything bad to happen to them on their race. We want them to be as comfortable as they can running or walking.”

The Waves are one local team who was directly impacted by the race year after year. Proceeds collected from the Lake City Running Festival are donated to North Country Health and Wellness (NCHW) an organization which provides scholarship funds for local youth athletes to support their financial needs to compete for sports clubs and teams like the Lake Champlain Waves.

“We really want to help some low-income kids that might not be able to afford to do club sports,” said NCHW president Hayden Reidy. “They might not be able to afford uniforms or anything like that for school sports, so we give scholarships to those kids to help them do those types of things.”

At the conclusion of all the running, an after-party featuring food and music took place at the Plattsburgh City beach. Adirondack Foord Therapy provided the snacks which accompanied live music performance by Abi Allen, a local musician from Peru, N.Y.

“It just keeps people here a little bit longer,” Reidy said. “Keeps them outside, gets them more active.”

Reidy, who has been the Lake City Running Festival director for the past three years, hopes to bring back the race for many years to come. It all comes down to more new runners signing up and returning runners coming back, who are on board with supporting an important cause.

“It makes it even better,” Reynolds said. “Helping the kids out and doing stuff for a good cause, that’s a big part of it.”

It’s a cause that also hits home for Ennis. The former Plattsburgh State women’s soccer goalie knows how important fundraising events like these are to supporting a sports team.

“As a former athlete myself, I understand how much fundraising helps,” Ennis said. “Donations and support really help the young athletes … any opportunity I have to give back to them is awesome.”

The Lake City Running Festival is expected to make its return to Plattsburgh in 2026.

With summer right around the corner, some Chicago teenagers on Saturday were calling out city leaders over a plan to allow police to impose so-called “snap curfews.”

Although a final vote has been delayed until next month, the City Council has advanced an ordinance that would allow Police Supt. Larry Snelling to declare temporary curfews anywhere in the city for up to 3 hours on as little as 30 minutes’ notice in an effort to stop teen takeovers.

Police could declare the curfews when any gathering of 20 people in public “is likely to result in, substantial harm to the safety of the community or others, or substantial damage to property, or substantial injuries to a person, including participants, or in a manner that otherwise presents or causes, or in a manner that is likely to present or cause, substantial harm to public health, safety, or welfare.”

Critics have said the ordinance is unconstitutional, and would subject Black and Brown teens to over-policing, and open the city up to lawsuits and police misconduct payouts.

The BRAVE Youth Leaders, an anti-violence youth program at St. Sabina church, said the city instead should provide more extensive youth programs instead of focusing on tightening curfew laws.

St. Sabina Academy alum Alexander Smith said youth curfews “may seem like an easy answer to the problem of youth violence, but in reality they are a temporary solution; one that only addresses the symptoms, but not the cause of the issue.”

“What truly makes a difference is meaningful community engagement. We need to invest in youth programs that have mentorships, that teach youth life skills,” he said.

St. Sabina was hosting a “peace carnival” and youth basketball tournament over the Memorial Day weekend.

Organizers said such events give teens a place to safe place to gather and interact with positive role models.

CINCINNATI — Cincinnati Bearcats catcher Kory Klingenback grew up with the same goal many young ballplayers in the area have.

“Cincinnati kids want to play for Cincinnati,” Klingenback said.

It wasn’t an easy path, but Klingenback is living out his dream.

“They didn’t really look at me out of high school. I had the opportunity to come here after junior college. It was just surreal to me that it all came true… what this place means to me is quite insane,” Klingenback said.

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“When he comes out of that locker room every day, it doesn’t matter if he went 4-for-4 the last day; he’s going to give me a smile, he’s going to give me a ‘how you doing, coach?’ He’s going to say ‘coach, you look good today.’ I know he’s lying, but that’s OK,” Cincinnati baseball head coach Jordan Bischel said.

Inside baseball, Klingenback is what’s known as the ultimate “clubhouse guy.”

“I just want to play for the city and help these guys win as much as I can,” Klingenback said.

Last season, he only had one hit.

“I really didn’t want to play baseball anymore after last year,” Klingenback said.

“What’s awesome about Kory is when you’re a junior and get one hit at this level, you do one thing and you transfer out. You go somewhere else where you’re going to play more,” Bischel said.

“My family was here. I had all the support here. He came up to me last year in Texas, when we lost to Texas Tech, and he said, I gave him a hug and he said, ‘I want you back here.’ And that really hit me,” Klingenback said.

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“You have to get his; you have to strike people out, you have to do those things to win. But you need 40 guys who believe in what they are doing and who don’t make it about themselves,” Bischel said.

Klingenback said it’s all for the Queen City.

“It’s just for this place, it’s for Cincinnati. I just love it so much. I just love everybody around it,” Klingenback said.

Because of the game that raised him, after his baseball career ends this spring, the Elder High School alum will continue to serve the city he loves by joining the Cincinnati Fire Department.

“I just want to help the guy next to me, the guy to the left, the guy to the right,” Klingenback said.

Before he trades in his catcher’s mask for a fire helmet, Klingenback has postseason baseball to worry about. The Bearcats are awaiting to find out if and where they will play in their first NCAA regional since 2019.

“The signs on the wall (that show the Bearcats’ postseason accomplishments) back there haven’t been updated in a while,” Klingenback said.

Bischel said Klingenback has helped the Bearcats “win a heck of a lot more games than most people realize.”

“I want to leave this place better than I found it when I first got here,” Klingenback said.

Jeff Reddoor demonstrates his stone etching work. He’ll be at Pipestone National Monument May 24 through May 30 as part of the Monument’s artist-in-residence program. Contributed photo

Jeff Reddoor will be the first of four Indigenous artists who will share their work at Pipestone National Monument this year as part of an artists-in-residence program. Reddoor will display and demonstrate his work from May 24 through May 30.

Reddoor said he comes from a family of artists and he’s been making art as long as he can remember. His art has included oils, acrylic, pen and ink, earrings, key chains, wood carving, stone etching and more.

“I’ve done all kinds of art, but what my passion has been the last several years and what I enjoy doing the most is wood carving, and I carve fish, I carve trout,” Reddoor said.

Reddoor uses primarily basswood and red cedar for his trout, which he said take hundreds of hours each. He paints some of them with great detail to make them look as authentic as possible. He also carves rocks from cedar to look like the river bottom under the fish and pinyon pine for stands to hold the fish.
“I love the look of pinyon pine,” Reddoor said. “When it’s sanded and shined, it just has this beautiful, raw look to it that really complements the fish.”
Trout are a subject he knows well as an avid fly fisherman.

“I like to go do research work, which means I like to go fishing,” he said with a laugh. “I tell my wife, ‘I’ve got to go do some research,’ and just disappear and go fly fishing all day.”

He said he also enjoys hunting and often hunts stones and wood to use in his artwork as he’s hunting animals.
Reddoor said he plans to demonstrate his stone art while he’s at Pipestone National Monument. He said he uses slate native to Utah, where he lives, that has red, gray and purple in it, and uses a scraper to etch images such as symbols, feathers and wildlife into the stone. He said that work has “more of a southwestern tone” to it.

Reddoor said he also plans to bring a family pipe made of pipestone with him during his visit. He said his family has been the pipe carrier for the Assiniboine Tribe and the pipe has been in his family for around 60 years. His father, Courtney Reddoor, made it and carried it until he died. Then his brother, Stormy Reddoor, carried it, and now he does.

“It’s absolutely beautiful,” Reddoor said. “It’s got an eagle’s head on it.”

In addition to making visual art, Reddoor is a performing artist, who plays the guitar and flute. He plans to play some Native flute music while he’s at Pipestone National Monument.

Reddoor’s family is originally from Poplar, Mont., which is on the Fort Peck Reservation. He and his family now live in Fillmore in central Utah, where his wife of 40 years, Tammy, is from. They have seven children, including two they recently adopted.

Reddoor is retired after a 40-year career with the state of Utah, which concluded with him serving as the director of the Utah State Building Board. He said he now spends most of his time making artwork and music, and hunting and fishing.

Other Indigenous artists who will share their work during week-long residencies at Pipestone National Monument over the summer include Holly Young from June 21 to 27, John Knife Sterner from July 25 to 31 and Marlena Myles from August 23 to 29. For more information, call 507-825-5464 ext. 214 or visit the park website at www.nps.gov/pipe. Event details and program schedules will also be posted on the park’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/PipestoneNPS.

This is a sample of the stone etching done by Jeff Reddoor, who will be sharing and demonstrating his art work at Pipestone National Monument from May 24 to May 30. Reddoor is from Utah and is the first of four Indigenous artists to be featured this year during Pipestone National Monument’s artist-in-residence program. Contributed photo

This is one of the trout carved and painted by Jeff Reddoor, who will be the first of four Indigenous artists featured at Pipestone National Monument this summer. In addition to wood carving, he does stone etching, bead work and more. Contributed photo

These are some of the earrings made by Jeff Reddoor, who will be the first of four Indigenous artists at Pipestone National Monument this summer as part of the Monument’s artist-in-residence program. He’ll be demonstrating his work there May 24 through May 30. Contributed photo