Thunder ace Westbrook out for month after knee surgery

LOS ANGELES - Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook, the 2017 NBA Most Valuable Player, will miss the next four weeks recovering from arthroscopic right knee surgery, the team announced Wednesday.

The 29-year-old American, a two-time NBA scoring champion and seven-time NBA All-Star, will be re-evaluated in about four weeks -- or less than a week before the Thunder visits defending champion Golden State for an October 16 opening-night game.

"The Thunder, Westbrook and his representation determined after he experienced inflammation in his knee this past weekend that the best course of action was the proactive procedure," a statement from the Thunder said.

The operation was performed by Neal ElAttrache in Los Angeles with Thunder medical personnel present.

Westbrook suffered a right knee injury in the 2013 playoffs and underwent three operations on the knee that year. He has missed only 20 games over the past four regular seasons.

The Thunder are expected to turn to German guard Dennis Schroder to replace Westbrook in training camp, which begins September 24, and the pre-season schedule. Schroder was traded from Atlanta to Oklahoma City in July.

Westbrook averaged a triple-double for the second consecutive campaign -- an unprecedented NBA feat -- with 25.4 points, an NBA-best 10.3 assists and 10.1 rebounds last season.

Westbrook, the fourth overall pick in the 2008 NBA Draft, averaged career highs of 31.6 points, 10.7 rebounds and 10.4 assists last season. In 10 NBA campaigns, all with the Thunder, he has averaged 23.0 points, 6.6 rebounds and 8.2 assists a game.

The Thunder landed swingman Paul George in the off-season while parting ways with Carmelo Anthony.

js/rcw

source: news.abs-cbn.com

He kissed Katy Perry and didn't really like it

NEW YORK - For many young men inexperienced in romance, having one's first kiss with none other than Katy Perry would presumably be a welcome prospect.

Not so for Benjamin Glaze -- a 20-year-old from Oklahoma who showed visible discomfort when kissed by the pop superstar as she served in her new role as a judge on talent show "American Idol."


Glaze explained on an episode broadcast this week that he had never kissed anyone before and had wanted to save the experience for a relationship.

His remark came after country star Luke Bryan, a fellow judge on the show, phrased as a question one of Perry's most famous lyrics: "Have you kissed a girl and liked it?"

Perry beckoned over Glaze and invited him for a kiss, which he delivered on her cheek. She followed up by quickly smacking him right on the lips. Blaze voiced shock and stumbled through his song before being dismissed by the judges.

Perry's forwardness, while in line with the playful behavior of television personalities, triggered a flurry of commentary on social media -- with some accusing her of sexual harassment amid the newfound focus on consent in the #MeToo movement.

Speaking to The New York Times, Glaze said he was raised in a conservative family and had felt "uncomfortable immediately" as "I wanted my first kiss to be special."

As the story generated growing commentary, Glaze on Wednesday went to Facebook to criticize the media coverage and said he was not complaining about Perry.

"I do not think I was sexually harassed by Katy Perry and I am thankful for the judges comments and critiques," he wrote.

"I was uncomfortable in a sense of how I have never been kissed before and was not expecting it.

"My main goal is to reach people through the universal love of music and not cause strife or anger against anyone or about any situation!"

sct/ska

source: news.abs-cbn.com

SLIDESHOW: Meet newly crowned Miss USA Olivia Jordan

Olivia Jordan of Oklahoma was crowned Miss USA at the 64th edition of the annual pageant held on Sunday (Monday in Manila).

Jordan, an actress and graduate of Boston University, will represent the United States in the upcoming Miss Universe pageant.

Here are some photos of Jordan during the just-concluded Miss USA contest.

Mobile users can view the desktop version of the slideshow here.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

 

 

Three storm chasers killed by Oklahoma tornado

CHICAGO – Three veteran storm chasers were killed while pursuing powerful tornadoes that tore through the US state of Oklahoma, a relative said Sunday.

Tim Samaras, his son Paul and their storm-chasing partner Carl Young died Friday in a twister in El Reno, west of Oklahoma City.

They were the first storm researchers ever killed while chasing tornadoes, media reports said, citing the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.

“They all unfortunately passed away but doing what they LOVED,” the elder Samaras’s brother Jim Samaras said on his Facebook page.

Tony Laubach, a fellow participant in the Tactical Weather Instrumented Sampling in Tornadoes Experiment, or TWISTEX, that Samaras founded, mourned the “devastating loss to the meteorological, research and storm-chasing communities.”

Samaras’s instruments are said to have offered the first-ever glimpse inside a tornado, and TWISTEX aimed to learn more about the storms in order to help increase the lead time in warnings.

A series of tornadoes battered Oklahoma with high winds, heavy rain and large hail, causing at least 11 fatalities in a state already reeling from a monster twister that claimed two dozen lives last month.

Debris from the chasers’ vehicle was strewn about half a mile (0.8 kilometers), Canadian County Undersheriff Chris West told AFP.

Only one of the bodies was recovered from the vehicle. The two others were found about a quarter of a mile in either direction.

Crews hauled away a badly mangled white truck with its windows smashed and its body crushed and twisted almost beyond recognition.

“Tim was a courageous and brilliant scientist who fearlessly pursued tornadoes and lightning in the field in an effort to better understand these phenomena,” National Geographic executive vice president Terry Garcia said in a statement.

The Washington-based institution had provided 18 grants to Samaras for his research.

It said he developed his interest in twisters after watching the film “The Wizard of Oz” when he was just six years old. The movie begins with a tornado sweeping heroine Dorothy and her dog Toto away to Munchkinland in Oz.

“Though we sometimes take it for granted, Tim’s death is a stark reminder of the risks encountered regularly by the men and women who work for us,” Garcia said.

Samaras developed probes to measure the environment inside tornadoes. Researchers had to place the probes in the path of the storm and then escape before being swept away.

He measured the lowest barometric pressure drop ever recorded (100 millibars) at the tornado’s center, saying that was equivalent to “stepping into an elevator and hurtling up 1,000 feet (305 meters) in 10 seconds.”

Samaras was also known as a star on the Discovery Channel’s show “Storm Chasers,” which ended last year.

His brother Jim Samaras said the storm chaser “looked at tornadoes not for the spotlight of TV, but for the scientific aspect.”

“At the end of the day, he wanted to save lives and he gave the ultimate sacrifice for that,” he told The Denver Post.

His final message on the social media site Twitter warned: “Storms now initiating south of Watonga along triple point. Dangerous day ahead for OK–stay weather savvy!”

And despite the big risks the storm chaser often took, Samaras was known to be very cautious and to pay attention to safety.

“He knew where not to be and in this case the tornado took a clear turn toward them,” Jim Samaras said.

Weather Channel anchor and meteorologist Mike Bettes had a close call himself in Oklahoma’s storms, and described them as highly unpredictable.

The tornado swept up the truck he was traveling in with a crew, throwing it 200 yards (meters) into a field and smashing it to the ground.

“I think this was just an erratic tornado. I think the size of it and the speed of it changed very, very quickly,” Bettes told CNN.

Bettes said the frightening experience left him unsure of whether he would ever chase storms again.

In a post on Facebook four days before he died, Tim Samaras wished fellow storm chasers well.

“Everyone enjoy the chase — and hope that tornadoes wander over open country,” he wrote.

“Most of all, I reflect and appreciate the freedom this incredible country has to offer, and the ultimate sacrifices so many have made to make it happen.”

source: newsinfo.inquirer.net

Five killed in Oklahoma tornadoes, storms move northeast

OKLAHOMA CITY - Tornadoes killed five people in central Oklahoma including a mother and her baby and menaced Oklahoma City and its hard-hit suburb of Moore, before the storm system tracked northeast early on Saturday.

The National Weather Service said the severe weather threat would shift into neighboring Illinois and Missouri, where Governor Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency on Friday.

The tornadoes struck just 11 days after a twister ranked as EF5, the most powerful ranking possible, tore through Moore and killed 24 people.

The mother and baby were killed on Friday while traveling on Interstate 40, just west of Oklahoma City, when their vehicle was picked up by the storm and they were sucked out of it, said Betsy Randolph, spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Highway Patrol.

The interstate was shut down due to the storm, with multiple crashes and injuries.

Two of the five deaths in Oklahoma on Friday occurred in Union City and one was in El Reno, in rural areas west of Oklahoma City, said Amy Elliott, a spokeswoman for the state Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. She could not confirm where the other deaths took place.

Over 40 people were being treated for storm-related injuries - including five in critical condition, among them a child, according to the Oklahoma-based Integris Health hospital system.

Meteorologists had earlier declared a tornado emergency for parts of the Oklahoma City metropolitan area, and at one point they posted a tornado warning for Moore.

Moore had limited damage from the latest storm activity, said a police dispatcher for the city.

A tornado rampaged down Interstate 40 toward Oklahoma City, tipping over trucks and hurling hay bales, a witness said. Television images showed downed power lines and tossed cars as the storm systems dumped at least 3 inches of rain, stranding motorists in flood water.

"For reasons that are not clear to me, more people took to the roads, more than we expected. Everyone acted differently in this storm, and as a result, it created an extremely dangerous situation," said Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett.

"I think we are still a little shaken by what happened in Moore. We are still burying children and victims, so our emotions are still strong," he added.

Brandi Vanalphen, 30, was among the hundreds of drivers trapped on traffic-snarled roads as she attempted to flee the tornado system menacing the suburb of Norman.

"What got me scared was being stuck in traffic with sirens going off," she said. "I started seeing power flashes to the north, and I said 'screw this.' I started driving on the shoulder. People started driving over the grass."

Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin told CNN that motorists faced great danger when stuck on any freeway in the path of a twister.

"What we saw from the tornadoes that came through Moore and the other ones last week was that people who were in cars on the Interstate were killed," Fallin told CNN.

CITYWIDE FLOODING

Tim Oram, meteorologist for the National Weather Service, said it was difficult to know exactly how many tornadoes had touched down, but three major thunderstorms with the potential to produce tornadoes moved through the center of the state.

The service later lifted a tornado warning for Oklahoma City and surrounding areas, as flash floods in the wake of the storms dunked parts of the sprawling metropolitan area - home to more than 1.3 million people - under water.

Storms also swept into neighboring Missouri, where Governor Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency on the heels of what he said was several days of heavy rain.

Winds turned over semi-trailer trucks on Interstate 70 between St. Louis and St. Charles County to the west, said Brett Lord-Castillo, spokesman for the St. Louis County Emergency Management Agency.

Hollywood Casino in Maryland Heights was evacuated when part of its roof was blown off, Lord-Castillo said. No deaths or serious injuries were reported in the greater St. Louis area.

Power utilities Oklahoma Gas and Electric and Ameren said 200,000 customers were without power in Oklahoma, Missouri and Illinois, which had been under a tornado warning on Thursday.

On Thursday, storms in Oklahoma and Arkansas killed at least three people, including Scott County, Arkansas, Sheriff Cody Carpenter, whose body was recovered early on Friday, said a spokesman for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.

A man also died in Tull, Arkansas, when a tree fell on his car, and a woman's body was found in flood waters in Scott County on Friday.

Large, long-lasting thunderstorms known as supercells are responsible for producing the strongest tornadoes, along with large hail and other dangerous winds.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Kristin Chenoweth comes home for country album

NEW YORK - She has played a witch in "Wicked," a lush on "Glee" and a deputy press secretary on "The West Wing," but actress Kristin Chenoweth's latest project is nowhere near a Broadway stage or TV screen. She is returning to her Oklahoma roots, singing country songs.

Due September 13, "Some Lessons Learned," is comprised of 13 songs that cast the pint-sized blonde into a musical genre that makes perfect sense for her signature high pitch voice. Country music, she told Reuters, fits her "naturally."

"It's the closest to home that I could get," she said. "Someone asked me 'why a country record, why now? ' Well, it's because it's been going on since I was about five."

Born in and raised in the Tulsa, Okla. suburb of Broken Arrow, Chenoweth's earliest experiences with country music came from watching her great uncle play bluegrass. From there, she sang country songs in church and at rodeos. She idolized Dolly Parton and even spent a summer when she was 19 years-old at Opryland in Nashville.

Prior to "Some Lessons Learned," Chenoweth dabbled in other genres, including a Christmas album, a Christian album and logically for the Broadway star, a collection of show tunes. But here, she shows more of a variety and flare for the country music's long history.

In doing so, she teamed with veteran songwriter Diane Warren for a handful of songs that show off a pop-country approach. She tackles a Dolly Parton song, "Change," as well pays homage to her idol in the tongue-and-cheek "What Would Dolly Do" -- one of two songs she co-wrote.

Dolly, Madonna, Julie Andrews

Anchoring the set is Chenoweth's high-pitched voice, which flows through different country factions effortlessly. Her stage training lends itself to the ballads "Fathers and Daughters" and the folk-leaning "God and Me."

Her quirky side comes through on "I Didn't," about a break-up stemming from a guy's God complex, as well as the album's first single, "I Want Somebody (Bitch About)" -- a song recalling the country pop of Shania Twain or Trisha Yearwood.

"Growing up in the '80s, I loved Dolly, Madonna, Julie Andrews," she said. "If we had iPods, that would've been on mine. In picking the material, you show who you are. I hope that's what I've done."

Country musicians whose careers start in Nashville and its environs have it easy compared to Chenoweth, who is trying to break into a genre without alienating her fan base.

That is something she experienced firsthand last year, when she took a dramatic role on Broadway in "Promises, Promises," versus the numerous lighthearted and comedic musicals such as "Wicked" that had come before.

"A lot of people didn't want to see me in that role, because it wouldn't make them laugh," she said. "But there's no growth" as an artist.

While TV shows like NBC's "The Voice" have recently shown the crossover potential of country music with other genres like R&B and pop, Chenoweth's ties to acting might have lumped her into a category of actors who just want to make record.

But the Broadway star's long-established voice gives her the bona fides to deflect any criticism and "Some Lessons Learned" holds its own against other country albums.

Chenoweth is cautiously optimistic about her future in the genre, She hopes her fans connect with the music and that she also collects a few new followers along the way.

"I just want more than anything for people to listen to the record and be moved by it or surprised by it in some way," she said. "I think challenging yourself and changing up is what's fun about this business." - Reuters

Source: gmanews.tv