Hugh Ryan is an absolute superstar of queer history. His first two books, “When Brooklyn Was Queer” and “The Women’s House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison,” were magnets for awards and accolades. After spending recent years immersed in cultural stories, he’s turned his investigative eye on his own coming of age with the rollicking, raw, funny and sharp memoir “My Bad: A Personal History of the Queer Nineties and Beyond.” Pivoting from scholar of history to student of life, Ryan shares lessons learned from beloved but homophobic middle school teachers (“The nicest mother— I knew could accidentally curb-stomp my heart at any moment”) to ones acquired on the dance floor (“Dancing is sex on a communal level: an embodied ecstatic ritual of union”).
Ryan swung through L.A. on his book tour, and what better place to host a paean to the ’90s than the ASU FIDM Museum, where the exhibit “Obsessed: Fashion and Nostalgia in the ’90s” is serving Westwood plaids, Calvin Klein’s minimalist silk parachute sheath and Donatella’s zipper-slashed, leather mourning dress. A fellow survivor of the era, I interviewed Ryan and the evening was introduced by the exhibition’s sparkling curator, Christina Frank, who cheekily shared period photos of the author alongside images from the museum’s ’90s archives, asking: Who wore it best? Whether it was Ryan channeling designer inspo or fashion-snatching looks from the streets, the display — like the book that inspired it — was colorful and daring, inspired and eccentric and wholly unique. At a time when nostalgia for the ’90s is seemingly everywhere, “My Bad” places the decade into context, including its paradoxical freedoms and oppressions, with the intimate, funny rough language of your freakiest, funnest bestie.
Michelle Tea: Your previous books are this amazing, accessible scholarship. In “My Bad,” your language is so different — you’re cussing! The academic gloves are off — which isn’t to say that it’s not brainy. Was this just the voice that the book wanted? It’s like, “Oh, so we’re just like sitting on the curb having a cigarette together.”
Hugh Ryan: I actually wanted to buy a box of clove cigarettes while I was doing the research, but apparently they’re illegal now because they’re deadly and full of fiberglass.
So much of it is about writing it for people today who are younger, who look up to my books and are like, “I’m going to get my PhD and be just like you!,” and I was like, I didn’t do that, I’ve misrepresented myself somehow, and I want to be really real. Also, I had this job for four or five years where I ghost wrote a kids’ books series, and I was eventually fired, because I took a beloved character — who I am not allowed to name — and made her curse, which she had apparently never done in her 100-year history. When I made her say ‘hell’ and ‘damn’ while solving a mystery, the internet went wild, and you can find the Amazon page where I am ruined. So, the ability to curse in my work and have a real voice was something that, from very early on in my career, I was like, “Oh no, I got to be real careful about being too much myself on the page.”
Ryan in ‘90s Calvin Klein; Dave Navarro walks the Anna Sui Spring/Summer 1997 runway.(Hugh Ryan; Michel Arnaud; Gift of Arnaud Associates, 2000; From ASU FIDM Museum Collection)
MT: You needed to break that pattern of self-censoring. What was it like to shift the focus of your intellectual investigation onto yourself?
HR: Excruciating. At first I really enjoyed it, when it was just this idea. I’ve never really told these stories. In the early versions of it, everything I wrote was jokey, silly, overly stylized, not honest. I wasn’t ready to really dig in. I think that I had a lot of layers of defensiveness that I didn’t even understand I had until I had to write things down. My agent kept being, “No, no, this isn’t real, stop with these jokes, it is funny, but you have to get into the serious issues.” There was a large resistance inside me. Asking, “OK, how did my experiences relate to the ’90s as a whole?” actually let me talk about myself and the time period I emerged from. I needed that scaffolding to feel comfortable.
MT: How do you feel about Gen X’s legacy as basically the coolest generation?
HR: I mean, I kind of love it.
MT: We’re having the most sex, even though we’re so old now. And we’re tough, because we’ve survived so much queer trauma. You write in “My Bad” about having Snapple bottles thrown out windows at you.
HR: If you looked queer and you were out in the world, it was just accepted that at some point during the day someone was going to be violent towards you. Verbally, maybe physically. It just was what it was. Though I will say, having now, later in my life, thrown some Snapple bottles really hard just to feel it, it does feel very good. They’re heavy, they’re glass, they explode. If you can get your hands on some classic ’90s Snapple, just throw them, just try it.
MT: We have to have a queer, Gen X ritual of throwing Snapple bottles, like a rage room.
Ryan in the ‘90s. In his new memoir “My Bad,” Ryan looks back on this time with the intimate, funny rough language of your freakiest, funnest bestie.
(Hugh Ryan)
HR: I do think that it’s easy to forget all of that, because I think we all wanted to forget it to a certain degree. We wanted to let go of our pain. Both the people who were hurt and the people who caused those hurts had some amount of evolution. This is something I think about a lot with my family. If you read the book, in the early chapters it’s rough with my folks. They were loving, but also had no idea what to do with me. I was not just gay, I was weird and trans and confused, and always making noise and acting out and being inappropriate. There’s all this tough stuff, and then we try to forgive each other and let it go, but without saying it. Writing the book was this moment of, “Oh no, am I making us talk about all the bad times again?” It took me sitting with that and realizing — that’s the only way to get to the other side. I’ve seen this change in my family, and it felt important to document how shitty it was, so we could see the change.
MT: What sign are you?
HR: Cancer.
MT: You’re Cancer?!
HR: Yeah, tell me about it. I know so little about astrology. It’s the straightest thing about me, how little I know about astrology.
MT: I don’t even know what to say, because I’m getting such Aquarius-Virgo-Gemini from you that Cancer is just blowing my mind.
HR: I do have a shell, I know that about myself. And that was my first two books. Now I’m trying to invite people in.
MT: Will you talk about the club kid scene in New York City in the ’90s?
HR: I just touched up on the edges of it. The club kid movement really stopped after effective retrovirals come in, in 1996. Suddenly club kids saw a future for themselves, and did not all imagine that they were going to die of AIDS imminently. The ones who I’ve interviewed have said, “That’s the moment at which suddenly, dressing for Friday night no longer felt like what you spend two weeks doing.” But when it was happening, it was amazing. There were these free magazines in New York City, HX and Next, little queer rags full of party promotions and photos of half-naked people in clubs, and ads for those awful viatical companies that would buy up your life insurance if you had AIDS. They were very weird, but they’re like style bibles for me. And then you would go to the clubs.
When you went to Limelight, there would be two entrances, one for straight people and one for gay people. The bouncer at the line for the straight entrance was a giant gay guy, who — this was abusive, and probably wrong, but it was very funny — he’d be like, “You two make out if you’re gonna tell me you’re gay, make out or you don’t come in.” You only got access to half the club if you went in the straight entrance — the other half was only for queer people, and so you would have these straight folks trying to get in. It was amazing, and it was a place where I came to really love my body, because up until then the only things I had been told my body were for were sports, and that was never going to be me. There, I could dance all night.
Limelight was the coolest, but I loved Tunnel. Tunnel was 80,000 square feet of nightclub in a former railway terminal. There was a room entirely designed by the artist Kenny Scharf, and it was covered in fake fur — in a club when smoking was still allowed! It was the worst smelling place I’ve ever been in my whole life. I would sneak down there wearing giant Jnco raver pants, and watch everyone. These giant pants had these huge pockets in them, and I would put a big, gallon Ziploc bag with a clean T-shirt and clean socks inside the pant pocket. When the night was done I would go out, get food, change my clothes, and put the dirty clothes inside the Ziploc bag. I still had to have the pants on. I carried like the smell of 1,000 humid homosexuals with me everywhere I went.
The club, Ryan says, “was a place where I came to really love my body, because up until then the only things I had been told my body were for were sports, and that was never going to be me.”
(Hugh Ryan)
MT: Speaking of being grimy — you were also really affected by Burning Man.
HR: I had met this guy, we totally fell in love. He was a high school dropout computer hacker who was the epitome of the bisexual ’90s — longhaired, androgynous, everything I wanted to be. You know, that very queer thing of: Do I want you, do I want to be you, should we go on a road trip or a killing spree? We were in love and I did not want to go back to school. I had had a terrible junior year, and I was looking to make new mistakes. He was like, “I’m gonna go to this thing called Burning Man, do you want to go? It’s out in the desert, there’s all this art, and it’s super cool,” and I was like, “When is it?” And it was the very first week of classes my senior year, and I was like, “Yeah, absolutely.”
It was amazing. We got adopted by these people who called themselves the Church of Mez, or Mezbians. They were extremely rich Microsoft engineers. We were completely unprepared, because we’d f—ing come in on the Greyhound bus. You’re supposed to bring a gallon of water per person per day, just to start with, and we had nothing. We had a tent and a sleeping bag, and these people thought we were somewhere between pets and aphrodisiacs.
It felt like such an amazing thing to get to touch. And I know that all of those people ended up being like fascist tech bros of today, I’m sure, and I worry about the environmental degradation that I did not know anything about. And it was so white, so many white people with dreadlocks and those terrible tribal tattoos. Like many things in the book, I have to write about it tenderly, even though I know there are so many problems. I don’t think I would be who I was if I didn’t show some tenderness towards those spaces that made me, or at least allowed me to see myself.
Michelle Tea is the author of more than 20 books for grown-ups, teenagers and children.
MINNEAPOLIS — The series finale between the Dodgers and Minnesota Twins featured a marquee pitching matchup between Shohei Ohtani and Joe Ryan. But the Dodgers’ 4-3 win on Wednesday wasn’t quite the pitcher’s duel it was advertised to be, in front of the Twins’ first sellout crowd of the season at Target Field.
The Dodgers offense had eight hits against Ryan, tied for the second-most he’s allowed in a start this season, and four runs in six innings. And Ohtani gave up three runs (two earned) and five hits.
Ryan won the first battle — the one against Ohtani the hitter to lead off the first inning.
Ohtani roped a first-pitch fastball to right field, clocking an exit velocity of 110.7-mph, into the glove of Twins outfielder Kody Clemens. That was part of a three-up, three-down first inning for Ryan. Ohtani countered with a hitless first inning of his own on the mound, but with a walk.
In the top of the second, Mookie Betts’ solo homer gave the Dodgers (52-29) an early lead. The 300th home run of Betts’ career was part of a three-hit day for the shortstop, a triple shy of the cycle.
The Twins’ offense responded.
Their first run was the result of a passed ball. Ohtani gave up singles to three of the first four batters he faced in the second inning, to load the bases. Then, Ohtani threw a first-pitch fastball inside to Ryan Kreidler. It got past catcher Dalton Rushing, who seemed to expect a different pitch, and the ball rolled out of play to tie the score.
Rushing, in his first game back in the lineup after being removed Monday to rule out a concussion, huddled with Ohtani and pitching coach Mark Prior on the mound to debrief.
Ohtani then gave up a two-run single to Kreidler before striking out Trevor Larnach to end the inning.
It was a good thing Ohtani, who went 2-for-5 on Wednesday, had lobbied to hit and pitch. Dodgers No. 9 hitter Alex Freeland led off the third with a double. Then Ohtani sent a ground ball up the middle to give himself some run support.
That started a three-run rally for the Dodgers. Max Muncy later drove in Ohtani, and Alex Call contributed a sacrifice fly to give the Dodgers a lead again.
Twins left-hander Anthony Banda, who received his World Series ring Monday from a gaggle of his former teammates, took over for Ryan in the seventh.
Ohtani was the first hitter he faced. And Banda struck him out on a fastball that barely clipped the outside corner — and was initially called a ball, before a successful ABS challenge by Twins catcher Victor Caratini.
Banda then hit Andy Pages with a pitch and gave up a single to Freeman. But he escaped unscathed, stranding them at the corners.
The Twins threatened in the seventh and eighth, but Dodgers right-hander Kyle Hurt overcame a pair of walks, and left-hander Alex Vesia navigated a pair of singles to hold the score. Closer Tanner Scott secured the save.
Rookie right-hander Ryan Johnson gave up one hit over six scoreless innings, Nolan Schanuel hit an early two-run home run and the Angels beat the Baltimore Orioles 5-1 on Tuesday night.
In his third career start, Johnson (1-2) carried a no-hitter into the sixth inning before Jeremiah Jackson hit a line drive single to center with one out. Johnson allowed one walk with career highs of eight strikeouts and six innings, while throwing 90 pitches.
A second-round draft pick by the Angels in 2024, Johnson earned his second career win against a Baltimore offense which combined to score 18 runs over its previous two games.
Right-hander Shane Baz (4-8) gave up five runs on eight hits over five innings with one walk and five strikeouts for the Orioles, who had their three-game winning streak halted.
Baltimore was without second baseman Jackson Holliday (groin) for a third consecutive game and was also missing utility man Blaze Alexander (knee). The Orioles fell to 4-4 on a nine-game, three-city trip that ends against the Angels on Wednesday afternoon.
Schanuel gave the Angels (33-48) a 2-0 lead in the first inning with a home run off Baz to right-center field.
The Angels padded the advantage in the fifth inning when Jose Siri led off with a single, Zach Neto doubled and Vaughn Grissom followed with a two-run single to left. Jorge Soler added a one-out sacrifice fly for a 5-0 lead.
With Johnson out of the game, the Orioles (38-43) broke through in the seventh inning when Gunnar Henderson singled and Pete Alonso walked against Samy Natera Jr. Baltimore scored its lone run on a two-out single to center by Leody Taveras against Chase Silseth.
In Australian writer-director Adrian Chiarella’s knotty roller coaster of a feature debut “Leviticus,” about a demon tormenting a pair of queer teenage boys, the fear is more insidious than the external threat of a violent bigot or shunning parent.
In an abandoned mill in their blighted industrial town, quiet new kid Naim (Joe Bird) and brash hunk Ryan (Stacy Clausen) allow a friendly, mischievous connection to turn into something more. But when Naim later secretly observes his new crush fiercely locking lips with another classmate, Hunter (Jeremy Blewitt), son of a leader in the tight-knit church that Naim’s single mom (Mia Wasikowska) just joined, hurt gets the better of Naim’s instincts and he secretly informs on the pair.
The church’s punishment, however, delivered in front of the congregants, is an eerie ritual performed by a gaunt, severe visitor (Nicholas Hope). Called a “deliverance healer,” his fire-and-brimstone method — making incarnate the title’s Biblical book, regularly used to justify anti-LGBTQ viewpoints — leave Ryan and Hunter writhing in agony. Afterward, Naim, sensing he might have unwittingly set into motion something awful, notices bizarre behavior in the stricken-looking Ryan. When they try to furtively rekindle their passion, it becomes violently clear they are not alone. Or even, it seems, themselves.
The feeling that nowhere is safe is a durable horror concept, the backbone behind such classics as “Nightmare on Elm Street” and “It Follows.” In “Leviticus,” which is expertly paced by editor Nick Fenton, it comes with a flair for open-space unease and unexpected claustrophobia that puts director Chiarella in a long line of savvy Australian mood-setters like Peter Weir and Fred Schepisi. These filmmakers knew how to fold tactile dread into a worthy narrative, rather than treat genre as if it were a kit with instructions.
But most urgently and bleakly, Chiarella is giving religious-based conversion therapy its devilish due as a warping of the soul designed to sow distrust in one’s own desires. He’s careful, however, not to tell a tale that would speak to homophobes. As distressing as their circumstance is, Naim and Ryan are unmistakably positioned as heroic lovers, not victims-to-be. Chiarella takes time between bouts of danger to show affection and intimacy that, in defiance of teen-slasher formula, isn’t immediately penalized with sadism. But their fraught relationship will decidedly keep you nervous, so score one for multilayered storytelling.
Points, too, for the solid casting, from the leads’ tricky pivoting from openness to caginess, to the criminally underseen Wasikowska, who navigates maternal complexities of worry and compassion that confound easy pigeonholing. If anything, the movie could have used more of her, although it’s better overall that “Leviticus” prioritizes Naim and Ryan as queer protagonists caught in a chilling loop of escape and reunion. We already know what’s out there, ready to do harm. This movie’s nail-biting, sorrowful power comes from what internalized destruction looks like.
‘Leviticus’
Rated: R, for bloody violent content, language, some sexual content and teen drug use
Coronation Street fans were left gobsmacked after discovering that Ryan Connor star Ryan Prescott previously appeared on rival soap Emmerdale
Coronation Street fans were left gobsmacked after discovering that Ryan Connor star Ryan Prescott previously appeared on rival soap Emmerdale(Image: ITV)
Coronation Street viewers have been left stunned after only just discovering Ryan Connor actor Ryan Prescott previously featured in rival soap Emmerdale.
On Thursday, ITV’s Instagram account posted an entertaining soap crossover feature, highlighting all the Coronation Street and Emmerdale stars who’ve graced both programmes.
While fans recognised familiar soap-hopping actors including Claire King, who portrays Kim Tate on Emmerdale and played Erica Holroyd on Corrie, alongside Chris Bisson, who plays Jai Sharma in Emmerdale and portrayed Vikram Desai in Corrie, audiences were astonished to spot a ‘forgotten’ performer.
The post featured Corrie’s Ryan Connor actor Ryan Prescott, who played Flynn Buchanan in Emmerdale back in 2011.
Throughout Flynn’s stint in the village, he briefly romanced Aaron Dingle, portrayed by Danny Miller, though Aaron remained hung up on his former boyfriend Jackson Walsh, played by Marc Silcock, reports the Daily Star.
Reacting in the comments section, soap enthusiasts were left astounded by the revelation, with some having completely forgotten Ryan’s Emmerdale appearance while others were unaware of the soap crossover altogether.
One viewer exclaimed: “Omg I forgot Ryan was in emmerdale!” to which another account responded: “Such a throwback!”.
Meanwhile, another account posted: “Wow x” with a different fan contributing shocked emojis.
Another enthusiast wrote: “The only one I remember being in another soap is Jai!” while a separate viewer commented: “Wow that’s insane to look at in the Past and the Future.”
Coronation Street’s Ryan first appeared on the ITV soap back in 2006, with the character originally played by Ben Thompson – Ryan Prescott, 37, stepped into the role in 2018. As the son of Michelle Connor (Kym Marsh), it wasn’t long before Ryan became entangled in a host of dramatic storylines.
In forthcoming scenes, Ryan heads out on a date with fellow Weatherfield resident Jodie Ramsay (Olivia Frances Brown) – who has caused quite a stir since making her soap entrance earlier this year.
According to spoilers for next week, Jodie lets slip that she’s lined up a date. When David Platt (Jack P. Shepherd) inadvertently mentions he’s due to meet Nick Tilsley (Ben Price) at the bistro, Jodie devises a cunning plan.
Jodie meets her date, Ryan, at the bistro, and when David arrives, Jodie turns on the charm in a bid to ignite David’s jealousy…
Coronation Street airs Monday to Friday at 8:30pm on ITV1 and ITVX
Christie has just signed a new deal with Bournemouth and will remain at the club until 2029. He is, as they say, in a good place. Messi’s exploits at 38 – he will be 39 this month – offers Christie a world of encouragement that this World Cup doesn’t necessarily have to be his last.
In England, he sees players getting better with age, guys in their mid-30s who are still operating well at the top level. “Some are pushing for the high-30s and still churning out unbelievable performances week in, week out,” he said.
Head coach Clarke has spoken often about the dynamic of starters and finishers, the importance of having influential players coming off the bench late on. That was the scenario Christie found himself in against Haiti. Tense moments, those.
Would he rather be a starter or a finisher? “I honestly don’t mind,” he commented. “I’m not too sure, to be honest. The manager’s been very, very big on that, especially since we’ve come into the camp.
“He’s making everybody realise that every single person in our squad is going to be needed at some point, whether some boys play three, four, five minutes, some players might play every minute, but everybody’s got a massive part to play. Everybody’s taking that on and doing their bit so far.”
So to Boston for Morocco on Friday. One point and Scotland are more or less guaranteed a place in the knockouts. One stellar 90-minute performance, however challenging, and they’re history makers.
“It’s a dream come true to even play in a World Cup, but you have to quickly adjust your targets and adjust your mindset,” added Christie. “From being happy to be here you want to go and create more and keep pushing the bar. The manager has kept the foot to the floor.”
Having achieved one dream by making it to America, Christie is now pursuing another. Morocco await – the greatest test of his football life.
Stokes’ future as Test captain is uncertain with England head coach Brendon McCullum not offering any guarantees when he faced the media on Monday.
But Stokes has the full backing of Australian Campbell, who has been unimpressed at how his player has been treated since news of the incident in a London nightclub emerged last week.
“Ben knows he made a mistake and broke the curfew, but some of the reaction has been a little over,” Campbell added.
“I’m a bit old school, I like a beer after a game of cricket if you’ve got 10 days off but I’m not the coach, I don’t run that system.”
Stokes played two county games for Durham in the run-up to the New Zealand series and Campbell has already suggested he has a “75% chance” of featuring against Northants.
With his availability for the third Test at Trent Bridge, starting on 25 June, uncertain, the four-day Championship game could be Stokes’ last red-ball cricket before the Test series with Pakistan in mid-August.
“Ben is a competitor and he loves to play and he wants to play,” Campbell said. “He put his hand up and said he made a mistake.
“From what I’ve seen, he’s in good spirits, he’s back in training, working hard and the rest will take care of itself.”
The war film, which follows a young British soldier’s journey to the D-Day landings, is being praised by viewers as a more authentic and moving portrayal of WWII than Saving Private Ryan — and it’s currently available to stream in the UK
07:10, 14 Jun 2026Updated 07:12, 14 Jun 2026
One fan hailed the film as ‘overwhelmingly moving’(Image: Joswend)
A “moving” and largely forgotten film from the 1970s depicting the D-Day landings is being hailed as “more realistic” than modern representations of the historic battle.
Overlord (1975) charts the experience of Thomas Beddows (Brian Stirner), a young British serviceman from his enlistment into the East Yorkshire Regiment, through initial training and ultimate participation in the Allies’ landmark amphibious invasion of German-held Normandy in June 1944 (codenamed Operation Overlord).
The picture, directed and co-written by Stuart Cooper, blends authentic archive material of the momentous military operation with sequences of Tom reflecting on his own death and the horrors awaiting him.
Screenrant writer Tommy Lethbridge observed that while it lacks the brutal, visceral intensity of the D-Day scenes featured in Steven Spielberg’s groundbreaking 1998 picture Saving Private Ryan, Overlord ultimately provides a more “authentic” depiction of the clash between Allied and German troops.
This, he argued, stems from Overlord’s deployment of archival footage, combined with the incorporation of “extensive detail from real soldiers’ diaries, clips from British Army training missions”, and seized German material, all of which grant the work “unrivalled authenticity”.
Fans have flocked to IMDb to lavish praise on the lesser-known war epic, with one saying: “The archival footage which makes up much of the film’s most stunning imagery is meticulously chosen and edited.
“It frequently becomes Tom’s dreams and visions of the War as it unfolds, and for the viewer, it is a vision of what WWII was, seen from both German and British sides.”, reports the Express.
“Cooper so masterfully situates Tom, an everyman, in visions of the surrounding war, that by the end of this surprisingly short, yet incredibly rich film, the magnitude of the toll the war took on the individuals fighting it becomes overwhelmingly moving.”
Another added: “If you watched Saving Private Ryan, go and see this film too. It’s totally different, but it deals with the personal feelings of a private much better, no battle scenes, just the perfect backdrop about a normal soldier going off to war, knowing what will happen.”
A third described it as “not your average war film”, noting: “There’s very little in the way of dramatised battle scenes as it shows one soldier’s path to one of the most important, pivotal battles of all time: his farewells with family, his journey to his unit, his training, his preparation for Overlord.
“No heroics, no jingoism, just the reality of what soldiers go through in becoming soldiers and how they handle the fact that eventually they’ll need to use this training in deadly earnest.”
A fourth viewer said: “It’s a sad tale, one of the forgotten men in a conflict long ago, but its universality still stands strong.”
Overlord, which carries a 15 certificate, is available to buy or rent on both Amazon Prime and Apple TV.
An eerie silence descended upon Dodger Stadium as the swatted ball soared toward the right field corner.
What was this? Who was this?
This wasn’t a crowd-roaring drive by a future Hall of Famer. This wasn’t a Ravine-rattling shot by a perennial All-Star.
This was rare. This was weird. This was a long fly by a long-shot outfielder ending a long minor-league journey with his first appearance at Dodger Stadium.
The ball flew and flew and, suddenly, this was a home run. A home run? Who was that again?
Yeah, the sunny 28-year-old did the Freddie Freeman Hop as he rounded second base in a wonderful show of giddy celebration by a guy who’s earned it.
“Kind of a blackout, if I’m going to be honest with you,” Ward said. “Hit it and kind of just went numb.”
Feel free to go numb with him. With his fourth-inning solo blast in Sunday’s 9-1 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies, this not-exactly-a-kid-anymore was the once-in-a-lifetime story.
After seven minor league seasons, his first major-league home run.
After 156 minor-league homers, his first big-league dinger.
After years of trudging through Great Lakes and Ogden and Tulsa and Oklahoma City, his first big fly at 1000 Vin Scully Ave.
In fact, it was his first game at Dodger Stadium, period, and he soaked in the atmosphere with the same wide-eyed wonder as all those little leaguers who marched around the field before the game.
”When I went out to left field, kind of just looking around, taking it in, just realizing how special it was, just have fun with it, enjoy it all,” he said.
The Dodgers’ series win against a team that will challenge them in October was especially a blast for the “others,” the role players who wind up being so important, with Ward and Alex Freeland homering while Alex Call hit a two-run single.
“Everybody in this locker room is a superstar,” Freeland said. “A lot of us get overlooked just because we have guys like Shohei and Freddie. Everybody in this clubhouse can ball.”
Nobody was as excited to just be in the clubhouse as Ward, who is one of the little-known casualties of the Dodgers’ success, a decent hitter from their farm system who has never gotten a chance because the Dodgers don’t have a need for just-decent hitters.
”When I went out to left field, kind of just looking around, taking it in, just realizing how special it was, just have fun with it, enjoy it all,” Ryan Ward said after hitting a solo home run Sunday.
(Ronaldo Bolaños / Los Angeles Times)
When it comes to position players, with the exception of the former prospect Andy Pages, they buy stars, they trade for stars, they hoard stars, and they rarely give a long look to anybody who isn’t guaranteed to be a star.
It is in this environment that Ward has surely asked himself, what does he have to do?
He was drafted out of Rhode Island’s Bryant University in 2019 and by 2021 he was showing home-run power with 27 jacks at class-A Great Lakes. Every year he climbed the minor league ladder, and every year he grew stronger, with 34 homers and 104 RBIs two years ago, and 36 homers with 122 RBIs last year when he was named Pacific Coast League MVP.
How long has he been in the bush leagues? He is triple-A Oklahoma City’s career leader in home runs.
But he was prone to slumps, and oversized swings, and average defensive skills, and last season at Oklahoma City his strikeouts equaled his RBIs.
So he never got even a major-league sniff, leading him to spend his winters working a snow plow with his father to stay in shape, yet he never complained.
“Even talking to Freeland today on the bench, and he made a note that Ryan was probably the most positive guy down there in triple A, and that speaks to his character,” said manager Dave Roberts. “And if there’s anyone that has the right to be salty and frustrated, it’s him, but he was professional about it, and he was an easy one to recall and get him here.”
This finally happened late last month when Ward was recalled to briefly fill a hole when Freddie Freeman went on paternity leave. He played two games in Colorado, had a couple of hits, and was sent back down.
This weekend, he was recalled again to replace Teoscar Hernández, who was placed on the injured list with a strained left hamstring. Ward was jammed in the lineup Sunday, struck out against Phillies’ rookie Andrew Painter in the second inning, then made contact on a 1-and-0 pitch and sent it whirling into the right-field bullpen.
“Watching it go over the fence was really cool,” he said.
Ryan Ward celebrates as he runs the bases after hitting a home run in the fourth inning against the Phillies.
(Ronaldo Bolaños / Los Angeles Times)
Watching the ball returned to his locker in a glass cube was perhaps just as cool. And then celebrating afterward by getting doused with all sorts of stuff by his thrilled teammates? Off the charts.
“I’m probably gonna smell for a little bit,” he said.
Smell of what?
“You name it.”
Considering Ward hit his homer in the fourth inning, you’re probably wondering how he performed the rest of the game. Well, um, there was no rest of the game. He was almost immediately benched again for Call.
And the struggle continues.
“Keep trying to grind your game as much as you can and just kind of force the door down,” he said.
Ryan Porter, the acclaimed trombonist and fixture of the West Coast Get Down jazz ensemble, has died. He was 46.
Porter died Saturday from injuries sustained in a “severe” car crash on April 28, Porter’s bandmate Tony Austin wrote on Instagram. “Despite the best medical care, his condition deteriorated,” Austin wrote, noting that Porter “took his last breath, peacefully surrounded by his loved ones.”
Porter was a pivotal figure in contemporary Los Angeles jazz, beginning with his studies under legendary educator Reggie Andrews in the Multi-School Jazz Band in Watts. Porter formed close friendships and musical connections with saxophonist Kamasi Washington, multi-instrumentalist Terrace Martin, bassist Thundercat and the key players that would later form the West Coast Get Down.
“When it comes to keeping the lineage of jazz in L.A. alive, there have been people who were selfless and sacrificed a lot,” Porter told The Times in 2024. “For me back then, it was hard to understand why they cared so much. But it was because they saw potential in all of us so early, so we could see it for ourselves.”
That group cultivated a following at Leimert Park’s beloved venue the World Stage. They would go on to craft dense, experimental and spiritually yearning compositions for Kendrick Lamar’s 2015 LP “To Pimp a Butterfly,” among countless other LPs in the L.A. jazz scene, including Washington’s 2015 breakthrough “The Epic.”
Porter released four solo albums in his career — 2018’s “The Optimist,” 2019’s “Force for Good,” and 2022’s “Resilience,” along with his 2017 children’s album “Spangle-Lang Lane” — each featuring arrangements from his lifelong bandmates. In 2024, he released a documentary film, “Resilience,” focused on the impact of free music education programs in Los Angeles and how they helped build the city’s modern jazz scene.
“In the inner city, you can be a gang member or drug dealer, but most kids want to take their best steps,” Porter said in 2024. “Friends and music teachers inspired me through their work ethic, giving us a place to perform where we could take advantage of that expertise. Now it’s our turn to take care of them for the next generation.”
Washington, Porter’s frequent collaborator, remembered Porter in a poignant statement on Instagram. “I love you Ryan Porter, I miss you, and you will always have a space in my heart and soul. I will cherish the many years we had together, I thought we would have more, but I am thankful for what we had,” he wrote, adding, “You have been my friend for most of my life. I’ve looked up to you since I was 11 years old. We learned from each other, we supported each other, we created beautiful music together and shared it with people all over the world.”
“You would always tell me that you wanted more than anything else to be a FORCE FOR GOOD and you did it, you are the complete embodiment of that,” Washington continued. “You did so much good Ryan, your life made this world better.”
Porter is survived by two daughters, both of whom are preparing for college, according to a GoFundMe page set up by his friends to contribute to funeral costs and support his children. “Beyond the stage and beyond the music, Ryan’s greatest pride was being a father and provider for his family,” the fundraiser states.
COMEDIAN Katherine Ryan has come up with a theory as to why Katie Price has fallen for the charms of estranged husband Lee Andrews – and it’s due to past ‘trauma’.
Katherine Ryan has suggested Katie Price is suffering from ‘rescuer syndrome’Credit: InstagramComedian Katherine has expressed her fears for Katie and her previous ‘trauma’Credit: Instagram
“So much unkindness around this story like so many of us haven’t also been bewitched by some bullsh*t,” the presenter wrote alongside the video featuring the former glamour model.
Within the footage, she told followers: “He’s been missing for five days. Katie doesn’t know where he is. She was a guest on Good Morning Britain.
“She was supposed to appear with him to address all these rumours that he’s a scammer and she appeared by herself, obviously, and she’s like, Lee’s stuck in Dubai, he can’t get out yet.
“People are being so unkind about it, they’re like, Katie is involved in this, there’s no possible way that someone can look past this amount of evidence into thinking that someone is this virtuous kind human being that she says he is.”
She continued: “I think what’s happened is this: she has a rescuer syndrome, for whatever reason.
“Being the firstborn, she’s very different to her brother and sister.
Katie Price was left to defend her husband on a GMB interview without Lee AndrewsCredit: ITVKatie fell for Lee Andrews and the pair married after just a weekCredit: mistraesthetics/Instagram
“She’s had trauma that mixes things up, but I think she’s also made so many romantic mistakes publicly that this one is so big, she’s fearing, oh, if this all comes out and he’s exposed as this scammer then I look stupider than ever, everyone’s gonna say I’m foolish.
“She cannot let that be true. So it’s a mix of like shame and loyalty. She just wants it to be true so badly that she’s constructed this reality where she’s hopeful.
“I think it’s a really sweet thing, like, yeah, it looks dumb to the rest of us. Yeah, she did not practice due diligence as she rarely does, because she married him after a week.
“All of that is bad. There are children involved in her life, she should potentially try to unravel herself from these romantic calamities and focus on her family, but she has said he makes her happy.
“She’s just so hopeful that it’s true. In the past, I’ve been in relationships not as bad as any of Katie’s, I don’t think, but some dodgy ones where when your friends and family start to express their horror that you are with this obvious loser.”
She admitted: “You just dig your heels in harder. You’re like, no, I can’t have this be untrue. I am going to show my loyalty. I’m going to sit here next to this man.
“I’m going to fix whatever problem he has. I’m going to show him enough love that all of these things that he says are true are magically going to be true.”
Concluding her opinion on Katie’s estranged husband’s whereabouts, she said: “Right now, he’s been missing for, I think, this is the sixth day, and she truly believes he’s maybe been kidnapped and hopefully this is the final straw for her.”
Fans commented: “Call me delusional, but I just feel sorry for Katie. It just seems like she just wants to be loved, and don’t we all.”
A second supported: “The amount of sh*t I have believed over the years from an attractive man is incredible.”
A third agreed: “I think you have hit the nail on the head. She has been treated so bad in relationships (we have all seen the documentaries). Someone has shown her love and she has gone with it.”
“I’ve always felt desperately sorry for her… She just wants to be loved,” echoed another.
Lee has disappeared without a trace leaving Katie ‘worried sick’Credit: InstagramThe TV star has expressed her concern for Katie over her missing husbandCredit: Getty
Singer Paloma Faith interjected: “I don’t know that it’s dumb I think I wanna give her a big cuddle and say it’s ok. Let’s get back to therapy (as I always have!) No one will rescue her until she rescues herself.”
Coronation Street spoilers for next week’s episodes have teased lots of drama, discoveries and a new arrival on the ITV soap, with new romance, and some shocking news
Coronation Street spoilers for next week’s episodes have teased lots of drama(Image: ITV)
There’s some big moments ahead next week on Coronation Street, spoilers have revealed.
Will’s shocked as Sam confronts him, before Will overhears a heartbreaking admission from Ben. Will climbs high up on the shop yard scaffolding, swigging vodka as Megan watches on, but can Maggie talk him down?
George and Christina attempt to bury the hatchet with Todd, while Tracy speculates Danielle is guilty of Theo’s murder. When Todd refuses to attend Theo’s funeral, Danielle accuses him of being the killer, only for Ryan to drop an admission about Danielle.
Ryan tells Lisa what he knows, and Danielle is taken in for questioning. Leanne gives Dylan and Betsy a trial shift at Speed Daal but explains there’s only one vacancy.
Idris arrives, and deals with a situation at the restaurant, while Adam takes an instant dislike to him. Soon, it’s revealed Idris is hiding something. Idris invites Leanne for a drink, but Alya is unhappy to find out they’ve kissed.
Daniel tells Ken that Bertie’s being bullied, as he’s determined to identify his troll. As the police get involved, Jodie tells Daniel it seems the troll has stopped posting, but Daniel is soon ambushed.
Sarah is struggling without Kit and Todd takes a call only to receive some shocking news. Jodie loses her job at the café, and Hope gets closer to Will.
It comes as fans speculated Summer Spellman is not the killer of Theo Silverton. As Monday’s episode heavily hinted she was to blame, she became the prime suspect.
Many fans do not think she did kill him though, and that someone else carried out the crime. While some added that she could be covering for this person, it’s yet to be revealed just how involved Summer is.
Fans think it was Sam Blakeman who killed Theo by accident though. With him experiencing hallucinations and possible psychosis, fans think he might have killed Theo thinking he was Will. A fan posted online: “I’m saying Sam.”
Another viewer posted: “I think Sam killed Theo during one of his mental health breakdowns.” A third fan added: “I think Sam pushes Theo (thinking he was Will), and Summer is covering for him.”
Sharing a similar theory, another fan posted: “Was that scene of Sam hallucinating with the view of the scaffolding an hint to him being the killer of Theo thinking he was Will?” A fan then wrote: “I really think Sam killed Theo.” The suggestion kept on being shared online, as one said: “I think Sam pushed Theo off the scaffolding while he was in a deluded state of mind maybe thinking it was Will.”
SAN DIEGO — Ryan Hollingshead scored his first goal this season in the 14th minute of stoppage time and Denis Bouanga added a goal for LAFC on Saturday night in a 2-2 tie with San Diego FC.
Mathieu Choiniere’s soft header off a corner kick played to the back post by David Martinez bounced in front of the goal and Hollingshead slammed home the finish to cap the scoring.
Marcus Ingvartsen scored two goals — his first career multi-goal game in MLS — for San Diego.
Anders Dreyer played a corner kick to the near post and Ingvartsen headed home the finish to open the scoring in the seventh minute.
On the counter-attack, Dreyer played a cross from the right side to Ingvartsen, who knocked down the ball with his first touch and then blasted a shot from the center of the area inside the left post and into the side-net to make it 2-0 in the 71st minute.
Ingvartsen has seven goals and two assists this season. The 30-year-old had two goals and one assist in eight appearances, five starts, in 2025, his first season in MLS.
Denis Bouanga scored in the 82nd minute, LAFC’s first shot on goal. Bouanga, who has scored at least 20 goals in each of the last three seasons, has five goals this season.
LAFC (6-2-3) beat Minnesota 1-0 last time out to snap a three-game winless streak.
San Diego (3-5-3) snapped a five-game losing streak.
CJ Dos Santos made his season debut and had three saves for San Diego but left due to injury in stoppage time and was replaced by Duran Ferree. The 24-year-old Dos Santos, who had 10 shutouts last season, suffered a fractured cheekbone and orbital floor fracture in a playoff loss at Portland on Nov. 1.
Wrexham’s dream of reaching the Premier League is over, for this season anyway.
And for Ryan Reynolds, it was tough to stomach.
“I am completely gutted by today’s result but incredibly proud of our season,” the actor wrote on X after the Welsh club he co-owns missed out on a place in the playoffs in the second-tier Championship by drawing 2-2 with Middlesbrough in a dramatic final round of the regular season on Saturday.
That allowed Hull to jump ahead of Wrexham and into sixth place — the fourth and final spot in the playoffs — courtesy of a 2-1 win over Norwich in a match played at the same time.
The winning goal for Hull, by Oli McBurnie in the 67th, appeared to be scored from an offside position but there are no video reviews in the English Football League.
It ended Wrexham’s unprecedented run of three straight promotions under its famous owners — a streak that began by getting out of the fifth tier in the 2022-23 season and has been documented in the globally popular, Emmy Award-winning “Welcome to Wrexham” series.
Still, seventh place marked the Wrexham’s highest finish in its history, bettering the 15th position it achieved in the second tier in the 1978–79 season.
“We’ve come a long way in five years and this was the best result in our 150+ year history,” Reynolds wrote alongside a graphic that showed how Wrexham has risen from the National League. “More to do. But for now, we have so much to be proud of, Reds.”
Elsewhere, Ipswich secured the second automatic promotion spot behind champion Coventry — and an immediate return to the Premier League — by beating Queens Park Rangers 3-0.
Ipswich is owned by U.S. investment group Gamechanger 20 Limited and counts pop star Ed Sheeran as a minority shareholder.
Joining Hull in the playoffs, which begin next week and are over two legs, are Millwall, Southampton and Middlesbrough.
Millwall will face Hull, and Southampton will meet Middlesbrough.
Best-ever finish by Wrexham
It was a memorable campaign by Wrexham in its first season in the second tier since the 1980s.
However, the short-term pain was acute, and Wrexham’s players sat on the ground and looked disconsolate after the final whistle — even though the Hull-Norwich match hadn’t finished.
Wrexham started the day in sixth place, ahead of Hull on goal difference, and conceded in the fourth minute to Middlesbrough, only to score through Josh Windass and Sam Smith for a 2-1 lead by the 41st.
Middlesbrough hit back immediately with a 43rd-minute equalizer but Wrexham finished the stronger, squandering a string of great late chances for a winner that would have secured a playoff place on goal difference.
Wrexham’s Josh Windass squats on the field and looks dejected following a draw with Middlesbrough on Saturday.
(Michael Steele / Getty Images)
In the end, Wrexham finished two points behind Hull.
“This squad as it stands, with a preseason together, will be even stronger next year,” said Wrexham manager Phil Parkinson, who oversaw a summer spend of around $40 million last year.
“Of course we’ll always look to add to that to try and give ourselves an even better chance … we know where we’d like to strengthen and what we need to improve on. We’ll do that and we’ll make this squad as strong as we possibly can to mount a challenge next year.”
Ryan Poehling scored 2:29 into overtime, and the Ducks pushed Connor McDavid and the Edmonton Oilers to the brink of first-round elimination with a 4-3 victory in Game 4 on Sunday night.
Jeffrey Viel tied it with 6:29 left in regulation for the Ducks, who rallied from an early two-goal deficit and another third-period hole before taking a 3-1 series lead with their third consecutive victory over the back-to-back Western Conference champion Oilers.
The Ducks won when Poehling’s sharp-angled shot trickled under Edmonton goalie Tristan Jarry, who had played well in his first playoff start for his new team. An extensive video review revealed no reason to overturn the judgment on the ice that the puck had barely crossed the goal line underneath Jarry’s skate.
Game 5 is Tuesday night in Edmonton.
The Ducks celebrate their Game 4 victory.
(Sean M. Haffey / Getty Images)
Cutter Gauthier and Mikael Granlund scored power-play goals in the second period for the Ducks, whose first playoff series in eight years has been an exciting demonstration of their revamped roster’s skill. Lukas Dostal stopped 24 shots for the Ducks, which have scored 20 goals in four games against the Oilers.
Evan Bouchard scored a tiebreaking goal early in the third period and Jarry made 34 saves for the Oilers. Kasperi Kapanen and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins scored first-period goals.
Edmonton nearly won it late in regulation, but Dostal made a spectacular, sprawling pad save to deny McDavid on a late breakaway. The Oilers’ superstar center has a goal and two assists in the series.
DENVER — What do you know? The once-stampeding Dodgers have been caged by the Colorado Rockies.
With a 9-6 loss Sunday at Coors Field, the two-time defending World Series champions lost back-to-back games for the first time this season. The Dodgers again couldn’t hold a lead, letting the Rockies tee off for 15 hits.
Nor could the Dodgers keep up offensively at the hitter-friendly park — though they put some pressure on in the ninth inning, when Shohei Ohtani led off with a ground-rule double and the Dodgers scored twice to cut the lead to three runs. Then the new guy, Ryan Ward, made the final out in his big league debut, robbed of a hit and a chance to keep chipping away by a diving Troy Johnston in right field.
Before that, the Rockies — who beat the Dodgers twice in 13 meetings all of last season — chased starter Roki Sasaki from the game in the fifth inning and then ruffled the Dodgers’ relievers. That included closer Edwin Díaz, who came on in the eighth and promptly gave up three singles, a walk and two runs before being pulled with the Dodgers trailing 8-4.
Dodgers starting pitcher Roki Sasaki gave up three runs on seven hits in 4-2/3 innings Sunday against the Rockies in Denver.
(David Zalubowski / Associated Press)
He and Blake Treinen combined to face eight batters without getting an out.
“They both weren’t sharp,” said manager Dave Roberts, who had theories but not many answers — though he did have real concern, especially about Díaz, who recently had his right knee checked out by the medical staff.
Roberts said the closer wanted to pitch after nine days off, even though it wasn’t a save situation. But his velocity was slightly down (95.4 mph vs. 95.8) and so, “today was a tough evaluation,” the manager said.
“It really was,” Roberts said. “Because, you know, I know what it’s supposed to look like, and when it doesn’t look like that, it gets a little concerning, really.”
And losing for the second time to the Rockies, who are now 9-13? Being in danger of losing their four-game series, after arriving in Denver without having lost to a National League opponent, against a club that hasn’t made the postseason since 2018?
It’s well below the bar the Dodgers have set, and it added a bitter note to Ward’s otherwise sweet debut.
Ward punched a big league clock for the first time wearing No. 67 and cranked his first hit off Rockies starter Michael Lorenzen in the fourth inning, lining a changeup to right field for a single that scored Andy Pages, made it 3-0 and got the 20-some members of Ward’s party up, jumping in place, hugging and high-fiving.
“When I was on first base, I got to see them all jumping around up there,” Ward said. “That was a pretty special moment.”
He also singled in the sixth and swung on the first pitch in his first at-bat, a fly out in the third inning.
The Dodgers gave Sasaki a 2-0 lead in the third. Alex Freeland drove in Hyeseong Kim, and Shohei Ohtani doubled in Freeland — and extended his career-best on-base streak to 51 games, moving past Willie Keeler into third place in Dodgers history.
Sasaki went 4-2/3 innings, threw 78 pitches and gave up three runs on seven hits, striking out two and walking two. His ERA after his fourth start: 6.11, worst in the six-man rotation.
The Dodgers fell behind 6-4 in the seventh when Treinen — who was cleared Friday after he was struck in the head by a batted ball during batting practice — gave up four consecutive hits, including a two-run home run by Mickey Moniak.
The result likely will be a minor detail when Ward tells the story years from now about getting the call after first baseman Freddie Freeman was placed on the paternity list.
The Dodgers’ No. 19 prospect and reigning Pacific Coast League MVP spent the last seven years in the minors. Last season, he hit 36 home runs and drove in 122 runs with a .937 on-base-plus-slugging percentage for triple-A Oklahoma City, and he has a 1.020 OPS and four homers this year.
Ward made it a point to improve his chase rate, draw more walks and get on base more frequently, everything the Dodgers asked of him. He also passed the broadest patience test.
“The plate discipline, being a better hitter … he’s done all that,” Roberts said. “He’s improved his defense. But honestly, for me, just not to let his lack of opportunity in the big leagues deter him. That’s easy when you get frustrated and let it affect performance, and he hasn’t done that.”
If anything, Ward said, the waiting made him better.
“I used it to keep going. ‘OK, if I’m not there yet, what do I have to do to get there?’” he said. “‘What part of my game do I need to work on to keep getting better?’
“I used it as fire to keep working.”
That will be the Dodgers’ assignment too.
In the finale of the four-game series Monday, the Dodgers are expected to start left-hander Justin Wrobleski (2-0, 2.12) against Colorado left-hander Jose Quintana (0-1, 5.63).
