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Two years ago, Joey Chestnut was interrupted by a protester who he put in a headlock — and then he still managed to eat 63 hot dogs and buns at the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest.
Chestnut will not be at this year’s event (which takes place on Thursday), but activists will be.
PETA, the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals, announced that they will “bombard the competition’s spectators” with a truck that will encourage the attendees to go vegan.
Baldwin sent the letter to the CEO of Madison Square Garden Entertainment Group on behalf on animal rights activist group PETA. (Paras Griffin/Getty Images)
The organization says it is a “life-size, hyperrealistic pig transport truck” that is donned with images of pigs in cages that are being sent to be slaughtered. The truck is named “Hell on Wheels.”
“Behind every hot dog is a once-living, sensitive individual who was crammed onto a truck for a terrifying, miserable journey to their death,” Tracy Reiman, PETA’s executive vice president, said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “PETA’s ‘Hell on Wheels’ truck is an appeal to anyone who eats pigs, cows, or other animals to remember that the meat industry is cruel to them and the only kind meal is a vegan one.”
PETA will be at Thursday’s Hot Dog Eating Contest in this truck. (PETA)
JOEY CHESTNUT TO COMPETE IN A JULY 4TH HOT DOG EATING CONTEST AFTER ALL
The truck will be posted outside the competition at 11 a.m. ET, an hour before the competition begins.
The organization also ripped the “shameful” National Dog Shot and the use of live mascots for sports teams, most recently with the Cleveland Browns after their mascot, a bullmastiff named Swagger Jr., died at the age of 5.
Chestnut was barred from this year’s competition after he partnered with a Nathan’s rival. Major League Eating said they would lift the ban if the partnership ended, which never occurred.
FILE – Joey Chestnut, winner of the 2021 Nathan’s Famous Fourth of July International Hot Dog-Eating Contest, poses for photos in Coney Island’s Maimonides Park, July 4, 2021, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. (AP Photo/Brittainy Newman, File)
Thus, it will be the first time since 2015, and just the second time since 2007, that there will be someone not named Joey Chestnut has the champion. Chestnut lost the competition in 2015 to Matt Stone.
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When reminiscing about sports moments and personalities of days gone by, the familiar anecdotes are often a joy to hear again and again.
Even better, though, is when there are fresh new stories to be told by those who were there.
The new YouTube channel Front Row to Boston Sports offers both familiar tales and ones you may not have heard before, as told by four of the most connected journalists and best storytellers in the modern annals of sports in this region.
Legendary former sports anchors Mike Lynch (Channel 5) and Bob Lobel (Channel 4), along with Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy and former Globe columnist Bob Ryan, have teamed up to share the funniest, most heartfelt, and illuminating tales from their storied careers, from press row and the locker room.
The project is the brainchild of Peter Brown, a former news director at Channel 4, where he spent 22 years before moving on to an accomplished career in public affairs and communications.
“You come from a news background, you’re always thinking about what’s the best way to tell a story,” he said. “What better story is there to tell than those about Boston sports? Everyone who is from here or has lived here is in some degree a fan. I thought a look back at some great moments and some behind-the-scenes details that only the most plugged-in reporters would know would be a fun thing to do.”
So Brown reached out to Alan Miller, a former sports producer at Channel 4 who worked with Brown during the local news heyday in the 1980-90s. Miller, who later worked at the Globe and in the Channel 7 newsroom before retiring in May 2024, has long been one of the most well-liked figures in the Boston sports media landscape, someone who knows everyone and whose word is as good as a signature on the dotted line.
Miller thought it was a super idea, and reached out to his close friend Lobel, along with Lynch, Shaughnessy, and Ryan. They all said yes immediately.
“We basically said, just tell us your best stories,” said Miller. “We wanted the stories that maybe you couldn’t tell on TV or in the newspaper, but the ones you might have told your buddies at the bar. The ones about what people are really like and what gets said behind the scenes. The ones about relationships. These were the four perfect guys to tell those.”
Currently, there are eight clips posted on the channel, ranging in length from just longer than three minutes (Ryan talking about his top five all-time Celtics) to 13 minutes (Shaughnessy sharing an assortment of Terry Francona stories). One of Lobel’s clips includes an emotional discussion of Ted Williams, while Lynch is especially insightful talking about Bill Belichick’s candor off camera during their old Bellistrator segments.
Brown and Miller plan to sprinkle out a few new clips each week. Since the project has been in the works for approximately a year, they were able to build up a catalogue of 30 clips before launch.
Miller said there’s another reason that everyone involved wanted to be part of the project — the fear that institutional knowledge about Boston sports isn’t what it used to be because of the changing media landscape.
“When I was at Channel 7, John Havlicek died, and I think there were about three people in the newsroom who knew how John Havlicek was,” he said. “It’s not their fault, a lot of them are 20-something kids and half of them are from out of town.
“But there can be a real lack of knowledge about the past. And Boston sports, as you know, has an amazing past. You’d like the legacy and the memories to stay alive.”
It’s no surprise that Patriots television ratings have risen this season corresponding with the team’s return to prominence.
But even if the rise in ratings is logical, some of the heights that they are reaching — or returning to, a half-dozen years after Tom Brady’s final season in New England — are remarkable.
Take last Sunday’s 35-31 loss to the Bills, which aired at 1 p.m. on CBS as a regional broadcast. The game had a 31.4 household rating and 78 share in Boston.
That household rating — the percentage of households in a defined area tuned in to a program at a given time — is the highest for any Patriots game on any network since the regular season finale against the Dolphins in 2021. That also happens to be the last season the Patriots made the playoffs.
The 78 share — the percentage of households with television in use — is reminiscent of the viewership the Patriots enjoyed during the dynasty. As noted here previously, the Patriots averaged a 35.3 household rating and 66 share in 2018, their most recent Super Bowl-winning season.
Nine of the Patriots’ 14 games have aired on CBS this season. Those broadcasts have averaged a 25.7 household rating and 73 share, up 35 percent from last year (19.0/59) through the same span.
Overall last Sunday, the 1 p.m. slot — which also included the Chargers-Chiefs matchup — was a massive success for CBS, averaging 18.9 million viewers across the games. That made it the most-watched regional window on any network in 37 years.
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A woman was rushed to the hospital after being seriously hurt in a fire Saturday in Rocky Hill.
This all unfolded during the late morning hours at a home on Main Street.
Fire officials say they had to rescue the woman from the home and her injuries are considered life threatening.
Hoarding conditions did a play a factor in the fire, according to the fire department.
No other injuries were reported. Further details pertaining to the fire weren’t immediately available.
The cause of the fire is under investigation.
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