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Got your ticket for bobblehead night? Check. Get the bobblehead? Not so fast

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Got your ticket for bobblehead night? Check. Get the bobblehead? Not so fast

The Dodgers are giving away a second Shohei Ohtani bobblehead doll on Wednesday, this one with Ohtani holding his dog Decoy. In May, when the Dodgers staged their first Ohtani bobblehead night, fans lined up outside Dodger Stadium hours before game time, with the gates to the parking lot still closed.

The demand for all things Ohtani has sent season-ticket prices soaring, just like one of his majestic home runs. As of Monday afternoon, the Dodgers were selling tickets to Wednesday’s game for a minimum of $131 and to Thursday’s game — against the same opponent, the Baltimore Orioles — for a minimum of $36.

It takes a lot of money to get that free bobblehead. However, in an illustration of a policy embraced by the Dodgers and most other major league teams, you could pay all that money and still not get that free bobblehead.

The Dodgers say they have 40,000 bobbleheads to give away. They sold 53,527 tickets to the first Ohtani bobblehead night.

“Why do that,” asked Andy Dolich, a marketing expert and formerly a top executive for the Oakland Athletics, San Francisco 49ers, Memphis Grizzlies and Washington Capitals, “when the promotional concept is to put a smile on someone’s face?”

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The San Diego Padres, like the Dodgers, limit most giveaways to the first 40,000 fans. The Angels generally provide giveaways to the first 25,000 fans. The Arizona Diamondbacks adjust their limit depending on the promotion, but most commonly distribute giveaways to the first 20,000 fans.

“I get it,” Diamondbacks president Derrick Hall said. “When I was a kid and I went to Dodger Stadium, I definitely had to get the batting glove every year, but I never feared not getting one.”

Dodger fans get a Cody Bellinger bobblehead and a rally towel upon entering the stadium before Game 1 of the NLDS against the Washington Nationals at Dodger Stadium on October 3, 2019 in Los Angeles, California.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

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What has changed, Hall said, is that the increase in the number of giveaway dates has made the total cost of giveaways more prohibitive.

“It’s really just a budget issue,” Hall said. “That’s all it is. Teams have so many more promotions than they used to.”

For one, Dodgers president Stan Kasten said, the corporate sponsors that cover the cost of most giveaways may not have the budget for 53,000 promotional items.

“And, when you get there early, you have the opportunity to do other kinds of shopping, whether it’s food or merchandise,” Kasten said. “It also helps with traffic and things like that.

“We try to make all our fans happy. Most fans, when there is a limit and they come late, I think they understand.”

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The Angels declined to make an executive available for comment, but a spokesman said the team tries to ensure every fan that arrives by first pitch can get that game’s giveaway item.

The Shohei Ohtani and Decoy bobblehead doll that will be given to fans.

The Shohei Ohtani and Decoy bobblehead doll that will be given to fans attending Wednesday’s game between the Dodgers and Baltimore Orioles at Dodger Stadium.

(Los Angeles Dodgers)

The Padres list seating capacity at 40,222, not including a grass and turf park behind center field that can accommodate another 6,000 fans. The Padres’ giveaway limit: 40,000.

“That number covers our fixed seating capacity and estimated turnstile attendance for nearly every giveaway game,” Chief Executive Erik Greupner said, “ensuring that all ticket holders will receive a promo item.”

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Hall said the Diamondbacks make adjustments for the most popular items. A replica National League championship ring was supposed to be limited to the first 30,000 fans, but the team actually distributed almost 40,000.

“We wanted to make sure we had a surplus so, if someone didn’t get one, we could take care of them,” he said.

Kasten said the Dodgers and other teams try to accommodate fans with extenuating circumstances.

The challenge on nights like an Ohtani bobblehead night is to take care of the actual fans rather than the speculators that buy the ticket in order to make money selling the item on eBay.

On Monday, the bobbleheads given away in May were selling in the range of $500 and up, with the ones scheduled for Wednesday already available for around $200.

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Still, given that ticket prices are so high because of the bobblehead giveaway, Dolich said the Dodgers would be wise to take care of every customer — not just the one who lines up hours in advance and resells the bobblehead before first pitch, but the one with kids who might not be able to arrive before the bobblehead supply runs out.

“You absolutely cannot alienate that last person,” Dolich said, “the family that comes from Encino just for that night, with 8-year-old twins, and it’s, ‘Sorry, we’re done.’ ”

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Nike to Cut 1,400 Jobs as Part of Its Turnaround Plan

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Nike to Cut 1,400 Jobs as Part of Its Turnaround Plan

Nike is cutting about 1,400 jobs in its operations division, mostly from its technology department, the company said Thursday.

In a note to employees, Venkatesh Alagirisamy, the chief operating officer of Nike, said that management was nearly done reorganizing the business for its turnaround plan, and that the goal was to operate with “more speed, simplicity and precision.”

“This is not a new direction,” Mr. Alagirisamy told employees. “It is the next phase of the work already underway.”

Nike, the world’s largest sportswear company, is trying to recover after missteps led to a prolonged sales slump, in which the brand leaned into lifestyle products and away from performance shoes and apparel. Elliott Hill, the chief executive, has worked to realign the company around sports and speed up product development to create more breakthrough innovations.

In March, Nike told investors that it expected sales to fall this year, with growth in North America offset by poor performance in Asia, where the brand is struggling to rejuvenate sales in China. Executives said at the time that more volatility brought on by the war in the Middle East and rising oil prices might continue to affect its business.

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The reorganization has involved cuts across many parts of the organization, including at its headquarters in Beaverton, Ore. Nike slashed some corporate staff last year and eliminated nearly 800 jobs at distribution centers in January.

“You never want to have to go through any sort of layoffs, but to re-center the company, we’re doing some of that,” Mr. Hill said in an interview earlier this year.

Mr. Alagirisamy told employees that Nike was reshaping its technology team and centering employees at its headquarters and a tech center in Bengaluru, India. The layoffs will affect workers across North America, Europe and Asia.

The cuts will also affect staffing in Nike’s factories for Air, the company’s proprietary cushioning system. Employees who work on the supply chain for raw materials will also experience changes as staff is integrated into footwear and apparel teams.

Nike’s Converse brand, which has struggled for years to revive sales, will move some of its engineering resources closer to the factories they support, the company said.

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Mr. Alagirisamy said the moves were necessary to optimize Nike’s supply chain, deploy technology faster and bolster relationships with suppliers.

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Senate committee kills bill mandating insurance coverage for wildfire safe homes

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Senate committee kills bill mandating insurance coverage for wildfire safe homes

A bill that would have required insurers to offer coverage to homeowners who take steps to reduce wildfire risk on their property died in the Legislature.

The Senate Insurance Committee on Monday voted down the measure, SB 1076, one of the most ambitious bills spurred by the devastating January 2025 wildfires.

The vote came despite fire victims and others rallying at the state Capitol in support of the measure, authored by state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Pasadena), whose district includes the Eaton fire zone.

The Insurance Coverage for Fire-Safe Homes Act originally would have required insurers to offer and renew coverage for any home that meets wildfire-safety standards adopted by the insurance commissioner starting Jan. 1, 2028.

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It also threatened insurers with a five-year ban from the sale of home or auto insurance if they did not comply, though it allowed for exceptions.

However, faced with strong opposition from the insurance industry, Pérez had agreed to amend the bill so it would have established community-wide pilot projects across the state to better understand the most effective way to limit property and insurance losses from wildfires.

Insurers would have had to offer four years of coverage to homeowners in successful pilot projects.

Denni Ritter, a vice president of the American Property Casualty Insurance Assn., told the committee that her trade group opposed the bill.

“While we appreciate the intent behind those conversations, those concepts do not remove our opposition, because they retain the same core flaw — substituting underwriting judgment and solvency safeguards with a statutory mandate to accept risk,” she said.

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In voting against the bill Sen. Laura Richardson, (D-San Pedro), said: “Last I heard, in the United States, we don’t require any company to do anything. That’s the difference between capitalism and communism, frankly.”

The remarks against the measure prompted committee Chair Sen. Steve Padilla, (D-Chula Vista), to chastise committee members in opposition.

“I’m a little perturbed, and I’m a little disappointed, because you have someone who is trying to work with industry, who is trying to get facts and data,” he said.

Monday’s vote was the fourth time a bill that would have required insurers to offer coverage to so-called “fire hardened” homes failed in the Legislature since 2020, according to an analysis by insurance committee staff.

Fire hardening includes measures such as cutting back brush, installing fire resistant roofs and closing eaves to resist fire embers.

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Pérez’s legislation was thought to have a better chance of passage because it followed the most catastrophic wildfires in U.S. history, which damaged or destroyed more than 18,000 structures and killed 31 people.

The bill was co-sponsored by the Los Angeles advocacy group Consumer Watchdog and Every Fire Survivor’s Network, a community group founded in Altadena after the fires formerly called the Eaton Fire Survivors Network.

But it also had broad support from groups such as the California Apartment Association, the California Nurses Association and California Environmental Voters.

Leading up to the fires, many insurers, citing heightened fire risk, had dropped policyholders in fire-prone neighorhoods. That forced them onto the California FAIR Plan, the state’s insurer of last resort, which offers limited but costly policies.

A Times analysis found that that in the Palisades and Eaton fire zones, the FAIR Plan’s rolls from 2020 to 2024 nearly doubled from 14,272 to 28,440. Mandating coverage has been seen as a way of reducing FAIR Plan enrollment.

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“I’m disappointed this bill died in committee. Fire survivors deserved better,” Pérez said in a statement .

Also failing Monday in the committee was SB 982, a bill authored by Sen. Scott Wiener, (D-San Francisco). It would have authorized California’s attorney general to sue fossil fuel companies to recover losses from climate-induced disasters. It was opposed by the oil and gas industry.

Passing the committee were two other Pérez bills. SB 877 requires insurers to provide more transparency in the claims process. SB 878 imposes a penalty on insurers who don’t make claims payments on time.

Another bill, SB 1301, authored by insurance commissioner candidate Sen. Ben Allen, (D-Pacific Palisades), also passed. It protects policyholders from unexplained and abrupt policy non-renewals.

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How We Cover the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

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How We Cover the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

Times Insider explains who we are and what we do, and delivers behind-the-scenes insights into how our journalism comes together.

Politicians in Washington and the reporters who cover them have an often adversarial relationship.

But on the last Saturday in April, they gather for an irreverent celebration of press freedom and the First Amendment at the Washington Hilton Hotel: The White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.

Hosted by the association, an organization that helps ensure access for media outlets covering the presidency, the dinner attracts Hollywood stars; politicians from both parties; and representatives of more than 100 networks, newspapers, magazines and wire services.

While The Times will have two reporters in the ballroom covering the event, the company no longer buys seats at the party, said Richard W. Stevenson, the Washington bureau chief. The decision goes back almost two decades; the last dinner The Times attended as an organization was in 2007.

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“We made a judgment back then that the event had become too celebrity-focused and was undercutting our need to demonstrate to readers that we always seek to maintain a proper distance from the people we cover, many of whom attend as guests,” he said.

It’s a decision, he added, that “we have stuck by through both Republican and Democratic administrations, although we support the work of the White House Correspondents’ Association.”

Susan Wessling, The Times’s Standards editor, said the policy is a product of the organization’s desire to maintain editorial independence.

“We don’t want to leave readers with any questions about our independence and credibility by seeming to be overly friendly with people whose words and actions we need to report on,” she said.

The celebrity mentalist Oz Pearlman is headlining the evening, in lieu of the usual comedy set by the likes of Stephen Colbert and Hasan Minhaj, but all eyes will be on President Trump, who will make his first appearance at the dinner as president.

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Mr. Trump has boycotted the event since 2011, when he was the butt of punchlines delivered by President Barack Obama and the talk show host Seth Meyers mocking his hair, his reality TV show and his preoccupation with the “birther” movement.

Last month, though, Mr. Trump, who has a contentious relationship with the media, announced his intention to attend this year’s dinner, where he will speak to a room full of the same reporters he often derides as “enemies of the people.”

Times reporters will be there to document the highs, the lows and the reactions in the room. A reporter for the Styles desk has also been assigned to cover the robust roster of after-parties around Washington.

Some off-duty reporters from The Times will also be present at this late-night circuit, though everyone remains cognizant of their roles, said Patrick Healy, The Times’s assistant managing editor for Standards and Trust.

“If they’re reporting, there’s a notebook or recorder out as usual,” he said. “If they’re not, they’re pros who know they’re always identifiable as Times journalists.”

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For most of The Times’s reporters and editors, though, the evening will be experienced from home.

“The rest of us will be able to follow the coverage,” Mr. Stevenson said, “without having to don our tuxes or gowns.”

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