Mitchell was one of five NFL legends on the latest Celebrity Family Feud.
Brian Mitchell enjoyed a 14-year NFL career before retiring after the 2003 season. Mitchell enjoyed most of his success in Washington, where he spent the first 10 seasons of his career and was a part of the franchise’s last Super Bowl champion.
These days, Mitchell is back in the DMV and co-hosts a radio show on 106.7 The Fan in D.C. called “BMitch & Finlay.”
On Tuesday, Mitchell was on national TV as one of five NFL legends on “Celebrity Family Feud” with Steve Harvey.
Mitchell joined T.J. Houshmandzadeh, Andre Rison, Terrell Owens, and LeSean McCoy as they faced off against five United States Olympians.
Mitchell ended his career as the NFL’s all-time leader in kick and punt return yardage, and sits behind only Jerry Rice as the league’s all-time leader in total yardage.
Yet, somehow, Mitchell is still waiting for induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
USMNT fans are not happy with coach Gregg Berhalter.
Fans of the United States men’s national team are ready to see a changing of the guard at head coach after the team’s awful Copa América 2024 exit.
Indeed, the team’s 1-0 loss to Uruguay on Monday night in Kansas City has fans sick and tired of the way coach Gregg Berhalter has led the program since returning to his post in 2023 after a brief departure in 2022.
USMNT fans expressed a healthy share of disdain for the coach, some feeling it was time he was replaced by a more suitable candidate for the 2026 World Cup, one set to take place in part on home soil.
After 74 games under Gregg Berhalter, one constant is that the team doesn’t create chances. This is who they are. There is no logical way to believe that will change with more time.
All the BS from tonight shouldn’t mask the obvious: it’s time for a change.
Berhalter should've never been brought back. That whole window of decision making process set U.S. Soccer back years. Just incredibly bad and self-serving from them.
FT: #usmnt 0-1 Uruguay. The U.S. is out of the Copa America, an utter disappointment, one that should cost Gregg Berhalter his job. For all the U.S.'s huffing and puffing, a fair result. Uruguay just ground the U.S. into dust, with a U.S. xG of 0.29 for the game.
The most talented team we've ever had is hosting the World Cup in two years.
Berhalter can't be the coach. He just can't. Pay whatever it costs to get a top coach. This is the United States of America. We have the money. Spend it. Fix this.
No coach deserves multiple cycles. Period. Almost always diminishing returns. The US has a structural inability to score that has not changed under Berhalter.
Expecting something different is like saying we believe in the tooth fairy.
Clint Dempsey said exactly what needed to be said about USMNT.
Former United States men’s national team superstar Clint Dempsey didn’t hold back while discussing USMNT’s unexpected and dispiriting exit from the 2024 Copa América on Monday night.
Speaking about the team’s 1-0 loss to Uruguay and overall tournament performance, Dempsey said he was at a loss for words with where the team has found itself with the 2026 World Cup on the horizon.
“Where have we come since 2022?” Dempsey asked his fellow panelists on the Fox Sports broadcast.
“You qualify for the World Cup, you get out of the group, and then, where have we progressed? And we haven’t… and that’s the most frustrating part. This is our Golden Generation. It looks like we’re wasting it.”
"Where have we come since 2022? You qualify for the World Cup, get out of the group. Where have we progressed? We haven't, to Alexi's point…This is our Golden Generation and it looks like we're wasting it."
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) July 2, 2024
Those are some sharp words from an all-time USMNT players who knows exactly what it takes for the team to qualify and win in the World Cup.
While a controversial no-call certainly angered fans in Monday’s loss, Dempsey’s disbelief with where the program has found itself after its Copa América loss undoubtedly resonates with USMNT supporters.
USMNT fans couldn’t believe this no-call for the refs.
The United States men’s national soccer team was eliminated from the 2024 Copa América after its 1-0 loss to Uruguay on Monday night in Kansas City.
Panama taking down Bolivia sealed the deal for the United States, who will exit this year’s tournament with a very difficult loss on home soil to fathom.
While blame will certainly be assessed to the U.S. coaching staff and players for flubbing this opportunity, Uruguay left backer Mathías Olivera’s goal came under lots of scrutiny from USMNT fans.
The score in question gave Uruguay the lone point of the match, but it sure looked like two players, including Olivera, were clearly offside on the replay.
URUGUAY TAKES THE LEAD 😱😳
Just seconds after Bolivia tied the game vs Panama, Uruguay scores and the USMNT is back out of Copa América 2024 pic.twitter.com/0IZfEwPzJw
The VAR look at the play didn’t help the United States, as the officials maintained after review that the goal was good and no offside had occurred. How they assessed the VAR angle was a bit strange to say the least.
This image just shows how truly egregious a missed call it was for the officiating crew. It’s just hard to understand the rationale behind the decision.
Scrap literally all video assisted review in all sports forever. If you can ignore video evidence to rig the result however you want in the first place, at least give the illusion that it's a missed call. https://t.co/6Q2BfNsu7v
look I’m not normally one to blame a loss on a ref bc there’s normally a lot that happens in 90 minutes. But this has undoubtedly been a joke from start to finish from this ref https://t.co/1OBIBUTsg5
During the 2024 Copa América Group C match between the United States and Uruguay on Monday night, fans at home got very sick and tired of the zoomed-out broadcast lens that made the action harder to follow at first.
Indeed, the first part of the Fox Sports broadcast from Kansas City’s Arrowhead Stadium was very difficult to make out, as the camera needed a much closer look at the players on the pitch than what viewers got on the live feed.
While Athletic reporter Chris Vannini noted that the camera feed and angle came from tournament organizer CONMEBOL and not Fox, fans still griped aplenty about how hard it was to watch the broadcast.
Here’s a sample of how widened the focus was on the live feed to start things out.
The official pulls out a yellow card and then proceeds to allow Uruguay to play on 🤔 pic.twitter.com/8CSLusQCiv
Game broadcaster Stu Holden even got a very funny jab with a Zoolander reference at the camera feed during the Fox Sports broadcast.
"This is not a stadium for ants. This is a very high camera for the CONMEBOL world feed." 🤣🎥🐜@StuHolden shares what everyone's thinking 😅 pic.twitter.com/V7ps4Ag8Of
One of the West’s most prolific archeological sites is surprisingly accessible. Pictograph Cave State Park is right outside of Billings, Montana. It’s famous for pictographs inside caves and for a phenomenal dig in the 1930s that revealed more than 30,000 artifacts.
“That really put it on the map of archeology in the West,” said Richard Tooke, the park’s ranger/manager/chief cook and bottle washer.
The 23-acre park includes three caves and is located about seven miles south of Billings. At roughly 50,000 visitors per year, it’s one of the busiest parks in south-central Montana. But when I visited on a Monday morning in early June, there were only a few other folks around. Here’s what I saw there and what you can look forward to when you visit.
Photo by Teresa Bergen
Pictographs
So, what do the pictographs depict? It’s hard to say for a couple of reasons.
“At least 12 different Northern Plains Indigenous tribes were in and out of here,” said Tooke. Modern Indigenous people might not know what all the pictographs represent. And if they do, they might not want to share that intel with outsiders. Plus, the porous sandstone is not a permanent artistic medium. When people started studying the pictographs in the 1930s, artists recorded about 105 of them. Now it’s hard to see half that many, as rock layers slough off and minerals build up.
Tooke estimates that Montana has 650 to 700 known pictograph sites. Most are on private ranch lands or on remote public lands. “This is one of the few places where people can just get off the interstate and in ten minutes hike up to the cave and see rock art and kind of contemplate this history of these native people being there for thousands of years doing everything people do in life,” Tooke said. The rock art chronicles the lives of long-ago people. “Some of it’s about their spirituality, some of it is simply you know, a grocery list. A grouping of animals, perhaps. This is what you can find here when you hunt and gather.”
Photo by Teresa Bergen
In winter, warm air occasionally hits the super chilled rock just right, and additional pictographs become visible. On those days, “You can see 20 or 30 more pictographs than you can see on a drier surface,” Tooke said. The local Crow people call this place Alahpaláaxawaalaatuua, which means a place where there is spirit writing. Tooke said that many visitors still consider the park a place with “a heavy presence of spirits and energy.”
Photo by Teresa Bergen
I visited on a dry day where it was hard to identify all but the most obvious pictographs, such as a grouping of red rifles. I relied heavily on signage to help me find the pictographs on the cave wall.
Saved from confusion by the interpretive sign! / Photo by Teresa Bergen
Wildlife at Pictograph Cave State Park
Pictograph Cave State Park is also popular with migratory birds and other wildlife. The visitor center posts a list of about three dozen birds that have recently flown by, including the pinyon jay, northern flicker, Merriam turkey, and the hairy woodpecker.
Tooke told me about a mule deer who for several years running left her fawn on the floor of one of the caves while she went off to forage. “She was pretty smart about leaving her baby where the people would probably dissuade any big cat from coming through,” he said.
The park also has porcupines, coyotes, mule deer, bobcats, mountain lions, and five different types of snakes. Indeed, I was impressed by the most aggressive depiction of a rattlesnake I’ve ever seen on a park warning sign.
Photo by Teresa Bergen
Pictograph Cave State Park recreation and education
Visitors also come for recreation. Hikers enjoy a circular trail system, while cyclists like the park roads. Even bikers enjoy the region.
“There’s a lot of motorcycle rallies in the area, and those guys are always in and out,” Tooke said.
In addition to offering recreation opportunities, education is a big part of the park’s job. In the fall, many school groups visit. Montana’s Indian Education for All program requires school curricula to cover Indigenous people. A trip to see the pictographs is a fun way to learn. Astronomy clubs also like to bring their telescopes for night sky viewing events.
Photo by Teresa Bergen
Tooke is happy to lead the park’s conservation mission. He explains that he enjoys “taking care of these kind of roadside attractions that have historic cultural meaning and are part of our heritage as Montanans.” Tooke adds that Montanans “take pride in our state park systems and the place we live in.”
Pictograph Cave State Park is open year-round: seven days a week in summer, and five days a week the rest of the year.
I sit on a rock in an artificial lagoon, watching workers feed rays. “One for Pinky!” a worker calls as she throws a fish to a large pink whipray. Another woman notes the treat on a clipboard. There’s only one pink whipray in the lagoon, but I’m really impressed when the keepers can tell the five spotted eagle rays apart. These tropical rays can reach 10 feet wide and 16 feet long. Despite looking pretty flat, they tip the scales at more than 500 pounds. Here, the biggest eagle ray weighs in at a svelte 290.
In a land of theme parks, Orlando, Florida’s Discovery Cove is a relaxing respite from lining up for rides. Owned by SeaWorld, it’s a manicured nature experience — the fake coral is brightly painted like an amusement park ride backdrop, and the rays have their barbs clipped so they can’t sting you. It’s part aquarium, part water park, and a lot of fun if you can stomach animals in captivity. While I’m always conflicted about animal attractions, I really enjoyed my day at Discovery Cove.
An eagle ray at Discovery Cove. / Photo by Teresa Bergen
About Discovery Cove
Discovery Cove opened in 2000 and bills itself as “an all-inclusive day resort.” You arrive in the morning between 7 and 9, show your ID, get your lanyard, then enter the lush grounds.
Breakfast and lunch at a big cafeteria are included in your admission, as are shorty wetsuits, towels, lockers, and animal-safe sunscreen. Guests can add extra amenities such as a private beach cabana or animal experiences like snorkeling with sharks or feeding flamingos.
Photo by Teresa Bergen
Freshwater swimming at Discovery Cove
The park is divided into three main water areas: freshwater, the Grand Reef, and a dolphin lagoon. After eating breakfast — they made a special vegan tofu scramble for me, which was very nice — I decided to start with the warm freshwater area, with a water temperature in the low 80s. You can lounge in a couple of lagoons or grab a pool noodle and float along the lazy river.
I wound up drifting the lazy river three times over the course of the day. The best part is after passing through a pounding curtain of water, you float right into a fabulous aviary with gorgeous tropical birds flying overhead. You can float on through or get out of the water and feed birds from cups of chopped fruit. The lazy river alternates between being shallow enough to stand and depths of about 8 feet.
A green aracari in the aviary. / Photo by Teresa Bergen
Exploring the Grand Reef
My favorite part of the park was swimming with rays and tropical fish in the Grand Reef. It was a little crowded, with snorkelers bumping into each other at times, but exciting to be so close to so many rays. There were shallow parts where people could stand and deeper parts for floating or swimming.
The shovelnose ray, which mostly spends its time on the sandy bottom, was especially large and odd-looking. People who are anxious about real-life snorkeling in the ocean will appreciate the safety of having the park’s sharks separated from the main lagoon.
Shovelnose rays swimming underfoot. / Photo by Teresa Bergen
Swim with dolphins
Swimming with bottlenose dolphins is perhaps Discovery Cove’s most popular animal interaction — and the most controversial. The Humane Society and other animal welfare organizations have come out strongly against swim with dolphin attractions. It was not something I’d ever planned to do. But as a visiting travel writer, I found myself with a booked appointment time. The dolphin swim was going to happen with or without me, so I decided to see for myself what it was all about.
At the appointed time, participants were divided into groups of about 10 or 12, paired with a trainer, an assistant, and a dolphin. Coral, 23 years old and born into captivity, was our dolphin. We humans waded into the chilly lagoons, wearing our wetsuits. When the trainer signaled, Coral swam up to us. We got a little education, a lot of photo ops where we took turns posing with Coral, and a few dolphin tricks. It was cool to get up close and pet her rubbery tail, but I was embarrassed to see a creature smarter than I am reduced to making fart sounds for laughing tourists.
People prepare to meet dolphins at Discovery Cove. / Photo by Teresa Bergen
Throughout my day at Discovery Cove, I asked various employees what they thought about swim with dolphin experiences. The strongest justification is the same one that’s always used for zoos: people don’t care about things we don’t see and experience. The idea is that if we see animals in captivity, we’ll care about preserving them in the wild. This could lead to votes and dollars benefiting conservation efforts.
One employee said that she believes this is the most humane swim with dolphin concession, and she wouldn’t do it anywhere else. The keepers assured me that the dolphins can choose whether or not to participate on any given day, and they get the same amount of food either way.
I asked what the dolphins get out of towing visitors across the lagoon while we hold onto their dorsal fins and flippers. “It’s enrichment,” the trainer said, adding that she wished she knew more about how much Coral was really enjoying herself. The trainer emphasized that the dolphins have different personalities and different relationships with the trainers. While Coral is keen on interacting with humans, some dolphins can only tolerate us for about five minutes. The trainer told me she hadn’t worked with Coral for a while, so the dolphin probably wanted to hang out with her.
Except for the very oldest dolphins, who were captured before the laws changed, all the Discovery Cove dolphins were born in captivity. Maybe it’s sort of like a different culture. If you’re born in captivity and spend your life in an artificial lagoon, you take whatever fun is on offer —whether that’s interactions with humans or the rich, complex relationships that these creatures have with each other.
If you visit Discovery Cove
If you decide to visit Discovery Cove, sign up ahead, as some of the animal experiences sell out. Wait until you get there to apply sunscreen; the park has animal-safe lotions on tap. If you want a nice base of operations for your group, splurge on a private cabana.
Despite my unease about dolphin swims, this activity gets very high TripAdvisor reviews, with people finding it very special and magical. I was glad to see that all the trainers care about the animals, knowing them by name and treating them as individuals — whether dolphins, flamingos, or eagle rays.
One of Discovery Cove’s private cabanas. / Photo by Teresa Bergen
Disclaimer: While this article was not sponsored, Outdoors Wire did visit Kissimmee during a press trip withExperience Kissimmee and its partners. As always, Outdoors Wire operates independently, and this doesn’t influence our coverage.
Could the next Super Clasico take place in the United States?
Regular-season Liga MX games could be coming to the United States very soon.
According to a report in W Deportes, Club América and Chivas are planning on staging the next edition of the Súper Clásico in the U.S. on September 14.
América, the back-to-back Liga MX champion, is set to hit the road for the 2024 Apertura, as its usual home of the Estadio Azteca closes for renovations ahead of the 2026 World Cup.
Las Águilas will be based at the Estadio Ciudad de los Deportes in Mexico City next season, but club president Santiago Baños said last month he’d be interested in bringing his team around the country — and possibly to the U.S. — during the 2024 Apertura.
“We’re not opposed to the possibility of playing in the United States as the home team, now that the lawsuit has been finalized and it appears that there’s a possibility for other teams to play there,” Baños told reporters.
“It would be incredible to play in the U.S. and in other (Mexican) states because we have so many fans.”
The lawsuit Baños referred to involves promoter Relevent Sports, which sued FIFA and U.S. Soccer in 2019 to challenge FIFA’s ban on league matches being played outside a given home country.
Relevent and FIFA have since agreed to drop FIFA from the lawsuit, leaving U.S. Soccer as the lone defendant. FIFA has said that it will likely change the ban before the end of 2024.
That could open the door for Liga MX’s biggest game to take place in the USA — an event that would no doubt be a financial boon to all parties.
In October 2023, Chivas and América drew 86,134 fans at the Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, CA for a friendly, the largest crowd ever for a game between two Mexican clubs in the United States.
Our fun outing to Mount Rainier National Park was derailed by a long line of cars waiting to gain entrance. Immediately, my husband and I were cranky. How do you escape into nature when surrounded by a gazillion fellow humans?
This has been a common frustration in recent years, and it intensified as the pandemic further popularized the great outdoors. Between 2001 and 2021, annual visitation to Arches National Park in Utah grew over 73%, from a little over a million to more than 1.8 million. Because of this overcrowding trend, some of the most popular national parks have adopted a timed entry system. While this puts the kibosh on spontaneity, the National Park Service hopes this reservation requirement will both protect natural resources and make for a less crowded visitor experience.
Photo by Teresa Bergen
Which parks have timed entry in 2024?
So far, about 10 parks have announced timed entry plans for 2024. Mount Rainier is implementing a reservation system for the first time ever. Arches, which started its pilot reservation program last year, will continue theirs.
Other parks requiring reservations for peak times of year include Glacier National Park in Montana; Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado; Yosemite in California; Zion in Utah; Shenandoah in Virginia; Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee; Acadia in Maine, Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico; and Hawaiʻi’s Haleakala, which will require sunrise vehicle permits year-round for visitors entering the park from 3 to 7 a.m. Muir Woods National Monument now requires visitors to get a parking permit in advance. Turn up without one, and you won’t be invited in to see the trees.
Photo by NPS/Neal Lewis
What does timed entry mean for your park visit?
Planning. And more planning. If you’re visiting a national park this summer, go to the park website and check the current rules. They can be quite complex — and each park is different, depending on which parts are the most touristed. For example, Mount Rainier requires timed entry reservations for the Paradise Corridor between May 24 and September 2. But if you want to enter through the Sunrise Corridor, you only need a reservation between July 4 and September 2. Each park seems to have similar complicated rules involving dates, times, and locales. Suddenly, extra research is required when visiting a park.
Fortunately, Rainier is open 24/7, and if you enter before 7 a.m. or after 3 p.m., you don’t need a reservation. That’s ultimately what we did on our last Rainier trip. We waited for the line to decrease, then entered the park for the last few hours of daylight.
Catching the last couple of hours before dark — without a reservation. / Photo by Teresa Bergen
And if you can go during a less-visited season, even better. During a February trip to the Grand Canyon, I whizzed right through the entrance from the gateway town of Tusayan, Arizona. But during spring break and summer, you might have to wait two hours! The moral of the story: go early, go late, go off-season, or plan ahead and score that reservation if you want to visit one of America’s most popular national parks.
