New Era

Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake says she is thrilled about the opening Thursday of Swedish retailer H&M in the Inner Harbor — and part of it's for personal reasons. Rawlings-Blake is into fashion, but she doesn't want to spend a lot to stay on top of the trends. H&M is known for fashion on the cheap, and the mayor might just become one of its best customers. But more importantly, Rawlings-Blake said, the opening of the 20,000-square-foot store that takes up two floors at The Gallery pavilion on Light Street is also helping to usher in a much-needed improved shopping experience along the city's waterfront.

There are many new sights and sounds to be experienced at Bob "Turtle" Smith Stadium this season, but it was a smell that caught the attention of second-year Maryland baseball coach Erik Bakich. "It smells like a ballpark," he said. The source of the appealing aroma was the Third Base Grill, a newly opened seating area and concession stand down the left-field line that is one of many improvements recently made to the university's baseball facilities in an effort to inject life into what has traditionally been a dormant program.

One of Kevin Anderson's first actions last week as Maryland's athletic director was to author a guest column for the campus newspaper challenging students to be "respectful" to opposing teams during sports events. After several days on the job, Anderson had already received messages from families complaining that Maryland fans' behavior was offensive. Anderson said he had been bothered by profane slogans he saw on T-shirts during recent football and men's soccer games against Duke.

Juan Samuel called his team together Thursday night for likely the final time and told his players that even though he had only four days left in his Orioles managerial tenure, his expectations hadn't changed. "I expect these guys to go out there and leave everything on that field for me these next four days," said Samuel, who had compiled a 16-31 record entering Thursday since taking over for Dave Trembley on an interim basis June 4. "I talked to the guys and said, 'Nothing will change.

Watching World Cup soccer on a 50-inch screen at the Best Buy in Arundel Mills last week, Brian Sturm was gazing through clunky-looking glasses at what could be the next big thing in popular entertainment. Sturm, a 34-year-old financial analyst who considers himself a "huge" sports fan, was brought into the store by the games and the offhand remark of a friend who said the 3D display at Best Buy would show him sports in a way he never had seen before. "The picture is amazing, and I'm not a 3D kind of guy," Sturm said.

While Archbishop Edwin F. O'Brien declared "a new era of Catholic education" on Thursday, angry families vowed to fight his plan to close 13 schools at the end of the academic year. A group of nearly 50 students and alumni from the Cardinal Gibbons School went to the downtown headquarters of the Archdiocese of Baltimore on Thursday morning to protest, and parents were planning rallies and fundraisers to save the high school. The archdiocese has scheduled public meetings next week to explain the reorganization, which will displace 2,152 students and 325 employees.

You would be able to play games, read electronic books, listen to music, watch movies and choose from nearly 140,000 smart-phone applications - all while on the go with Apple Inc.'s new iPad. The question is whether you would want or need such a device, and be willing to pay $499 or more for it. After months of hype that culminated in days of water-cooler speculation, Apple unveiled Wednesday the highly anticipated iPad, essentially a personal computer contained in a portable flat-panel touch screen.

WASHINGTON - - They have a former All-NBA point guard with a left knee injury that kept him on the bench for most of the past two seasons; a 33-year-old power forward who will start the season sidelined with a right shoulder injury; a center in a contract year who missed almost all last season with a torn wrist ligament; two veteran additions, also approaching free agency, who haven't appeared in the playoffs the past three seasons; and a veteran power...

More than a quarter-century ago, the governors of Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania, along with the administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, agreed to a partnership to restore the Chesapeake Bay. Since then, the federal role in that partnership has been helpful but all too limited, with states left to do much of the heavy regulatory lifting on their own. That looks to be changing, and none too soon, given the Chesapeake Bay's compromised...