The NFL Draft always brings chaos, but this year it feels even crazier than usual.

Double-digit teams are trying to move up in the first round as franchise quarterbacks and game-changing wide receivers headline this year's class.

While on Thursday one NFC West team, the Los Angeles Rams, was reported to be looking to advance to the first round, The Athletic's Diana Russini now reported that a second team in that league is interested in advancing – and that is the case They're taking calls on two of their best players.

SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA – DECEMBER 11: Deebo Samuel #19 of the San Francisco 49ers and Brandon Aiyuk #11 of the San Francisco 49ers line up during an NFL football game between the San Francisco 49ers…
SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA – DECEMBER 11: Deebo Samuel #19 of the San Francisco 49ers and Brandon Aiyuk #11 of the San Francisco 49ers face off during an NFL football game between the San Francisco 49ers and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on December 11 at Levi's Stadium on , 2022 in Santa Clara, California. The 49ers are reportedly fielding calls on Deebo Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk to move up in the draft.
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Russini reports that the San Francisco 49ers are interested in moving up in the first round and have had discussions with teams around All-Pro wide receiver Deebo Samuel and the dominant Brandon Aiyuk.

According to sources, the 49ers have had discussions with teams, including a pick in the top 10, about trading their prized wide receivers Brandon Aiyuk or Deebo Samuel to move up in the first round.

— Dianna Russini (@DMRussini) April 25, 2024

Aiyuk has been in the headlines all season, long after a trade request was reported. However, 49ers general manager John Lynch revealed that the team would like to keep him in San Francisco for the remainder of his career.

Aiyuk is having the best year of his young career in 2023. The former first-round pick caught 75 passes for a career-high 1,342 yards and seven touchdowns last season. This was followed by a 2022 season in which he set career highs with 78 catches and eight touchdowns and 1,015 yards.

However, Aiyuk is seeking a long-term deal, which is why he has made his name in trade talks this offseason.

As for Samuel, he has already received his long-term contract, although only after his own offseason full of drama and trade requests in 2022. He did, however, secure his big deal, a three-year, $71.5 million contract that runs through the next Season is underway.

If the 49ers were to trade Samuel on Thursday, they would pocket over $21 million in dead money, according to Over The Cap. As for Aiyuk, he's entering the final year of his rookie contract, which will pay him just over $14 million, but he wants a long-term deal.

This year's class is full of wide receivers. So if the 49ers wanted to add one on a rookie deal, they would have their options.

The best receiver in this year's class is probably Ohio State's Marvin Harrison Jr., but not far behind are LSU's Malik Nabers and Washington's Rome Odunze. Those are the “big three” and all would require the team to move up, probably to the top 10. After that, there are other great options like Texas' Adonai Mitchell, LSU's Brian Thomas Jr., Oregon's Troy Franklin and Florida's Keon Coleman from the State.

The 49ers currently have the No. 31 pick in the first round. But it sounds like they're aiming for a promotion, similar to what they did in 2020 when they got Aiyuk. In this draft, they moved up to No. 25 from the same No. 31.

Unusual knowledge

Newsweek strives to challenge conventional wisdom and find connections in the search for common ground.

Newsweek strives to challenge conventional wisdom and find connections in the search for common ground.

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A new program by the City of San Francisco to revitalize the empty downtown area to provide free rents and grant money for pop-up shops was launched Monday. Applications are now available.

Since 2020, around the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, San Francisco has seen a major loss of storefronts and retail locations in the city. High crime rates, overt drug use, and record numbers of homeless vagrants in neighborhoods are all major contributors to this loss. Additionally, high rents, a huge drop in foot traffic caused by businesses migrating from the city center, and many businesses relocating out of town to be closer to where owners and employees live have contributed . As a result, both chain stores and independent companies have left San Francisco, leaving a large number of vacancies.

With nearly a third of all downtown office and retail space now vacant, and similar rates elsewhere in the city, San Francisco has tried numerous schemes in recent years without success. In her State of the City in February, Mayor London Breed highlighted many areas to focus on to bring businesses back to the city centre, including improving safety and cleanliness, attracting and retaining a wide range of industries and employers, finding new uses and flexibility in vacant buildings, making it easier to start a business, increasing the workforce, making downtown a cultural and entertainment center, improving public spaces, improving transportation and focusing on the positives of the city to attract new residents and businesses.

Specifically, as part of this plan, the mayor is calling for lowering permitting costs, suspending tax hikes for businesses remaining in the city, and offering three-year tax breaks to new businesses. For the development of downtown into an entertainment hub, Mayor Breed even proposed passing legislation allowing outdoor drinking.

However, the situation has not improved. While the summer tourist season may bring more potential customers to these stores, many are still staying away due to the whole array of issues mentioned earlier. Needing more ways to attract businesses, San Francisco decided to focus on pop-up stores or short-term retail and arts locations that typically last less than a few months by launching a new program Monday.

Accepted pop-up stores, known as Vacant to Vibrant, will receive three months of free rent plus an additional subsidy of $3,000 to $8,000 to help cover relocation costs. Interested companies must first fill out an application. Once accepted, a committee will rank each one, with the highest-ranking interested property owners being cheered. Owners must apply themselves to be considered to host such a business, with areas under 5,000 square feet being preferred first. The must-haves for interested landlords include available WiFi, at least one bathroom and a ground floor apartment.

The city will foot the bill itself, with $710,000 provided by the Office of Economic and Workforce Development and nonprofit group SF New Deal.

“Vacant to Vibrant is a city-funded program aimed at revitalizing the economic heart of San Francisco (aka “Downtown”) by helping small businesses, entrepreneurs, artists, and cultural organizations activate vacant storefronts, to revitalize the area and promote economic recovery,” the Vacant says on Vibrant’s website. “As part of the larger vision of Mayor Breed’s Roadmap to Downtown San Francisco, Vacant to Vibrant will provide a glimpse of what the future of downtown with public participation can look like – innovative, creative, vibrant and diverse.”

While the program has been praised by some in the city, many others have serious doubts as to whether the pop-up locations will have any success.

“It’s not going to be successful,” Michelle Duggan, a building occupancy researcher, told the Globe on Monday. “Cities in the Bay Area have literally been trying to launch pop-up stores for years, but to no avail. The city lures them in, they stay there for 3-4 months, then they leave. Not many business cycles go through and few people benefit. Some of the better known ones, like San FranDisco, had a good couple of early days but quickly fell by the wayside as the city’s troubles crept in.”

“It’s good that the city is still trying, but it’s ignoring the incentives that are proven to work, like tax breaks and city programs to reduce crime and other related issues, to make them stay.” We know how to get business back, but San Francisco seems to be trying everything except the obvious solutions for long-term retail and other leases.”

Applications for the Vacant to Vibrant program are open until June 1st.

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I am finding myself mildly addicted to the TikTok hashtag #ramenhacks because I’m all for ways of dressing up instant ramen so that I don’t feel like I still have the diet of a college student. (For the record, the combo with egg, Kewpie mayo and Shin Ramyun is good.) I’m Carolina A. Miranda, arts and urban design columnist at the Los Angeles Times, with your weekly arts newsletter and sexy clay videos:

California Uber alleys

Fresh air is a hot commodity in architecture, one that has been made only more evident by the pandemic. That is why I was excited to pay a visit to Uber’s new San Francisco headquarters, designed by SHoP Architects. The building — actually, two buildings connected by a pair of bridges — have facades studded with 14-foot operable windows that do something fairly radical for an office tower: let fresh air in.

Uber’s San Francisco headquarters, designed by SHoP Architects, has operable windows.

(Carolina A. Miranda / Los Angeles Times)

The accordion-style windows were placed in specific locations around the building, based on the patterns of the wind and the sun. And they are programmed to react automatically to external conditions: bending ever so slightly when it’s cooler or windier, or perhaps closing entirely or only admitting sips of air. Or opening more widely when the wind is still. As Fast Company’s Nate Berg noted in a story published last year upon the HQ’s completion, the windows “rebel against the model of the air-conditioned box.”

The building doesn’t rebel completely — the fresh air only travels into the multistory common areas that inhabit the perimeter of the building, where employees at Uber can hang out, eat lunch, work on a task or gather for meetings. But it does make a significant move toward unplugging the U.S. office tower from its ravenous consumption of HVAC.

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Unfortunately, I was only able to see these architectural innovations from the outside because Uber wouldn’t allow a journalist into its headquarters without a nondisclosure agreement. And at The Times, we have a no-NDA policy.

(The whole trip left me wondering if having vital transportation infrastructure administered by a private company with controversial employment practices and murky algorithms for paying its contractors is such a great idea. It may be time to invest a few more dollars in programs like Metro Micro, L.A. Metro’s ride-hailing app, part of a pilot program that is bringing ride-sharing to eight zones around L.A. for $1 a ride. Knock LA has a good report on the program.)

Since I didn’t have to sign an NDA to see the building from the street (which, if I’m not mistaken, hasn’t been privatized yet), I made my way to S.F.’s Mission Bay neighborhood, one of those revitalized urban zones still boasting that new-condo smell, to have a look at Uber’s windows — and perhaps get a peek inside them. Thankfully, the area around the building is studded with publicly accessible parking structures, so I had some vantage points from across alleyways and streets.

My view of one of Uber’s common areas from the parking garage across a pedestrian lane.

(Carolina A. Miranda / Los Angeles Times)

I was there on a warm and breezy day in March, and it was possible to see windows slowly opening and closing over the course of my walk. As the sun began to set and the breezes picked up, you could really see the windows kick into action: As windows in one corner opened, the ones at the other end of the facade might close.

It’s a remarkable kinetic display, giving the building a dynamic skin. Though I look forward to office buildings where humans, along with an algorithm, might also be empowered to open a window. (Crazy, I know.)

Even though I couldn’t get inside Uber HQ, the trip wasn’t a waste. As part of my afternoon spent skulking around the building, I also got a look at a separate tower, Mission Bay 3, which is also inhabited by Uber and was designed by Pfau Long, an architectural studio that is now part of Perkins&Will.

There, I got to see a series of rattan egg chairs dangling from the ceiling of the wellness center:

A view into the Uber offices at Mission Bay 3 and Mission Bay 4 reveals a series of rattan egg chairs in a wellness space.

(Carolina A. Miranda / Los Angeles Times)

Huntsman Architectural Group did the interior design, including the wellness center (see the images online) — and the aesthetic definitely feels very microdosing-room-for-tech-bros.

It was definitely worth the lurk.

On the stage

After a couple of years of pandemic-induced quiet, Times theater critic Charles McNulty is hot on the trail of everything that is new in theater — on two coasts, no less!

In New York City, he took in a performance of Michael R. Jackson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning musical, “A Strange Loop,” which tells the story of an aspiring writer named Usher (played by Jaquel Spivey), who dreams of penning a hit musical about “a Black, gay man who’s writing a musical about a Black, gay man” but is faced with the reality of taking day jobs to make ends meet. “For much of this triumphant, emotionally lacerating show, which had its official opening Tuesday at the Lyceum Theatre,” writes McNulty, “I sat with my mouth agape, astonished and grateful that something so brutally honest and rigorously constructed had finally broken through to a Broadway stage.

Jaquel Spivey as Usher — with an ensemble cast as his many inner voices — in “A Strange Loop” at Broadway’s Lyceum Theatre.

(Marc. J. Franklin )

Also on Broadway is a revival of “Funny Girl” — the musical that catapulted Barbra Streisand to fame — with Beanie Feldstein in the role of Fanny Brice. The revival features a retool of the original’s “sluggish” book by Harvey Fierstein. A fan of Feldstein’s, McNulty writes that she is “most convincing as a Long Island matriarch who wants everything to run according to her plan.” But she has yet to make the role her own.

Back in Los Angeles, McNulty checked out the Tony-nominated “Hadestown,” which has landed at the Ahmanson Theatre in “smoldering fashion.” Inspired by the legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, he says the production “is crowded with vibrant musical performers.”

For L.A., the show represents a comeback — since “Hadestown” was born and first performed here. The Times’ Ashley Lee profiles Anaïs Mitchell, its creator, about the musical’s extraordinary journey: “We had 14 people and a dog in a 15-passenger van,” recalled Mitchell of the show’s early tour. “We’ve had a very long road. It was like a train that kept rolling — and here we are, back in L.A.”

Mitchell also talks to Lee what about lies ahead. Interesting nugget: She has “started casting around a little net” in her mind for the next musical project.

Kevyn Morrow plays Hades in “Hadestown,” now at the Ahmanson Theatre.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

Lee also sat down for a Q&A with Lauren “LOLO” Pritchard, who played Ilse in the rock musical “Spring Awakening: Those You’ve Known” and is now set to appear in the new country musical “May We All.” “Spring Awakening” told the story of a group of adolescents while addressing topics like sexual development and mental health. The character of Ilse is a young woman who fled an artists colony where she was sexually abused. Pritchard talks to Lee about doing the show as she wrestled with her own history of abuse.

Classical notes

My former colleague Makeda Easter (whom I miss very much!) has a new arts newsletter titled “the art rebellion” that tells the stories of artist-activists. (Sign up here.)

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In an article that touches on these themes for Represent Classical, Easter looks at some of the grassroots activist classical music groups looking to create change within the industry. “Through benefit concerts, workshops and platforming emerging artists of color, these groups represent alternatives to the paradigm of classical music and are setting the example of what an inclusive classical industry could look like.”

See you at the Biennale

OK, maybe not. Instead of going to the Venice Biennale and all of its attendant goings-on, I went to Denver. (More on that in the coming weeks.) But I can read all about the biennale on my space phone.

L.A. painter Mary Weatherford made a suite of works inspired by Titian’s 16th century masterpiece “The Flaying of Marsyas,” which shows the tragic story of the satyr from Ovid’s tale. “I thought it was the most evil painting I had ever seen,” Weatherford tells the New York Times’ Robin Pogrebin. The new works are currently on view at the Museo di Palazzo Grimani in Venice.

L.A.-based critic Andrew Berardini delivers a lyrical dispatch from Venice in Artforum, where art installations are interspersed with acknowledgments of the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. “Art and love and dancing and dreams,” he writes, “are worth fighting for, in whatever way we can.”

I’ve been intrigued by images of Simone Leigh’s installation at the U.S. Pavilion. The artist has given this very Jeffersonian building an African-style architectural makeover, by adding a thatched roof that drapes over the building’s roof:

For her installation at the 2022 Venice Biennale, sculptor Simone Leigh wrapped the U.S. Pavilion in thatch.

(Timothy Schenck / Simone Leigh / Matthew Marks Gallery)

As she told the New York Times’ Siddhartha Mitter of the installation: The vibe she was looking for was “1930s African palace.”

“It has an over-the-top Blackness,” she says, “that I really like.”

Find more on the installation, which was commissioned by the ICA Boston, at this website.

Graphic arts

In the late 1960s, artist Larry Fuller launched “Ebon: Fear of a Black Planet,” a comic with a Black superhero that paved the way for others that followed. Despite its influence, Fuller’s work remained relatively obscure — until artists Stacey Robinson and John Jennings, also known as Black Kirby (in reference to DC Comics pioneer Jack Kirby), decided to expand Ebon’s story. Their work, reports contributor Danielle Broadway, is now on view at the Culver Center for the Arts at UC Riverside. As Jennings tells Broadway: It’s important to “look back and find lost creations and creators.”

An installation view of John Jennings and Stacey Robinson’s “Ebon: Fear of a Black Planet” at UC Riverside.

(UCR Arts)

Design time

I paid a visit to an old friend: The Times’ Orange County building in Costa Mesa, where I once went to take a drug test. (I passed!) The building — really, a series of buildings that began with an office and printing plant designed by William Pereira — recently received a refresh courtesy of Ehrlich Yanai Rhee Chaney. Now known as “the Press,” the structure will soon be occupied by Anduril, a defense contractor that designs drones. It’s an opportunity to dig a little bit into the history of The Times, the history of SoCal and the history of the defense industry in Southern California — histories with an incredible amount of overlap.

A view of The Times’ Orange County plant, redesigned by Ehrlich Yanai Rhee Chaney.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

Plus, architecture critic Mimi Zeiger reviews the Selldorf Architects-designed renovation at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego. “Renovations always mean letting go of some part of the past, but this one is particularly upwardly mobile,” she writes, “more attuned to the language of the global art cognoscenti than a sleepy beach town.”

Essential happenings

Matt Cooper has the latest on what-to-do, with a roundup of all the cool L.A. and O.C. museums shows to see in May. This includes a look at the murals of Renaissance Rome at the Getty Center and a show of work by Japanese pop painter Takashi Murakami at the Broad museum — as well as much, much more!

A detail from Takashi Murakami’s “In the Land of the Dead, Stepping on the Tail of a Rainbow,” 2014.

(Takashi Murakami / Kaikai Kiki Co., Ltd / Robert McKeever, the Broad Art Foundation)

Moves

Laguna Art Museum has named art historian Jean Stern and curator Rochelle Steiner as curatorial fellows through early 2023. The two will assist in developing and presenting museum exhibitions and public programs.

Anna Deavere Smith’s “Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992,” a hybrid oral history/solo performance examining the roots of the Los Angeles uprising, will return to the Mark Taper Forum nearly 30 years after its world premiere.

The American Academy in Rome this week announced the winners of the 2022-23 Rome Prize. Among the artists selected are Elle Pérez, Ioana M. Uricaru, Tony Cokes and Los Angeles artist Todd Gray.

Passages

Cynthia Albritton, also known as Cynthia Plaster Caster, who became known for creating casts of rock-star penises, has died at 74.

Composer Klaus Schulze, a pioneer of electronic music, whose body of work included orchestral pieces, psychedelic jams and an electronic opera, is dead at 74.

Painter Donald Baechler, known for canvases in which he depicted crude, “balloon-like” faces,” has died at 65.

In other news

— In Ukraine, burned-out Russian tanks have become popular photographic backdrops.
— In this rather bananas essay, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) recommends tearing down historic buildings in Chicago for the sake of courthouse security. (Maybe the courthouse could get some nice blinds?)
— A series of 23 new artworks will be landing in San Diego’s public parks starting on May 21. The installations will be free and open to the public.
— How a handful of major museums are working to weave greater diversity into their collections and their exhibition programs.
— An exhibition at the Vitra Design Museum in Germany examines how plastic became a de facto material in industrial design — and how we might be able to move beyond it.
— Over at KCET, Carren Jao previews a major installation by artists Einar and Jamex de la Torre at the soon-to-open Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture in Riverside.

And last but not least …

Because making pottery can be very sexy.

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SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) — Police Chief Bill Scott escalated a war of words with District Attorney Chesa Boudin Monday less than two hours after State Attorney General Rob Bonta and San Francisco Mayor London Breed had issued a joint statement voicing their hopes of mediating the dispute over the investigations of use of deadly force incidents.

Scott had terminated an investigative agreement between his department and the DA’s office earlier this month in the wake of revelations that came to light during the trial of Officer Terrance Stangel.

READ MORE: Alameda County Sheriff’s Deputy Dies Unexpectedly Following Medical Emergency

The agreement, or memorandum of understanding, between the agencies went into effect in July 2021 and allows the district attorney’s Independent Investigations Bureau to respond to crime scenes and investigate officer-involved shootings, in-custody deaths, and use-of-force cases.

Stangel is being tried on charges of battery, assault with a deadly weapon, assault likely to cause great bodily injury, and assault under color of authority. A DA investigator tested under oath that she felt pressured to mislead police and withhold evidence from a sworn affidavit out of fear of losing her job.

The alleged assault occurred in October 2019 encounter with Dacari Spiers, an unarmed Black man. Stangel and another officer initially responded to a report of a man choking a woman in the city’s Fisherman’s Wharf area and, once at the scene, a struggle ensued between Spiers and the officers.

During the encounter, Stangel allegedly struck Spiers’ legs with a baton several times, resulting in Spiers suffering a broken leg and wrist, as well as lacerations to his leg.

The testimony hath broiled over into a heated public debate with an exchange of accusations between Scott and Boudin. Now Scott and Boudin are scheduled to sit down this week to start renegotiating a new agreement to cooperate on use of force investigations.

READ MORE: San Francisco Police Arrest Suspect In Attempted Homicide

In the statement from Bonta, Breed and City Attorney David Chiu, the officials said that they were “working together to support the parties to swiftly and collaboratively reach an agreement on the terms of an amended MOU that address the significant issues of compliance, accountability, and mutual expectations.”

Scott used the statement to once again level criticism at Boudin, questioning the integrity of the DA’s office.

“I’m grateful to Attorney General Bonta, Mayor Breed and City Attorney Chiu for recognizing and responding to the significant issues of compliance that eroded my confidence in the integrity of my agreement with District Attorney Boudin’s office,” Scott said in his statement.

“I stand strongly for the principles of accountability and transparency, which are foundational to all 21st century police reforms — including those involving uses of force and officer-involved shootings,” the statement continued. “But accountability and transparency must be mutually honored by both parties in agreements such as these. I am hopeful that rigorous protections can be put in place to restore and then guarantee the ‘two-way street’ moving forward, which according to the sworn court testimony of an SFDA investigator that office abandoned.”

Boudin denies violating the agreement. Rachel Marshall, a spokesperson for Boudin’s office, said the agreement has room for improvement and that the DA’s office remains committed to prosecuting unlawful use of force.

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“We are hopeful that we will be able to reach an agreement that preserves our ability to conduct independent investigations of police use of force,” she said.

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