Appliance Repair in Helm, CA

Good for Charlie Montoyo.

His contract extension, agreed to in recent weeks and announced Friday by the Toronto Blue Jays, is a just reward for his work over three tumultuous years at the helm. After managing the 95-loss bottom touch of 2019, the pandemic season chaos of 2020 and the three-home trek of 2021, all while overseeing the big-league acclimations of Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette and so many others, a little more job security, at minimum, had been earned.

A little more is precisely what the Blue Jays gave Montoyo, adding one more guaranteed year, through the 2023 season, with team options for 2024 and 2025 beyond that. The terms allow GM Ross Atkins to have both extended stability (Montoyo won’t go into any season as a lame duck) and the ability to pivot with relative ease, if needed (think Randal Grichuk’s extension).

The Blue Jays, like every team, do love their flexibility, but when considering whether they simply gave Montoyo some more rope rather than actually tethering him to their dugout, it’s worth noting the organizational lean toward stability.

Remember that former manager John Gibbons (and his coaching staff) remained in place for three sometimes uncomfortable seasons after president and CEO Mark Shapiro and Atkins took over from Paul Beeston and Alex Anthopoulos before the sides parted ways.

Pitching coach Pete Walker and third-base coach Luis Rivera remained in their roles when Montoyo took over from Gibbons and there’s been no turnover on the staff since, although more roles have been added.

Given all that, then, thinking Montoyo is a bad April away from being on thin ice runs counter to how this Blue Jays front office has operated. And while the finding-easy-answers-to-all-problems-in-the-manager set is quick to pin every loss on the 56-year-old, how many managers have had three seasons of extremes quite like Montoyo?

In 2019, he inherited a team in transition with pitching so threadbare that he once announced his next day’s starter as “an opener and a guy,” and often referred to reliever Sam Gaviglio, the always-available reliever who soaked up 95.2 innings, as the team’s MVP. The Blue Jays ran through 39 pitchers that year, including position players Luke Maile and Richard Urena, while handing at-bats to the Socrates Britos and Alen Hansons of the baseball world.

Out of the ashes of the Gong Show came the pandemic season of 2020, when border restrictions meant he and his players gathered for Summer Camp in Dunedin, Fla., unsure where they’d train, let alone play. They ended up holding camp in Toronto but were forced to shelter at their triple-A home in Buffalo after plans for games at Rogers Centre, and stadium shares in Pittsburgh and Baltimore fell through. Despite that, a 32-28 finish qualified them for the expanded playoffs.

Last year, stranded again by the closed border, the Blue Jays started their season in Dunedin, moved to Buffalo and then eventually returned to Toronto. Amid all that upheaval, they overcame a series of gutting bullpen implosions and other hiccups to eventually rally and miss out on the playoffs on the last day of the season.

While the Blue Jays in-game decision-making became a frequent talking point, it wasn’t his fault that Tyler Chatwood and Rafael Dolis were often the best option in a bullpen where he regularly had to make things up.

And though the players, first and foremost, get the credit for performing so relentlessly under trying circumstances, Montoyo had a hand in keeping things from imploding. This stat illustrates how disruptive circumstance has been: Of the Blue Jays’ 192 home games during his three seasons, 75 of them, or 39 per cent, haven’t actually been at home in Toronto.

“Charlie should be manager of the year,” Rays manager Kevin Cash, who won the award, said in an interview last September. “I mean, what he has gone through over a two-year period, it's pretty remarkable. It's a special group over there but he has helped keep that group together and unified it with all the B.S. that has taken place because of the travel and inconsistencies.

“Look at the uncertainty that all those players, certainly Charlie and the staff, but ultimately all the players faced. You've got three home ballparks, you're getting booed half the time because when we played them in Dunedin, we've got fans there, in Buffalo, you've got New York Yankees fans there – that's not how you draw it up. And the way that team has shown over the last two years the ability to just wipe that off and be very, very good is a testament to the players, but also Charlie.”

Now, Montoyo faces a different challenge.

The adversity of the past three years is replaced by the overriding expectation to win. The roster, once stocked with fliers and filler, is stacked with stars and contributors. The team is at home, with a new scoreboard, LED lights and no capacity restrictions in the stands. The AL East is still a meatgrinder, but there’s an extra post-season berth in play.

Having shown the capability to help the Blue Jays survive through some of the franchise’s worst times, this is the time for Montoyo, extension in hand, to help the team thrive through some of its best opportunities, too.

Armed with marketing experience from California, seven years cultivating a community at the Oak Bluffs Library and a lifelong connection to the Vineyard, Carolina Cooney is prepared to tackle her next role as executive director of the Martha’s Vineyard Chamber of Commerce.

The chamber board of directors announced their selection of Ms. Cooney as executive director this week. She will follow the footsteps of Nancy Gardella, who announced her retirement this past December, ending a 15-year tenure as executive director.

In a phone interview with the Gazette Wednesday, Ms. Cooney said she was looking for a challenge when she applied for the position, missing the world of marketing she left behind when she moved to the Island from California.

“Everything sounded like what I wanted, so I applied,” she said.

Ms. Cooney was born on Martha’s Vineyard, but moved away when she was two years old, she said. She returned 11 years ago to take care of her grandmother and raise her family, eventually returning to work at the Oak Bluffs Library. There, she continued her work in marketing and communications, serving as the library’s programming coordinator and working in public relations and graphic design.

She said she hopes her deep connections to the Vineyard act as an advantage in her new role.

“I think it’s hard to imagine somebody off-Island coming to [take] this position,” she said.

A resident of West Tisbury and co-creator of the retail website SilverSahara.com, Ms. Cooney said she understands what it’s like to run a business on the Island. She added that she believes it’s important for Island businesses to become more present online.

“Even not living here year-round, you don’t know what it’s like to have a business on the Island,” she said.

Ms. Cooney cited housing and staffing as two of the biggest challenges facing Island businesses. She added that the Island’s seasonality adds an additional layer of challenge for business owners.

“We rely so much on having the J-1 visa population . . . and we haven’t had that in the last few years,” she said in part.

In recent years, Ms. Cooney said she’s seen help wanted signs up at nearly every business on the Island. Even as Covid cases wane and the Vineyard prepares for an explosive summer, she said many of those same signs have been hung along the Island’s main streets.

“Having enough people to work, and having trained people to work, is a challenge,” she said.

One place Ms. Cooney sees opportunity for Island businesses is in the shoulder season, she said. With more people on the Island year-round, Ms. Cooney said the Island may be able to appeal to those who may not want to visit during the hectic summer season.

“Right now used to be the dead season,” she said. “And now . . . it’s pretty busy.”

Even if businesses can’t extend their seasons, Ms. Cooney said there’s opportunity in advertising and promotion throughout the year.

“They can still do promotions to really ramp up their summer sales,” she said.

And while she acknowledged the role of the chamber in promoting the Island for tourists, she said she feels Martha’s Vineyard speaks for itself when it comes to attracting summer visitors. Still, she said she believes there are demographics the Island could do a better job of attracting.

“We can certainly expand to reach more international visitors,” she said.

As Ms. Cooney steps into her new role, she’ll be helping to handle a season that has already seen sold-out ferries and a high octane rental market.

“Definitely anticipating to have a busier season than ever,” she said.

But looking to the summer and beyond, Ms. Cooney said she’s just excited to be able to help serve the Island and its business community.

She begins work Friday.

“I’m looking forward to getting started,” she said.

Mexico is among one of the world’s top mining jurisdictions for silver and gold, and although output in the country decreased in 2020 following COVID-19 lockdown measures, production has completely recovered, consistently reporting year-over-year growth.

Investors eyeing opportunities in the hot gold and silver market may have a lot of options, but few check as many boxes as this precious metal exploration company active in the Americas, specifically Mexico, when it comes to a quality project, solid results, and a stable share structure.

Focused on the acquisition, exploration, and development of precious metal deposits within Mexico and across the Americas, Mammoth Resources’ (TSX-V: MTH, OTC: MMMRF, Forum) flagship 53 sq km (5,333-hectare) asset is its 100% owned gold-silver with copper, Tenoriba Project located in the prolific metal producing Sierra Madre Precious Metal Belt (SMPMB) in Chihuahua State, Mexico. The SMPMB is home to numerous deposits that combined have yielded 96 million oz gold equivalent of combined gold and silver.

Project history and highlights:

The Tenoriba property is comprised of 4 concessions, upon which Mammoth has earned a 100% interest, subject to a 2% Net Smelter Return royalty of US$1.5 million payable two years into commercial production.

Prior to the 2022 exploration program, $5.5 million has been spent on Tenoriba, including:

2,600 soil geochemical samples identified a large 15 sq km area (5 km by 3 km) with highly anomalous gold in soil (where anomalous soil sample results are often measured in 10’s or up to 100’s of parts per billion (ppb) Mammoth sampled up to 6,300 ppb gold in soil). In addition, 600 rock chip samples collected with gold-silver concentrated in 3 principle areas along a 5 km east-west trend, open to the east and west. 14 channels were cut for a total of 151 metres along 5 km of strike. 72-line km of IP-Mag surface geophysics performed over 40% of total mineralized surface area. This gold-silver mineralized area remains open to the east and west. 26 diamond drills holes testing areas along a 4 kilometre (km) trend to 150 metre (m) depth, 18 of which are potentially economical, a couple of highlights with respect to grade and interval, include:

2,600 soil geochemical samples identified a large 15 sq km area (5 km by 3 km) with highly anomalous gold in soil (where anomalous soil sample results are often measured in 10’s or up to 100’s of parts per billion (ppb) Mammoth sampled up to 6,300 ppb gold in soil). In addition, 600 rock chip samples collected with gold-silver concentrated in 3 principle areas along a 5 km east-west trend, open to the east and west. 14 channels were cut for a total of 151 metres along 5 km of strike. 72-line km of IP-Mag surface geophysics performed over 40% of total mineralized surface area. This gold-silver mineralized area remains open to the east and west.

The company’s current $1.5 million drill program is testing mineralized areas along a corridor of surface mineralization and coincident geophysical anomalies. Exploration focused on three areas of gold-silver mineralization over a 6 km strike length. Over the coming weeks and months, more results from this work is expected to be released.

The project had been optioned by Centerra Gold Inc. (TSX: CG), a public mining company with a $3.7 billion market cap, which was to spend $10 million (USD) to earn 70% interest in Tenoriba over a 7-year option period commencing early 2019.

In September 2020, after 21 months under the option agreement and having spent $1.2 million and permits submitted for 139 drill holes / two contractors bidding on drill program, Centerra announced they were leaving Mexico, returning 100% of Tenoriba to Mammoth.

Drilling at the project is testing up to 5 large targets that measure from hundreds of metres to 1.2 kilometres in size over a large 18 sq km gold-silver footprint - highest gold-silver sample graded 74 g/t gold - 62 g/t silver. What makes these historic results even more significant, is that they show the potential for a low cost, large scale, open pit mine (abundant surface mineralization) and low-cost heap leaching processing (free gold).

Preliminary results from the Mammoth Resources team efforts to consolidate the historical data generated at Tenoriba noted the presence of a large irregular shaped roughly 5 km by 3 km, generally east -- west striking soil gold anomaly with numerous surface rock samples assaying greater than 5 grams per tonne (g/t) gold up to as high as 23.50 g/t gold (see map above).

Field work to date has confirmed previous geological observations, including the presence of a large area extending over numerous square kilometres of altered Tertiary felsic volcanics intruded by diorite, quartz monzonitic and quartz feldspar intrusives, all characteristics typical of multi-million ounce gold mines in production in the Sierra Madre similar to Tenoriba, these mines owned by some of the largest mining companies in the world the likes of Agnico Eagle, Alamos Gold and Pan American Silver.

Drill results:

In early March 2022, Mammoth Resources reported that it had drilled up to 6.46 g/t gold and 6.4 g/t silver at its Tenoriba Property in Mexico. Then in early April the company announced additional drill results which included gold-silver and copper values over 10’s of metres.

Mammoth Resources’ President and CEO, Thomas Atkins said in a media release on this news that the company continues to intersect potentially economical gold-silver grades over lengthy, tens-of-metre intervals at generally shallow depths in significant step-out distances from prior drilling.

“It’s important to keep in mind that Tenoriba is a very large, at least 4 to 6 km long mineralized system with gold-silver sampled in thousands of surface samples, and as such an excellent candidate for large-scale open-pit mining.”

Initial results from November 2021 saw 4 diamond drill holes completed totalling 426 metres testing the TA-2 target in the eastern portion (Carneritos area) of the trend.

The Carneritos area remains very prospective and field assessment is underway analyzing drill sections, surface geology, sampling, and geophysics data to assist in defining follow-up drill locations on these targets with additional drilling aimed at assisting in more clearly understanding the size, orientation, and controls to gold-silver mineralization at Carneritos.

Meet the team:

Guided by an experienced technical and business management team with more than 100 years of combined industry, mine finding, and development experience, as well as advancing exploration activities, among a tight group. CEO Atkins is an accomplished mining executive who, over the past 35 years, successfully lead and financed exploration and development programs throughout the Americas.

He has a degree in geology and five years field experience in mineral exploration and mine development , an MBA and has worked as a senior executive in corporate and investment banking, investor relations, corporate development. As a director of investment banking for CIBC World Markets, he participated in raising more than $1.7 billion in equity and debt for numerous small to large cap companies. Over the past 17 years he has been the CEO of successful early stage development and production stage companies, including former CEO of Rockex Ltd. (now trading as Rockex Mining Corp. (CSE: RXM), Castle Gold Corp., a gold producer, acquired by Argonaut Gold (TSX: AR), and Crowflight Minerals Inc. a nickel exploration and mine development company (TSX: CML).

Chief Financial Officer Sandra Evans is a financial professional with 30 years experience in the energy, mining, and manufacturing industries. A CPA, CGA trained accountant and has previously served as the CFO for several Venture listed companies, she has more than 15 years of experience in the oil and gas and mining sectors with responsibility for business plans, budgetary control, audits, project management and International Financial Reporting Standards. Her skills incorporate all levels of controllership, treasury, and internal control governance.

Mammoth Resources’ VP Exploration, Richard Simpson, BSC. GEO is a professional geologist with more than 25 years of exploration experience throughout Latin America. A graduate from the Universite de Montreal, he has worked for several companies, both majors, such as Iamgold Corp. (TSX: IME) and juniors including Normabec Mining Resources Ltd. (TSX-V: NMB). Early in his career, he has also worked in Northern Quebec (Abitibi), Manitoba and Nunavut on numerous VMS and precious metal projects for Noranda and Aur Resources.

Financials:

With only 67 million shares outstanding, Mammoth Resources boasts an attractive capital structure. Moreover, the market valuation for the company is impressive, especially considering what the team had spent at Tenoriba defining gold-silver with copper mineralization.

Investment summary:

In an area where projects totalling 40 million oz Au Eq (25 M oz Au / 1.0 B oz Ag) had been discovered over two decades, this represents a compelling investment opportunity with high leverage to exploration success for investors.

Comprised of a highly experienced management team, the company’s focus on gold mineralization with silver and copper in a large gold enriched zone has seen extensive surface mapping, sampling, and geophysics segue to drilling.

As the company continues to develop its valuable Tenoriba Project with an eye on other potential high-quality targets in the Americas, the team leading Mammoth Resources is excited about what the future has in store for their company and its shareholders. Investors new to this story would be wise to deepen their due diligence into what is offered here. This company is set up to excel in the future market and serves as a compelling investment opportunity for both the seasoned investor, and newcomers to the industry.

For more information, visit mammothresources.ca.

To learn about some of the most-talked about Gold stocks on Stockhouse, check out the Gold Bullboards. For more of the latest info on Gold stocks, check out the Gold Trending News hub on Stockhouse.

FULL DISCLOSURE: This is a paid article produced by Stockhouse Publishing.

Last September, the company launched its inaugural rocket but it was intentionally exploded minutes after lifting off.

CEDAR PARK, Texas — A private equity firm, AE Industrial Partners, has a new majority stake of Firefly Aerospace based in Cedar Park. The acquisition comes as the aerospace company makes arrangements for its second rocket launch after the first ended in an intentional blast over the Pacific Ocean.

Firefly Aerospace managed to fundraise roughly $75 million in a move led by AE Industrial Partners and, according to a report from KVUE's news partners at the Austin American-Statesman, Firefly says their value sits at around $1 billion.

The company set up shop in Cedar Park after initially being headquartered in California. Since its founding in 2014, Firefly has sought to position itself as a competitor in the small satellite market. The industry has seen an emerging number of launch providers to government and commercial customers to deliver payloads into space.

Flight 2 is getting ready to head to our launch pad at Vandenberg Space Force Base. Get a behind-the-scenes look into our journey so far. #makingspaceforeveryone #seeyouonthepad https://t.co/CiviehkBgn

— Firefly Aerospace (@Firefly_Space) March 29, 2022

Firefly’s flagship unmanned rocket, the Alpha, took off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California last year but it only remained in flight for 2.5 minutes before Space Force officials detonated the rocket. Officials cited the intentional explosion over the rocket’s trajectory, which changed after it began tipping sideways and steered off course.

The acquisition of Firefly comes as the company intends to launch a second rocket later this year. In addition to a new rocket launch, the company says it just finished a “critical design review” phase of its Blue Ghost lunar lander. Final prefabrication of the lander is expected to be completed next month.Firefly CEO Tom Markusic told the Austin American-Statesman the new ownership marks an exciting new chapter for his company.

“These investments allow Firefly to build on the momentum from last year’s financing, and better position us for future growth. We’re eager to work with the AEI team and benefit from their industry and financial markets experience,” he said.

As the new injection of capital unfolds at the company, the Cedar Park area is poised to see significant growth in Cedar Park, according to the company. Firefly leaders say they want to quadruple the workforce and add hundreds of jobs at its headquarters in coming years as it expands into a new facility.

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Quali's infrastructure automation platform increases value and helps businesses achieve scale in DevOps by simplifying deployment and management of Helm Charts

AUSTIN, Texas, March 15, 2022 /CNW/ -- Quali, a leading provider of Environments-as-a-Service infrastructure automation solutions, announced today that its Torque platform now supports seamless integration with Helm. Helm Charts allow engineers to define their applications for Kubernetes with all the requisite microservices and networking components – in essence, acting as a package manager for Kubernetes.

"Many IT organizations are struggling with managing complexity, costs and accountability for container infrastructure," said Edan Evantal, CTO of Quali. "Our aim is to help organizations gain greater value and control using Helm to add speed and reliability to development and test processes. At the same time, we allow them to maintain governance and reduce friction by reusing proven, existing Helm Charts, so they can innovate quicker while mitigating business risks associated with scale."

With native support for Helm Charts in Torque, customers can now:

Torque has been adopted by leading enterprises to accelerate software development and deployment pipelines while providing frictionless management and governance. With Torque, organizations can define complete application environments, including infrastructure, data, services and application tools into unified reusable blueprints to support automated deployment of the infrastructure required in software delivery pipelines and QA/Test environments.

Torque also supports security mandates with self-service access controls that allow centralized DevOps teams to define which elements of environments end users are free to configure and which elements can't be changed, providing both flexibility and governance. Torque achieves this through built-in features including auto-tagging, custom tagging and Role-Based Access Controls (RBAC).

About Quali Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Quali provides the leading platform for Environments-as-a-Service infrastructure automation solutions, helping companies achieve freedom from infrastructure complexity, so they can operate with velocity. Global 2000 enterprises and innovators everywhere rely on Quali's award-winning CloudShell and Torque platforms to create self-service, on-demand automation solutions that increase engineering productivity, cut cloud costs, and optimize infrastructure utilization. For more information, please visit quali.com and follow Quali on Twitter and LinkedIn.

SOURCE Qualisystems USA Inc.

For further information: Sean Harris, sean.h@quali.com, 512.553.6404