A number of the details for the NBA’s bubble league plan still need to be worked out, but the general gist of the whole thing is that 22 teams will head to Disney and play out a truncated regular season, a potential play-in for the 8-seed, and a full postseason. The basketball-specific portions of the plan are the headliners, but a whole lot has needed to go into this plan in an attempt to keep players and personnel as safe as possible in the face of COVID-19.

That portion of the plan got a major endorsement from Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. In an interview with Michael Kim of Stadium, Fauci signed off on the plan, praising it for being “quite creative.”

“I actually have looked at that plan and it is really quite creative,” Fauci said. “What they are really trying to do, and I think they might very well be quite successful with it, is to create a situation where it is as safe as it possibly could be for the players by creating this bubble — essentially testing everybody, make sure that you start with a baseline of everybody being negative and trying to make sure there is no influx into that cohort of individuals and do a tournament-type play.”

Fauci continued to heap the praise onto the plan, saying that he does not find it reckless and that he believes, if it works, it could “possibly” end up being a model for other leagues that would like to go with a bubble approach.

“They really wanted to make sure that the safety of the players, and the people associated with the players, was paramount,” Fauci said.

This endorsement from the nation’s top infectious disease doctor came one day after a collection of players hopped on a phone call to express some reservations they have with the plan. It also comes on the same day that Player’s Association executive director Michele Roberts said that she is operating under the assumption that someone will contract the virus while players are posted up in Orlando.

There are still a number of concerns with this plan, because nothing is truly ironclad and we just won’t know whether or not it will work until everyone gets to Disney. Still, all the league can hope to do at this point is have a good plan in place, and in Fauci’s eyes, that’s what is happening.

“For the people who are thirsting for basketball, who love basketball, the way I do, it’s something that I think is a sound plan,” Fauci said.

The NBA Players’ Association is currently having lengthy discussions internally about the league’s proposed restart in the Orlando bubble and whether it is the right move for the players to go amid a pandemic and nationwide protests of police brutality and systemic racism against the Black community.

Kyrie Irving has been a prominent voice in questioning whether players returning would be wise, noting that playing basketball could serve as a distraction from the Black Lives Matter movement that has garnered unprecedented support in the last month. Others have voiced similar sentiments, and on top of concern of whether playing basketball would detract from the fight for racial justice, there’s the looming concern over the safety of players and the long-term effects of the coronavirus.

The activism of players around the league is having an effect and its for that reason why there are some skeptical of whether they can continue being impactful once games begin again and discussion shifts to the on-court product. An example of that impact was noticeable on Sunday when the Atlanta Hawks became the first NBA team to publicly announce that they would be making Juneteenth (June 19) an official company holiday to celebrate the official ending of slavery in the United States.

“I am proud of the decision our organization has made to recognize Juneteenth as a company holiday this year and going forward,” said Camye Mackey, Chief People, Diversity and Inclusion Officer for the Atlanta Hawks & State Farm Arena. “This is one of many steps we’ll take to support the positive change we need to see in society.”

Making the official abolishment of slavery a national holiday has become a more prominent topic in recent weeks, and some companies like Nike, Twitter, and now the Hawks have taken it upon themselves to add that date to their internal holiday calendar. June 19, 1965 was the date Union soldiers made it to Galveston, Texas to deliver news that the Civil War had ended and the slaves were now free — two and a half years after Lincoln first read the Emancipation Proclamation.

It is a significant date in U.S. history and one that, for a large part of the population, has gone unnoticed for most of our lives. That something this big is not widely known or celebrated offers yet another example of how little actual Black history gets taught in the American education system, and illustrative of why this movement is so important right now — and why players are fearful of diluting it in any way. It’s good to see the Hawks taking this step and hopefully the league will follow suit.

Spike Lee has abruptly apologized for defending Woody Allen during a radio interview while promoting Da 5 Bloods, his latest Netflix project that hit the streaming service this weekend. While promoting the film, Lee appeared on a New York City radio station and called the director a friend and a “great, great filmmaker” he apparently felt is getting treated unfairly by those who want to “cancel” him.

“This cancel thing is not just Woody,” he said. “And I think that when we look back on it, [we’re] gonna see that, short of killing somebody, I don’t if you can just erase somebody like they never existed.

“Woody’s a friend of mine. I know he’s going through it right now.”

Lee was speaking in reference to the allegations of sexual abuse of a minor in his own family. The allegations, and some in Hollywood continuing to work with him and appreciate his films despite the seriousness of the allegations, has been a controversial subject that in recent years has resurfaced in light of the Me Too movement and other societal upheaval.

Lee’s initial comments seemed to put distance between allegations against Allen and other wrongdoings, such as police brutality and issues that have sparked massive protests in recent weeks. But later Saturday, Lee tweeted an apology without context, saying his “words were wrong” and acknowledging the “real damage that can’t be minimized” caused by sexual assault and violence.

Though the apology did not reference Allen, it seems clear given the “damage” he’s referencing that it was walking back his comments about Allen.

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An insert that’ll turn your grill into a pizza oven? Yeah, I’m gonna ~knead~ that.

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Something tells me that TikTok-ing burglary generally isn’t a great idea.

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Which classic DCOM matches your personality?

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Former SNL cast member Jay Pharoah shared a chilling video on Instagram where an Los Angeles police officer kneeled on his neck in an apparent case of mistaken identity strikingly similar to the police actions that killed George Floyd and sparked an international movement against police brutality against Black people.

The video started with images of kneeling police officers and shots of protesters and policemen walking together, which have been widely shared as signs of unity in the last few weeks of widespread protests against police brutality. While the images play, Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech can be heard. The video then shows Pharoah, who explains that a week before George Floyd was killed by police in Minnesota, an extremely similar incident happened to him in Los Angeles.

Pharoah explained as security camera footage showed an officer run up to him, weapon drawn, in daylight in Los Angeles while he was on a run.

“I could have easily been an Ahmaud Arbery or a George Floyd,” he said.

Apparently, officers were looking for a suspect and he fit the description: “a black man with gray sweatpants and a gray shirt.” Four officers approached him with their weapons drawn, and once he was on the ground one officer put his knee on his neck. The video, with Pharoah narrating, is a harrowing look at just how easily someone can be put at gunpoint just for being a Black man on the streets of an American city.

“I’m Jay Pharoah and I’m a Black man in America,” he said. “My life matters. Black lives always matter. They always matter.”

Our Longest Summer series will look at the eight teams whose seasons are now officially over, and will have to wait until mid-October to make decisions on what’s next and how to proceed after falling short of the cut-off for a continued 2019-20 campaign.

The Charlotte Hornets entered the 2019-20 season with exceptionally low expectations. Many, including a handful of Las Vegas oddsmakers, projected the Hornets to finish dead-last in the NBA after the loss of Kemba Walker and, at the very least, a playoff push wasn’t expected to be in the cards. Along the way, however, Charlotte overachieved significantly, posting a 23-42 record that nearly saw the team eclipse its 82-game over/under win total in only 65 games.

It would be fair to note that the Hornets’ point differential was substantially worse than the team’s record but, even when accounting for that, Charlotte was simply better than they were “supposed” to be this season. Much of that can be attributed to the rise of Devonte’ Graham, but, with James Borrego drawing encouraging reviews on the bench and a respectable overall defense, the Hornets might have a little bit of momentum with a 10th-place finish in the Eastern Conference. With that as the backdrop, the offseason arrives early for Charlotte and a number of intriguing outcomes are in play.

2020 Free Agents

Nic Batum (player option), Bismack Biyombo (UFA), Dwayne Bacon (RFA), Willy Hernangomez (UFA)

2020 Projected salary cap space (assuming $115 million salary cap)

$25.1 million, per Early Bird Rights

Areas of Strength

Even with the relatively positive overall performance this season, the Hornets aren’t overflowing with talent. The team’s backcourt was highly productive this season, though, and the duo of Graham and Terry Rozier did a lot to carry Charlotte’s offense. Though Graham cooled off during the campaign, he produced 18.2 points per game and knocked down 37 percent from three-point range on substantial volume. As for Rozier, the jokes about his (highly) lucrative contract were quieted to some degree, as he put together the best offensive season of his career by a comfortable margin. In addition to the backcourt, the Hornets may have a gem in 2019 lottery pick P.J. Washington, and 2018 lottery pick Miles Bridges put together a few flashes along the way.

Areas of Need

With apologies to Graham (or even Rozier), the Hornets still don’t have a No. 1 option on the offensive end of the floor. Every rebuilding team is in search of “the guy” and Charlotte simply doesn’t have that player right now. As a result, the team ranked near the bottom of the league in virtually every offensive category (sans three-point shooting) and the lack of offensive talent is stark when examining the roster. From there, it wasn’t as if the team was incredible defensively, failing to overcome its small backcourt without anything approaching a dominant rim-protecting force on the roster. To put it bluntly, this is a roster that needs a lot.

Biggest Decisions

With the widespread assumption that Batum will opt in to his $27.1 million player option, the Hornets still project to have more than $25 million in salary cap room, at least under the pre-pandemic projections. On one hand, it is a bad year to have substantial cap space, simply because there is a lack of top-end talent hitting the market. On the other, Charlotte isn’t usually mentioned on the list of teams ready to land max-level players in free agency, so they could use the space to acquire draft picks in exchange for toxic assets on other rosters. It will be crucial that the Hornets use their salary cap flexibility wisely and, from a draft perspective, Charlotte is in position to use a lottery pick to bolster its stockpile.

Overall Offseason Focus

The Hornets are still in asset collection mode, or at least they should be. There isn’t a single “untouchable” piece on the roster, and while everyone knew a rebuild had to arrive when Walker exited, Charlotte isn’t in the kind of advanced position of teams like Atlanta or Minnesota that already have some star power on the roster. Prudence is the order of the day, and the Hornets can improve their long-term standing while keeping their eye on the ball when it comes to not pushing too hard for the short term.

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