Month: October 2021

Beyonce is preparing for another release through her beloved line Ivy Park, and it sees her partnering with Peloton, the popular fitness company. According to Women’s Wear Daily, the upcoming line includes lifestyle and performance footwear and apparel in neon, olive, and black colors. In total, 29 pieces will be available, including T-shirts, bike shorts, tights, sports bras, shorts, windbreaks, and cropped hoodies. She’s also releasing the IVP Ultrapack, a unisex sneaker that will be sold in sizes 4 to 14.

The line will be available on the Adidas website, in physical stores, and on the Peloton e-commercial sites on November 10. Prices for the apparel will range from $45 to $200 while IVP Utrapack shoes are priced at $200. She also shared a campaign video for the upcoming drop on her Instagram page.

Beyonce teamed with Peloton nearly a year ago for a multi-year partnership benefiting HBCUs, which gave two-year Peloton Digital memberships to students at ten HBCUs: Bennett College, Clark Atlanta University, Grambling State University, Hampton University, Howard University, Morehouse College and Morehouse School of Medicine, Spelman College, Texas Southern University, and Wilberforce University. Students were thus granted access to a library of fitness classes on the Peloton app. In a press release, the fitness company also promised to “build on its relationships with each of these schools to pursue long-term recruiting partnerships at both the internship and undergraduate levels.”

The greatest goal scorer in the history of the Premier League did his best to get one of his old clubs a new fan on Friday. Alan Shearer, who scored 260 goals in his PL career for Blackburn Rovers and Newcastle United from 1992-2006, is in Los Angeles for Premier League Fan Fest, the product of NBC Sports and the league teaming up to bring the beautiful game to cities in the United States.

While there, Shearer met with former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a well-documented supporter of Liverpool. Their half-hour meeting involved a pitch to get Schwarzenegger to embrace Newcastle, and while the pair did pose for a photo of The Terminator holding a shirt, Shearer is brutally honest in how he thinks his pitch went.

“I don’t think it worked,” Shearer tells Uproxx Sports.

Shearer usually spends a whole heck of a lot of time talking about Newcastle — he’s the greatest player in club history and was part of the inaugural class of Premier League Hall of Fame inductees in large part due to his excellence as a Magpie — but that’s been ramped up lately, as the club came under new ownership through a consortium led by Saudi Arabia’s government and its sovereign wealth fund. He has acknowledged that he has reservations about the takeover, but he’s excited for long-suffering fans of Newcastle to see their loyalty rewarded by owners who do everything they can to support the club.

On Friday, Uproxx Sports caught up with Shearer to talk Newcastle, the perceived title contenders in the Premier League this season, the early season struggles of two of the greatest English goal scorers of the current era, and more.

What are you going to be doing in Los Angeles this weekend?

Engaging with the fans of the Premier League and all the different football clubs. It’s great to be a part of it, and it’s great see how diehard of supporters they are — they have to be to get up at stupid o’clock to watch their teams do it. So, we’re here for the weekend. I’ve been fortunate enough to do … I think we did one in New York, one in Washington, one in Austin, we’ve been to India several times, and here we are in L.A., and I’m really looking forward to it, should be a great weekend.

What’s your favorite thing about getting to do an event like this?

My favorite thing is seeing the dedication of all the U.S. soccer fans for the Premier League. I mean, obviously I’m aware of it in England and around Europe and other parts of the world, but to get here and just sample the atmosphere of all the fans here, I think it’s amazing.

This is a really fun weekend in the Premier League, what is the thing that you’re most excited about with the league this weekend?

Well, I think the standout game is Manchester United-Liverpool on Sunday. I don’t need to tell you or anyone how big those two particular football clubs are around the world. And I’m sure that it’ll generate great interest in our Fan Fest on Sunday. The way both teams are scoring goals, I’m hoping for a high scoring game. I have no particular allegiance to any of those teams. I just hope it’s a really exciting game for us all to watch.

I’d love to start picking your brain about the teams and first one would be United. They got Cristiano Ronaldo in the summer, got Raphael Varane, Jadon Sancho, but something has just seemed a little bit off. What has stood out about them?

Well, I watched them closely last weekend when they played Leicester and were beaten by Leicester. Man United will always score goals because of the fantastic attacking talent that they have, whether that be Ronaldo, or [Marcus] Rashford, or [Mason] Greenwood, or Sancho, [Bruno] Fernandes and [Paul] Pogba. All these guys, they’re so good going forward.

But what I also noticed is that they’re so open, and that’s why they’re conceding so many goals. I felt they really struggled last weekend in terms of the press, they didn’t know when to press, how to press. And I think when you’ve got that attacking talent in the team, it’s finding that balance. So, that’s why I think they’ve struggled defensively. You can’t pin all the blame on the back four, whether that’s Harry Maguire in there, or [Victor] Lindelof, or Varane when he’s played. The press must come from the midfield and the forwards, and I’ve just felt they’ve really struggled with that this season.

And then Liverpool, they’ve just been scintillating. To me, they look like the team that pushed City to the final day then ran away with the league again. How have they been so effectively, to this point, able to put last season behind them and have success this year?

One of the big things, obviously, is [Virgil] van Dijk being back. When you have a player of his caliber missing for the year that he did, then you’re gonna miss him, because he’s one of the world’s best, and he proved that when Liverpool went all the way. So, to have him back is a big plus, and then the way that the forward players are playing. I think it also helps that Mo Salah, if I’m correct in saying, didn’t play any football in the summer. So, he’s coming back and he’s probably playing the best football of his career, and for me, is probably the best in world football as we sit here.

And then I want to ask about the other two teams viewed as the title contenders. First one is Chelsea, they’re top of the table. Some injury concerns, but what do you think they need to do to be able to stay on top for the remainder of the season?

They’ll need to keep [Romelu] Lukaku fit. I know they had one or two injury concerns with him and [Timo] Werner, I think they both came off in midweek, which will be a concern in the long run. I don’t think it should be a big concern this weekend for them.

But he’s a game-changer for them. I know he hasn’t scored for five or six games, Lukaku, but in terms of what he gives them with a threat in front of goal. They didn’t quite have that last season despite them winning the Champions League — Werner missed numerous chances last year. So, they keep Lukaku fit or get him fit and he doesn’t miss too many games, then it won’t be too long before he’s back amongst the goals. And as I said, he will be the game-changer for them.

I think defensively, they’ll be strong, they know how to defend as a team. They’ve got midfield who can pretty much do everything and make it tough for the opposition. They just needed to find someone to put the ball in the back of the net, and they’ve taken great confidence from what they achieved last season. I actually picked them to win the title this season. I’ve not seen, at the minute, anything to change my mind.

Well then I have to ask about the champions. With Manchester City, it’s going to be tougher sledding for them compared to last year. What have you liked about them, and where have you been concerned about their potential ability to retain their title?

Well, they obviously wanted to bring in a center forward, they wanted to bring in Harry Kane, and that never happened. They wanted to bring in Ronaldo, obviously that never happened. So, clearly, Pep [Guardiola] felt he was short in that department, and I think the longer the season goes on … I mean, it’s very difficult to predict because they’ve got so many good players who can be creative, who can score goals, who will open teams up for fun. We’ve all seen that. But there has been a few occasions where they’ve just missed that killer instinct, or that who can be that presence in and around the six yard box, because I’ve always said it, really, an average player in Man City’s team should get at least 20 goals a season. But a world class center forward in their team, I think, would get 40 to 45 goals.

Is there one team outside of that perceived top group that you’ve really enjoyed watching the most, and why?

Well, I’d love to say Newcastle [laughs]. I would say Leicester because of how long they’ve been up there now, how long they’ve been with the big boys. I know they’ve had injury problems this season, but they were back to somewhere near their best last weekend against Man United. Everyone seemed to be enjoying their football, they had Jonny Evans back, who was a big player in that team, and the way they’re not scared of the bigger teams, bigger clubs. They just go after them, and they’ve got so many talented players in that squad. So, I’d have to say Leicester.

I figured with how great of a goalscorer you were, you’d be a perfect person to ask about Harry Kane and Raheem Sterling. The narrative is they’ve both had a poor run a form relative to their expectations. Do you think that’s a hangover from Euros and their summers being so hectic, or do you think something’s going on with them?

I think something’s going on with Raheem. I think that has, sort of, rolled on from last season, if you’d like. He had a brilliant summer for England, as did Harry Kane. I have no doubt about both players’ abilities and that they’ll both come back. I mean, Harry came back last weekend against Newcastle, and if you look over his career, traditionally, he’s a slow starter for most, if not every, season in the Premier League. So, he got his first against Newcastle last weekend, don’t be surprised that, because of the life of a goalscorer, you go a few games without scoring, then you get one, then you get another three or four after that. So, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if he went on a bit of a scoring spree now.

But with Raheem, I don’t know, I guess it looks to me as if something’s gone on. But they’ve got so much talent, particularly on that left-hand side, where he wants to play, or I think is his best position. Whether that’s Phil Forden in there, whether that’s Jack Grealish in there, Bernardo Silva, or Raheem, I mean, that is some serious talent, and you can’t play them all. If I remember rightly, Bernardo Silva — there was talk about him in the summer leaving, or at the end of last season — he’s probably been Man City’s best player this year. So, if you get your head down, which I’m sure Raheem will do, then I don’t think it’ll be too long before we’re talking his form and his goals again.

You said Newcastle fans are excited after feeling like they haven’t had a voice in their club for 14 years. Do you anticipate that fans are going to be willing to be patient with the new ownership group, knowing that if it takes a few years, there could be a light at the end of the tunnel here?

Absolutely, they will be patient, because they know there’s a project going on. It just can’t happen instantly, as much as we’d all like it to, because we, as a football club, Newcastle have flatlined and had no ambition and no hope for the last 14 years. So, the owners have come in and they’ve had more communication in the last 10 days with the fans than we’ve had in the in the previous 14 years. So, I’m absolutely certain the fans will be patient. And it’s going to take time, and whoever the next manager is, that may not be the guy that takes us to the success that the fans want in three, or five, or 10 years’ time. So, there’s a project going on, and we all understand that, and we all have to be, and will be patient, for that.

Yeah, I think people forget that it took City three years to win a trophy and four to win the league. So, I’m glad that you think there’s going to be that willingness for that fans to be able to sit back and say, “Alright, our club is going in the right direction.”

Well, at least we’re going in the right direction, at least we’ve got some hope now, at least they’ve got a little bit of excitement, and a little bit of ambition. And that’s why they will be patient and understand that.

During the third quarter of the Los Angeles Lakers’ game against the Phoenix Suns, a fan was ejected for an incident with Lakers guard Rajon Rondo. Video showed that Rondo, while appearing to point at someone in the aftermath of a drink getting spilled on the floor, had his hand slapped away by a fan sitting courtside.

Immediately after the fan made contact with Rondo, the officials and courtside security came over and saw to it that he was removed from the arena. It is unclear if Rondo and the fan exchanged in any back-and-forth, or if the fan was unhappy with how Rondo was pointing at him.

At the time of the incident, the Suns found themselves up by 30 in a rematch of a series we saw in the first round of the 2021 NBA playoffs. The Lakers had already lost their first game of the year on the league’s opening night of the 2021-22 season in a 121-114 loss to the Golden State Warriors.

After winning a championship with the Lakers during the NBA’s Orlando Bubble, Rondo joined the Atlanta Hawks in the 2020 offseason before getting traded to the Clippers at the deadline. This past offseason, he made the decision to return to the Lakers on a one-year deal.

As the Los Angeles Lakers coughed up a lead in the second quarter of their Friday night tilt with the Phoenix Suns, a rematch of last year’s Western Conference quarterfinals, Los Angeles big men Anthony Davis and Dwight Howard had to be separated by teammates after the two got into a scuffle on the bench.

Howard looked to be getting up and infringing on Davis’ space and Davis seemingly took issue with it, extending his arm and causing Howard to fall back toward the seats on the Lakers’ bench.

A subsequent shot captured the two continuing to hash it out verbally with Howard getting frustrated and seeming to repeatedly say “come on” to Davis.

Another returning member of the Lakers’ 2019-20 NBA Championship-winning team, Rajon Rondo, was able to get between the two big men in both situations to settle things down. Earlier in the game, Howard had been called for a personal foul against Suns point guard Chris Paul, slapping at the ball and catching a lot of body from Paul at the same time.

The Lakers went into the half down 13 after their physical play allowed Phoenix to get into the bonus with about 9:30 left in the half. Los Angeles committed 14 fouls in the first half alone, and Davis and Howard contributed two apiece.

On November 18th, Paloma Mami will be vying for the coveted Best New Artist Award at the 22nd Annual Latin Grammys. The Manhattan-born Chilean-American now lives in Santiago and she’s quickly becoming the gold standard of Chilean Latin Pop. She released her debut album Sueños de Dalí, this past March and there’s a palpable Andean lean to terrific Pop songs with production from Hitboy, Nova Wav, The Stereotypes and others. Stylistically, highlight tracks like”Goteo” and “Religiosa” align her more with the celestial reggaeton-tinged pop of Kali Uchis than with fiercer Latin trap of artists like Karol G and Becky G.

Today, Paloma Mami released “Cosas De La Vida.” the first single from her yet-to-be-announced follow-up album, along with the song’s video that she co-directed. Her pillowy voice rests alongside a delicate acoustic guitar-driven melody and in the video, she’s navigating steadily through space with a panoramic view of the stars and the universe. It paints the imagery that she sings about in the song, of looking to the heavens and dreaming of being with that certain someone once again.

She tweeted today that: “COSAS DE LA VIDA YA ESTÁ AFUERAAA!! Esta canción es muy especial para mi…espero que se pueda transmitir todo el amor que le metí” (“COSAS DE LA VIDA IS OUT!! This song is very special to me…I hope that all you can feel all of the the love that I put into it.”)

Watch the video for “Cosas De La Vida” above.

The Pardon the Interruption 20th anniversary celebration rolled on this week, and to cap off the hit ESPN show’s actual anniversary, hosts Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon received a congratulatory message from former President Barack Obama. As Kornheiser explained, this was a surprise largely organized by ESPN’s Pablo Torre, at which point Obama popped up on screen, much to the delight of the two hosts.

The former President of the United States described his time as a state senator two decades ago when he would, during a long day of menial work, turn on ESPN for some light entertainment and often find himself watching PTI to catch up on the sports stories of the day and hear the two hosts bicker and debate until the buzzer sounded.

“Segment after segment, day after day, year after year, you guys show up,” Obama said.

As president, Obama was well-known for his sports fandom and he often linked up with ESPN for interviews and his annual NCAA Tournament bracket. Of course, since the show has always been filmed in part from Washington, D.C., and Wilbon hails from the president’s hometown of Chicago, it likely holds an even greater place in Obama’s heart.

May we all hope one day to argue with our friends so passionately about sports that the President goes out of his way to tell us we did it incredibly well. If any show deserves that, it is PTI.

The Philadelphia 76ers played their first home game of the 2021-22 NBA season on Friday night. The team played host to the Brooklyn Nets on what had been, to that point, a busy day in Philly, as Ben Simmons showed up to practice earlier in the day and addressed the team. According to reports, Simmons expressed that he wants to play but does not believe he is at a place where he can do that to a certain standard.

It’s been a tumultuous offseason to say the least in Philly with regards to Simmons, who had previously made clear he does not want to continue his career with the team. Perhaps not surprisingly, Sixers fans took Friday as a chance to express some frustrations as they booed Simmons when he appeared in a pregame hype video.

Shortly after, Joel Embiid addressed the crowd and gave an otherwise simple pregame address. But at the end, he implored Philly fans to continue to show support for Simmons.

“I just want to thank you for your support all these years, and then now,” Embiid said. “A lot has happened the last few months, and I urge you guys to continue to support us and our teammate Ben, cause he’s still our brother.”

Embiid was critical of Simmons earlier in the week following the latter getting kicked out of practice, telling the media that it is not the team’s job to babysit Simmons.

There is a seemingly pretty logical solution to the Ben Simmons and Kyrie Irving situations in Philadelphia and Brooklyn: Just trade the two players for one another. According to a new report by Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, though, this is not going to happen any time soon, because the two teams have not been in contact about a potential swap.

Wojnarowski reports that the Sixers have canvassed the league in an attempt to find a trade partner for Simmons, but one team they have not called is Brooklyn about an Irving deal. This does make them a bit of an anomaly, because there is interest around the league in acquiring Irving’s services.

“Brooklyn, I’m told, has taken incoming calls from teams on Kyrie Irving, but they have not themselves made any calls about Irving,” Wojnarowski said. “So Brooklyn and Philadelphia, with these two players in limbo, they have not talked to each other about a Simmons for Kyrie Irving trade.”

The news comes on the same night that the Nets head down to Philly to take on the Sixers. While there has not been an update on Irving’s situation in quite a while — he’s still not with the team as they prefer he stays at home due to his unwillingness to get vaccinated against COVID-19, which prevents him from playing in games without violating a New York City mandate — Simmons reportedly met with the Sixers’ roster on Friday morning and expressed that he is not in a place mentally where he believes he can suit up for the team.

Eight years a go, a grandfather in Michigan wrote a powerful letter to his daughter after she kicked out her son out of the house for being gay. It’s so perfectly written that it crops up on social media every so often.

The letter is beautiful because it’s written by a man who may not be with the times, but his heart is in the right place.

It first appeared on the Facebook page FCKH8 and a representative told Gawker that the letter was given to them by Chad, the 16-year-old boy referenced in the letter.

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In the letter the grandfather is responding to his daughter Christine, who says her son is a “shame” to the family and an “abomination.” She’s also suprised that he became gay because she didn’t raise him that way.

Given the fact she called him an abomination, she must be a very religious woman. Because men who “lie” with men are deemed an “abomination” in The Bible. But one should take that with a grain of salt because in the same chapter, eating shellfish is an abomination as well.

Here is the letter in full:

“Dear Christine:

I’m disappointed in you as a daughter. You’re correct that we have a shame in the family, but mistaken about what it is.

Kicking Chad out of your home simply because he told you he was gay is the real ‘abomination’ here. A parent disow[n]ing her child is what goes ‘against nature’.

The only intelligent thing I heard you saying in all this was that ‘you didn’t raise your son to be gay’. Of course you didn’t. He was born this way and didn’t choose it any more than he being left-handed. You however have made the choice of being hurtful, narrow-minded and backward. So, while we are in the business of [disowning] our children, I think I’ll take this moment to say goodbye to you. I now have a fabulous (as the gay put it) grandson to raise and I don’t have time for heartless B-word of a daughter.

I[f] you find your heart, give us a call.

— Dad”

The grandfather’s letter shows true moral clarity. He can’t believe that she is abdicating her responsibility as a parent just because her son is gay, an orientation that wasn’t even his choice. He then turns the tables on her by doing to her what she did to her son.

“So, while we are in the business of [disowning] our children, I think I’ll take this moment to say goodbye to you,” he writes. He then shows he has some passing familiarity with gay culture by refering to his grandson as “fabulous.” That’s pretty progressive for a grandfather in 2013.

The identities of the teen and his grandfather have never been revealed, but they know the letter received a lot of support. A representative from FCKH8 said that, at the time, the grandfather and grandson refused to do any interviews about the letter because the teenage boy had yet to come out of the closet.

One of the primary tenets of the Sikh faith is “sewa,” or selfless service. We have seen sewa in action in Sikh communities organizing to feed the hungry and rallying to help stranded truck drivers, but sometimes opportunities to practice selfless service pop up in unexpected places.

According to Maple Ridge News, Ridge Meadows Search and Rescue received a call at around 6:00 p.m. on October 11 alerting them that two hikers were in trouble just above the Lower Falls at Golden Ears Provincial Park in British Columbia. The manager of the search and rescue, Rick Laing, told the news outlet that one of the men had fallen into the pool above the falls and was struggling to get out.

But before the rescue team got there, a group of five male hikers were alerted to the stranded men and took the matter into their own hands—and heads. The hikers were Sikhs and were wearing the traditional dastaar (turban)—a piece of cotton cloth up to six yards long wrapped around the head.

“We were trying to think how we could get them out, but we didn’t know how to,” Kuljinder Kinda, one of the hikers, told NBC News. “So we walked for about 10 minutes to find help and then came up with the idea to tie our turbans together.”

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When they got to the area above the hikers, they unwrapped their turbans and used them to make a “rope,” which they then lowered down to the stranded hiker. One of the rescuers lowered himself partway down the rock and tested the rope while the others held on from above.

Watch:

Watch: Video Shows Sikh Men Using Turbans To Rescue Hikers At Canada Waterfall

www.youtube.com

“The rocks there are quite slick and it can be really difficult to get back out of it, especially if you are wet and cold,” said Laing. “So, they were fortunate that these five young men happened by and were able to get him out and back up to the trail.”

Laing added that the man could have succumbed to hypothermia if he had stayed in the pool any longer, and if he had been swept over the falls, he could have suffered broken bones or worse.

“Several people are injured each year as a result of slips or falls,” he told NBC News. “It seems about once every one to two years, someone will be swept over the falls and die as a result of their injuries.”

The two men told the Ridge Meadows rescue team that they did not see the hazard signs in the area. It’s unclear whether they climbed down near the water or if one fell from above, but Laing says the man who fell in was lucky.

“In Sikhi, we are taught to help someone in any way we can with anything we have, even our turban,” Kinda told NBC.

He said that he and his friends weren’t worried about their own safety. “We just really cared about the safety of the men,” he said.

Truly selfless service. What a beautiful example for us all.