Year: 2022

Tom Brady announced his retirement from the NFL earlier this year. After the Tampa Bay Buccaneers lost in the NFC Divisional Round to the Los Angeles Rams, Brady took a few weeks to contemplate his future and ultimately decided that he wanted to end his football playing career and spend more time with his family.

But as it turns out, Brady still has the itch to play, and on Sunday afternoon, the future Hall of Fame inductee announced on his Twitter account that he’s changed his mind on retirement and will return for his 23rd season this fall.

“That door is never closed,” Buccaneers coach Bruce Arians said at the NFL Scouting Combine about Brady potentially returning to the team despite his original announcement. “Whenever Tom wants to come back, he’s back. … If Tom wants to come back, we’ll have plenty of money for him.”

Ian Rapoport of NFL Network said that Brady’s potential return is why the team didn’t try to find a way to replace him or make an offer to bring Deshaun Watson in via a trade, and that they made sure everything was in order in the event he tried to come back.

Brady will turn 45 in August. He led the NFL last season with 5,316 passing yards and 43 touchdowns.

March Madness has arrived in full force, with conference tournaments providing plenty of drama, upsets, and punched tickets for the 2022 NCAA men’s basketball tournament. Selection Sunday put a bow on conference tournament week as the field of 68 was officially announced and matchups were set for the first round games on Thursday and Friday, as well as the First Four games in Dayton, Ohio on Tuesday and Wednesday.

In a year in which there isn’t a clear dominant team, the bracket feels as open as ever for a team to get hot at the right time and make a run at a Final Four. Whether that feeling of openness leads to chaos full of bracket-busting upsets or if chalk will reign supreme remains to be seen, but with matchups now locked in, fans can start planning out their path to the second weekend and beyond. Earning the four top seeds this year are Gonzaga, …

Here is the complete bracket (printable version here), with the full first round TV schedule with tip times and commentators still to come.

First 4

16. Wright State vs. 16. Bryant
11. Rutgers vs. 11. Notre Dame
16. Texas Southern vs. 16. Texas A&M-Corpus Christi
12. Wyoming vs. 12. Indiana

WEST

1. Gonzaga vs. 16. Georgia State
8. Boise State vs. 9. Memphis

5. UConn vs. 12. New Mexico State
4. Arkansas vs. 13. Vermont

6. Alabama vs. 11. Rutgers or Notre Dame
3. Texas Tech vs. 14. Montana State

7. Michigan State vs. 10. Davidson
2. Duke vs. 15. Cal State Fullerton

SOUTH

1. Arizona vs. 16. Wright State or Bryant
8. Seton Hall vs. 9. TCU

5. Houston vs. 12. UAB
4. Illinois vs. 13. Chattanooga

6. Colorado State vs. 11. Michigan
3. Tennessee vs. 14. Longwood

7. Ohio State vs. 10. Loyola-Chicago
2. Villanova vs. 15. Delaware

MIDWEST

1. Kansas vs. 16. Texas Southern or Texas A&M-Corpus Christi
8. San Diego State vs. 9. Creighton

5. Iowa vs. 12. Richmond
4. Providence vs. 13. South Dakota State

6. LSU vs. 11. Iowa State
3. Wisconsin vs. 14. Colgate

7. USC vs. 10. Miami (FL)
2. Auburn vs. 15. Jacksonville State

EAST

1. Baylor vs. 16. Norfolk State
8. UNC vs. 9. Marquette

5. Saint Mary’s vs. 12. Wyoming vs. Indiana
4. UCLA vs. 13. Akron

6. Texas vs. 11. Virginia Tech
3. Purdue vs. 14. Yale

7. Murray State vs. 10. San Francisco
2. Kentucky vs. 15. Saint Peter’s

Kanye West had a lot to get off his chest today. So far, he’s used Instagram to once again air out his grievances against Pete Davidson, who is now dating his ex-wife Kim Kardashian. He also expressed his frustration with her apparent refusal to let him see his oldest daughter North. Another topic of conversation on Kanye’s Instagram was comedian D.L. Hughley’s recent comments about West. In an interview with VladTV, Hughley commented on West’s behavior towards Kardashian and said the rapper is stalking her.

“We gone stop letting practicing drug addicts be used by leftist to Willie Lynch our Future,” Kanye said in a post that also featured a clip of a past stand-up routine by Hughley. “Black people with our own opinion are not allowed to speak in public. I am the glitch. DL God does not like you. You have no favor. Your family hates you. I would hate to be related to somebody who used to be famous. Now you just known as a broke pawn. at least Oprah got billions ‘allegedly.’”

Kanye continued, “Come on leftist. Y’all gotta do better than this. DL Ye Bring the real smoke baby. Show your real face Charlemagne just don’t hit the same do he. Who y’all gone get now God is with us and you send DL to be against us. You’ve lost. No brilliant Hebrew’s will bow to y’all no more Only dumb ass drug addict House n****s.”

“Don’t play me and don’t play with God Anybody related to DL call Chris McLean at adidas for yeezys,” Kanye wrote. “They not free though. We running a business over here. He just getting ran. You see Skete missing work. Anybody else wanna play with me. Please please please for the love of God come and get me Let’s see how it turns out.”

You can view screenshots of the now-deleted posts above.

William Hurt, star of stage and screen who won an Oscar in his mid-30s, has died, according to Deadline. “It is with great sadness that the Hurt family mourns the passing of William Hurt, beloved father and Oscar winning actor, on March 13, 2022, one week before his 72nd birthday,” his son Will posted in a statement. “He died peacefully, among family, of natural causes. The family requests privacy at this time.”

A Juilliard graduate, Hurt began his career on the stage, winning an Obie Award for one of his first performances. He crossed over to movies, making his screen debut in 1980’s Altered States as an obsessive psychopathologist whose experiments with isolation tanks and psychoactive drugs takes surprising turns.

He became a star thanks to two films with writer-director Lawrence Kasdan: Body Heat, a sweaty, sexy neo-noir that paired him with Kathleen Turner (in her debut), and the Boomer classic The Big Chill. By 1985 he had an Academy Award for Kiss of the Spider Woman, playing a gay man imprisoned by Brazil’s military dictatorship. Other nominations soon followed, for the drama Children of a Lesser God and the very funny, very smart Broadcast News. In Body Heat and Broadcast News, the emphatically intelligent Hurt proved himself adept at playing dumb himbos, in the former used by someone much slyer than him.

Hurt could be an arresting leading man or a scene-stealing supporting player. Among his many credits were incredible turns in I Love You to Death (paired with Keanu Reeves in what proved an underrated and unexpected comedy duo), Until the End of the World, Smoke, Dark City, A.I.: Artificial Intelligence, Mr. Brooks, Into the Wild, and more. He also did occasional TV work, playing Duke Leto Atreides in the 2000 Sci Fi Channel take on Dune, Damages, Too Big to Fail, and an episode of Mythic Quest.

Like many in Hollywood, Hurt wound up working for the MCU. He was an early adopter, appearing in 2008’s The Incredible Hulk as General Thaddeus Rose, a role he repeated in Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, and, one of his last films, Black Widow.

Hurt received his last Oscar nomination for his one-scene turn in David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence. He needs only a few minutes to work his magic, as you can see below. RIP to a king.

(Via Deadline)

There was an added buzz in the air on Sunday afternoon in Boston as the Celtics hosted the Mavericks for a Sunday Showcase game on ABC, as Celtics royalty was in the building for the jersey retirement ceremony for Kevin Garnett.

Garnett, Paul Pierce, and even Ray Allen were courtside at the TD Garden for the occasion, with Garnett seated on the baseline underneath the Celtics basket. The game started with a flurry of points from Jayson Tatum but soon settled into some sloppy offense (or, optimistically, good defensive basketball) from both teams, with the first quarter finishing at 20-18 in favor of the Celtics.

In the second quarter, the Celtics were able to seize control thanks to Jaylen Brown, who decided he would get the Celtics out of their funk by sheer force of will, starting with this nasty crossover into a thunderous driving dunk.

That was just a warmup from Brown, who shortly after found himself once again with an open lane to the basket and only Maxi Kleber in his way. That proved to be bad news for Kleber, who found himself on the wrong end of a Jaylen Brown poster, to the delight of KG.

It is as vicious a poster dunk as you’ll see, as Brown goes body-to-body on Kleber for what Marv Albert would’ve undoubtedly referred to as “a facial.” Brown celebrated with a quick dap from a fired up Kevin Garnett under the hoop and almost had a third highlight on the next possession when he nearly dropped his defender on a stepback but airballed the three. Still, Boston was able to take a 9-point lead into the halftime break thanks to Brown’s second quarter aggression as the Celtics took a bit of control.

Kevin Garnett’s place in Boston Celtics lore was never in question after the role he played in helping the franchise to its 17th championship in 2008. Garnett made up a Big Three in Boston along with Paul Pierce and Ray Allen, the latter of whom became public enemy No. 1 for that squad after he bolted for Miami to team up with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh.

For years, Allen has had a contentious at best relationship with his former teammates in Boston, as Garnett, Pierce, and others felt betrayed by Allen’s decision to leave for their top rival in the East at the time. While Pierce has indicated a desire to reconcile at some point, there haven’t been a lot of indications of when exactly that would come, but the signs have been pointing to an easing of tensions recently, starting with this year’s All-Star Game when the 75th Anniversary team was celebrated in Cleveland.

On Sunday, Garnett’s No. 5 jersey went into the TD Garden rafters alongside the rest of the franchise legends and there was a lot of “will he, won’t he” talk about whether Allen — who was not at Paul Pierce’s jersey retirement in 2018 — would attend. Shortly before tipoff, Allen arrived at the arena for his first appearance with the Celtics since he left in a fairly momentous occasion.

Allen was seated with Kendrick Perkins courtside and got a nice ovation from the Celtics crowd when he was shown on the Jumbotron in the first quarter.

It’s cool to see Allen back in the TD Garden and reuniting with his old teammates given how important he was to that 2008 team. Old grudges can die hard in the NBA, but it’s good to see all parties recognizing that it’s best to try and move on and reconcile sooner rather than later, while everyone is still here to be able to celebrate and reminisce together.

Last spring, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood announced that they were joining forces for a new band called The Smile. Shortly after that announcement, the pair performed a bunch of new music at Glastonbury’s 2021 Live At Worthy Farm festival. In the meantime, a new solo song by Yorke, entitled “5.17,” appeared in a recent episode of the British drama series Peaky Blinders.

If you’re a fan of the new record, there’s another one on the way soon. As Pitchfork noted, the Apple Music listing for the new songs suggests that “5.17” will be followed by “That’s How Horses Are,” another song by Yorke for Peaky Blinders. Last month, Peaky Blinders director Anthony Byrne spoke to NME and revealed that Yorke and Greenwood will contribute multiple records to the current season of the show.

“I’m over the moon about all of that,” Byrne said. “The music has always been really important historically, and I was really keen to bring a dramatic score into it. We’re using that much more in this season. It’s a much heavier season so the score is taking things in a very different direction.”

This isn’t the first time that Radiohead’s music has appeared on the show. “You & Whose Army?” and “Pyramid Song” have both been used.

You can listen to “5.17” in the video above.

The Players Championship this week has been a marathon, as weather has wreaked havoc on Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, causing stops and starts due to torrential rain and, even once the moisture passed, players were left to deal with brutal wind conditions on Saturday as The Players morphed into an Open Championship for a day.

While the conditions made it miserable to play in, with steady winds of 15-25 miles per hours and gusts well over 40, it created spectacular theater on Saturday, as fans were glued to their TVs watching the world’s best players get absolutely rocked by the combination of insane wind and all the water that lurks, waiting to drown a bad shot at any time at TPC Sawgrass. Two holes in particular stood out, with the long par 4 18th playing dead into the wind, with water all down the left side of the fairway, and the iconic 17th, a 136-yard par 3 on an island green, with wind blowing dead into the players faces.

Players were hitting 7- and 8-irons into 17 on Saturday, sometimes clubbing up as much as 50 yards to account for the wind, and those that could flight their ball low fared pretty well. Those that hoisted their shots up into the air or couldn’t commit fully to a swing saw their ball get killed by the wind and fall to a watery grave, 19 in all, creating an incredible 5-minute long compilation video of delicious golf failure.

Most years, the 17th at Sawgrass feels a bit over-shown, as the large green tends to be pretty easy for players to hit in normal conditions. However, on Saturday it produced some of the greatest theater in sports, as players were absolutely rattled by the wind and found that normally spacious green had become a coin-flip to hit. The best reaction came from Brooks Koepka, who on his second visit to 17 on the day could only laugh as his ball went way too high and got gobbled up by a huge gust, falling miles short of dry land.

It was the ideal day to be watching golf on TV and not be out on the course yourself, which was unfortunate for the players who found themselves in the late tee time window and had to be the ones whose misery provided so much entertainment.

(SPOILERS for this week’s Power Book IV: Force will be found below.)

Shortly after Tommy Egan moved to Chicago in Power Book IV: Force, he ran into his half-brother, JP. They were both unaware that the other existed, but through their discovery, they formed a bond that was focused on them helping each other out. JP has shown Tommy videos and photos of their mother when they were young while Tommy has offered to help clean up JP’s grandmother’s house as well as lend JP money when his bar gets shot up. As their bond strengthens, JP and Tommy are in for a surprise at some point in the future.

Who Starts Following Tommy Around Chicago In ‘Power?’

As Tommy’s beef with Jenard continues, the latter offers D-Mac, a younger member of CBI, $5,000 to tail Tommy and see what he’s up to. D-Mac has been introduced several times during the season. We know that he’s JP’s long-lost son, one who was taken away from him by his ex-wife some years ago. We also know that D-Mac is the one who shot up JP’s bar. At this point, it’s clear that D-Mac has some disdain for his father, but for some reason, when he discovers that Tommy and JP are spending time together, he quickly returns to Jenard and tells him he can no longer do the job. It should also be noted that during episode one, D-Mac briefly held Tommy at gunpoint during their first meeting.

New episodes of STARZ’s ‘Power Book IV: Force’ are available to watch on Sunday at 12:00am EST.

Kanye West has spent much of the year attacking Pete Davidson, who is now dating Kim Kardashian, through his songs, videos, and Instagram posts. Through it all, Pete’s responses have been limited, but enough seemed to be enough for the SNL comedian as he decided to take a moment to respond to Kanye’s antics. His response came via text messages, which were shared through screenshots posted to Instagram by SNL writer Dave Sirus.

Earlier Sunday morning, Kanye shared an Instagram post in which he once again expressed his frustration with his daughter North’s use of TikTok, as well as her attendance at the “godless Sierra Canyon school.” “I said I am not allowing my daughter to be used by TikTok, to be used by Disney,” he wrote. As a result, Pete decided to text Kanye and ask him to “take a second a calm down.” After calling Kim the “best mother I’ve ever met,” Pete added, “I’ve decided I’m not gonna let you treat us this way anymore and I’m done being quiet. Grow the f*ck up.” Kanye then asked for his whereabouts, to which Pete replied, “In bed with your wife.”

Pete tried to schedule a meet-up with Kanye, who told him to come to Sunday Service if he wants to talk to him. In a new video, Kanye spoke about the text messages. “At this point, it’s going too far,” he said. “The boyfriend texts me, antagonizing me, bragging about being in bed with my wife. He texts me, talking about bragging about how he’s in bed with my wife. And it’s like, well, who’s watching my children?” He added, “Kim gets Black people out of prison, you know who puts them in prison? The person that the boyfriend has a tattoo of,” which is a reference to Pete’s tattoo of Hillary Clinton.

In additional videos, Kanye accused Kim of keeping North away from him by not letting him go to his Donda 2 listening party in Miami, as well as a basketball game for his Donda Sports Academy team in Chicago.