Michael Jordan’s tenure with the Wizards is one that many fans prefer to forget. There was something perfect about the way he left the game with his second retirement after hitting the game-winner to win the NBA Finals in 1998 as a member of the Chicago Bulls. When he returned in Washington, he was an aging star that wasn’t as effective on a nightly basis and, despite still being effective, couldn’t shake the expectation to be Mike.

It turns out fans of Jordan aren’t the only ones that wish the Wizards years didn’t exist. Jerry Stackhouse played one season in Washington with Jordan after being traded there from Detroit for Rip Hamilton, and the now-Vanderbilt head coach recently joined ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski on The Woj Pod and explained why his year with his idol was far from the experience he’d hoped it would be, noting it tainted his perception of Jordan a bit.

“Honestly, I wish I never played in Washington and for a number of reasons,” Stackhouse said. “I felt we were on our way in Detroit before I got traded there. It was really challenging to be able to be in a situation with an idol who at this particular point, I felt like I was a better player. Things were still being run through Michael Jordan, and Doug Collins, I love Doug, but I think that was an opportunity for him to make up for some ill moments that they may have had back in Chicago.

“So, pretty much everything that Michael wanted to do… We got off to a pretty good start and he didn’t like the way the offense was running because it was running a little bit more through me. He wanted to get a little more isolations on the post, of course, so we had more isolations for him on the post. And it just kind of spiraled in a way that I didn’t enjoy that season at all. Kind of the picture I had in my mind of Michael Jordan and the reverence I had for him, I lost a little bit of it during the course of that year.”

For a Carolina guy who grew up in Kinston, NC and was a Tar Heel, Jordan was Stackhouse’s idol, but as he says, at this point he felt he was the better player, which made it tough to play with Jordan. Mike wasn’t one to give up the mantle of being the top dog and, as Stack notes, got his way when he wanted the offense to shift away from Stackhouse and more to post isos. It’s something that, surely, a number of players have gone through over the years. Young guys that play with former legends on the tail end of their careers have to deal with that inner strife of feeling they’re better than their once idol and not fully knowing how to handle the situation.

It’s even tougher when you’re dealing with the GOAT, and Stackhouse goes on to note he was pretty thrilled when he left Washington and was no longer in that situation.

Tracy Morgan made a memorable and instantly viral appearance on the Today show on Tuesday where the comedian peppered host Hoda Kotb with a barrage of hilarious anecdotes about his life under quarantine, including the wild claim that he’s already gotten his wife pregnant three times over the past three weeks. “Every week she got pregnant,” Morgan joked to a very surprised Kotb.

But Morgan’s knack for off-the-cuff interview answers didn’t stop there. The Last OG actor also made remote calls from his house to Late Night with Seth Meyers and Conan where he continued to crack wise about his sex life, home-schooling his kids, and his beloved shark aquarium, which was a constant source of comedy.

While talking with Meyers, Morgan joked that his new method of foreplay is taking off his medical mask, and he also upped the ante on his wife’s pregnancies, which he now says is up to four. Just for the record. The comedian then took Meyers to task for asking about the names of his fish. Apparently, Morgan doesn’t believe in naming his pets. “They don’t even have brains, they just have nerves.” When asked how his kids are doing, Morgan said that his version of home-schooling is taking them down to the turnpike and teaching them how to get hit by a FedEx truck. Is that a reference to Morgan’s own accident, or just the first thing that popped into his head? Who knows?

You can watch the full Late Night interview below:

As for Morgan’s appearance on Conan, he continued to wheel out the sex jokes, only this time he added a trip to the doctors where he was diagnosed with three types of crabs. He also kept busting out a pirate impression in front of his aquarium, which left Conan laughing every time. Without fail. As for Morgan’s kids, they’ve gone from learning how to get hit by FedEx trucks to seeking shelter in his aunts “64DD” bra. Apparently, it’s keeping everyone safe at the Morgan house.

You can watch the full Conan interview below:

(Via The AV Club)

The National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum recently announced that it was designing a Dr. Anthony Fauci bobblehead. The NBHFM pledged to donate $5 of each sale of the $25 item to support the 100 Million Mask Challenge—an initiative of the Protect the Heroes Campaign that is trying to increase the supply of surgical masks for medical workers during the coronavirus pandemic.

Less than a week later, they’ve already had enough pre-sale orders to raise over $100,000 for the cause.

Dr. Fauci has become a folk hero of sorts during the pandemic. As the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a position he’s held since 1984, Dr. Fauci is one of the expert faces of the White House’s coronavirus response team. He has brought a measure of professionalism and expertise and well-informed calm that’s been praised by people of all political persuasions, so it’s no wonder there’s such a demand for a bobblehead of his likeness.

The NBHFM announced on its Facebook page that as of last night the Dr. Fauci bobblehead had become the best-selling bobblehead of all time.

NBHFM co-founder and CEO Phil Sklar described to ASI the multiple goals of the Fauci bobblehead sales.

“We will continue these efforts to raise funds to defeat COVID-19 and keep the nation’s first responders safe while making people smile during these unprecedented and difficult times,” he said. “I also hope we will inspire other businesses and individuals to help others during this pandemic with their unique talents and capabilities.”

Dr. Fauci was asked on Fox News for his thoughts on the bobblehead, to which he laughed and replied, “You know, I’m sorry, but I can’t get involved with that peripheral stuff. Bobbleheads—that’s nice if someone wants to do it, but I have other things to worry about.”

Yes you do, Dr. Fauci. And we’re oh so grateful for it.

The Dr. Fauci bobblehead can be preordered here.

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As the NBA 2K Players Only tournament wraps up this week, the NBA and ESPN are reportedly close to finalizing an arrangement to get basketball on TV again soon. Adrian Wojnarowski reported on Wednesday afternoon that a deal is imminent for a HORSE competition that would include NBA star Chris Paul, Trae Young, various WNBA stars, and even NBA alumni.

The plans for the event would likely include players (who have access to a gym or a basket in their driveway) filming themselves attempting a certain shot, followed by another player attempting to copy the shot from home. Considering that the whole goal of HORSE is to replicate your opponent’s shot perfectly, it’s hard to tell exactly how the event will go, and it’s not hard to imagine some chicanery going on.

However, foul play would certainly make for more fun. The 2K tournament has been a cool insight into the competitiveness and personality of some of the league’s top stars, but they are clearly playing it safe, and the games sometimes drag. A game of HORSE happening remotely has all the makings of chaos and entertainment.

The bar is pretty low. Last time the NBA introduced HORSE, it was at All-Star weekend, and no one took it seriously. This video of Kevin Durant, Rajon Rondo and Omri Casspi competing explains everything you need to know about how dull the event was.

Hopefully more players, better production value, and the intense boredom of self-isolation makes for a better product this time around.

Because Major League Baseball’s season crashed before takeoff in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the league understandably has acted with more urgency than other American pro team sports leagues to try to return to people’s lives. That urgency veered into desperation this week when reports indicated the league is willing to embrace a unique and gigantic undertaking in the Southwest in order to start the 2020 season, a strategy already nicknamed the “Arizona Plan.”

MLB seemingly has zeroed in on Phoenix as its Plan A for a “bubble league,” an idea that we’ve seen kicked around in other sports. Whereas the original Cactus League facility opened in Tucson, about an hour and a half south of the Phoenix metro area, today’s formation includes 10 ballparks within 50 miles of one another. Toss in the Diamondbacks’ own Chase Field and Arizona State’s Phoenix Municipal Stadium, and that’s 12 stadiums separated by, at most, a half-hour drive. The suburban sprawl makes for a pretty easy commute between parks, and most of the stadiums include spacious training facilities, as teams use the venues to practice, eat, and work during the spring in addition to play games.

Structurally, MLB’s plan makes sense. But as with any of the reports emanating from sports executives during this pandemic, there are holes in it.

Consider first the size of the undertaking. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reported on Tuesday night that MLB is considering expanding rosters “to as many as 50 players” to help handle the compressed schedule and relative likelihood that players become sick. Several reports indicate the league does not intend to shut down if players become infected with the novel coronavirus. That means this plan would include at least 50 players in addition to the coaching staff, training staff, and front office. It’s not a stretch to imagine each team would itself need about 100 personnel just from the baseball operations side, not to mention the dozens of people involved in managing each facility. Stretch that out to include the hospitality workers — who themselves would have to potentially live at the hotel to properly physically distance — and it’s easy to see why Rosenthal and others have reported MLB envisions thousands of people being involved in the “Arizona Plan.”

Phoenix is not small. Already, local officials are wondering how American cities might sustain the power grid or emergency response staff if smaller or less-prepared cities than New York or Chicago sustain big waves of infection. Cactus League facilities stretch from Mesa, itself a city of 500,000 or so, where the Cubs and A’s typically play, to Goodyear, home to a sizable Air Force Base and a big Amazon distribution center. As we’ve seen, not moving or coming into contact with other people is the best way to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Mandating the travel of thousands of people to and from work in the country’s fifth-biggest metropolitan area becomes quite risky.

As one Phoenix physician put it to the Associated Press, “You have to realize, maybe all of them could get it, and that’s going to be a cluster.”

Arizona is also crushingly hot. It doesn’t reach 125 degrees, like one anonymous player quipped to Andy McCollough of The Athletic, but it’s a place where heat warnings are in effect all summer, to the point that recesses are occasionally cancelled for school children. Sure, pro athletes are in better shape than 9-year-olds, but there’s a reason Chase Field has a dome, while the Cactus League facilities are all open-air. There’s no feasible way to ensure that no games are played in the Cactus League venues during the day, unless MLB commits to a drastically reduced schedule, with Chase Field hosting day games and the Cactus League stadiums only hosting games at night.

The player in McCollough’s piece was certainly right when he worried about the prospect of playing 20 days in a row, with more frequent double-headers in the Arizona heat. On the other hand, Diamondbacks CEO Derrick Hall appeared to fudge the facts a bit when he said on local radio, “This is going to be a place where hopefully, if we do things right, where we keep that curve flat, where it doesn’t become too much of a problem, where the summer is going to heat up a little bit.”

There is no definitive research showing that this novel coronavirus will be seasonal like other similar viruses. Plus the Arizona Department of Health Services deemed the virus “widespread” among the community weeks ago, and COVID-19 testing remains a major problem in the state, which has tested less than 1 percent of its population.

Understandably, there is hope among local officials that they can be part of shepherding sports back into Americans’ lives as a distraction and source of joy. “At the city, we value flexibility and innovation and are willing to work with the many different sports franchises that call Phoenix home, but only if public health leads every single discussion,” Phoenix mayor Kate Gallego said in a statement on Tuesday.

No one is arguing that the return of sports, baseball or otherwise, would be a welcome reprieve from our world’s hellish spring. Yet considering the scope of a 30-team league and circumstances on the ground in Arizona, being decisive won’t be enough for the “Arizona Plan” to succeed.

Right now is a time when some people could use some extra cheer in their lives. That’s just what Camila Cabello and Shawn Mendes provided to some of their young fans in the hospital when they got on a surprise video chat with them.

Ryan Seacrest, through his Ryan Seacrest Foundation, helped set up the call and shared some videos from it, which show Cabello and Mendes dancing with the kids, answering questions, and otherwise brightening their day. It was a gesture that clearly meant a lot to these young folks, and Mendes’ appearance was apparently just a cherry on top, as Seacrest wrote while sharing the clips, “Just when the kids thought their video call with @Camila_Cabello couldn’t get any better, @ShawnMendes enters the chat. Thank you both for hanging out and pulling off this surprise.”

Cabello also shared some clips from the chat and wrote, “Kids are the light of this whole world!!!!! We hung out with some friends at the hospital in DC yesterday – thanks @ryanfoundation for bringing smiles to these kids, who are brave and spunky and warriors everyday!”

The two, who are quarantining together in Miami, also recently participated in the iHeartRadio Living Room Concert For America.

Song parodies are one of humanity’s greatest weapons against despair. When the sh*t hits the fan, we can surrender to the doom and gloom or we can make new art with funny lyrics. It’s just what we do.

Since everything is shut down right now, our creative theater folks don’t have anywhere to perform. So some former and current Hamilton company cast members got together to perform a pandemic parody of “The Room Where it Happens,” appropriately called “The Zoom Where it Happens.”

The Zoom Where It Happens

www.youtube.com

Hamilton musical directors Kurt Crowley and Ian Weinberger wrote the lyrics, and the main parts are performed by Nik Walker (who played Aaron Burr in the Hamilton touring company) and Michael Luwoye (who played Alexander Hamilton for a stint on Broadway). And they’re backed up by a bunch of singers who look like they’re super happy to be performing in some capacity.

It’s just delightful. Enjoy.

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In a wide-ranging interview to promote his new sci-fi series Tales from the Loop, Matt Reeves opened up about his plans to give The Batman a “humanist bent” as the film chronicles Robert Pattinson‘s further descent into becoming the Dark Knight.

While discussing how “humanism” is a necessary component of his filmmaking and that he can’t operate without “emotionally” understanding the stories he tells on camera, like his well-received take on the Planet of the Apes, Reeves revealed to Nerdist how he plans to examine Batman’s origin even though the film reportedly takes place during the second year of the Caped Crusader’s war on crime.

“I wanted to do not an origin tale, but a tale that would still acknowledge his origins, in that it formed who he is. Like this guy, he’s majorly struggling, and this is how he’s trying to rise above that struggle,” Reeves explained. “But that doesn’t mean that he even fully understands, you know. It’s that whole idea of the shadow self and what’s driving you, and how much of that you can incorporate, and how much of it you’re doing that you’re unaware of.”

Reeves said his story will also focus on the corruption in Gotham City, which he says is a theme that always feels “current.” But if you’re expecting Reeves’ new vision to skew more towards Christopher Nolan’s more grounded take on Batman, Reeves wants to ensure that his entries in the franchise are “distinctive” and not “just another one” on the list. In fact, he specifically cites Tim Burton’s Batman Returns as a major influence, and Reeves can’t help but gush over the ’90s classic.

“I just think it’s such a beautiful movie,” Reeves tells Nerdist. “I love the Penguin stuff when he’s going down the sewers as the baby. It’s just like, wow. This is the beautiful thing about Tim Burton at his best in that way that he’s got that connection into the fantastical that feels very, very personal.”

Batman Returns is an interesting choice for Reeves to single out. Just like the Burton sequel, The Batman will also feature Catwoman and the Penguin (played by Zoe Kravitz and Colin Ferrell, respectively). Unfortunately, it could be a while until we see Reeves’ take on the classic villains. The Batman has been delayed indefinitely during the global health crisis, and that makes the chances of the film hitting its June 2021 release date somewhat unlikely.

(Via Nerdist)