Category: Worldwide

For years, Tiger Woods was known for his stoic nature on the golf course, prowling around with the killer instinct that made him one of the fiercest competitors in all of sports, not just in golf.

In recent years, though, we’ve seen a different side of Tiger, a man who’s come back from personal and physical pains to get back to the top of the sport, winning last year’s Masters in sensational style. Woods isn’t quite what he once was, particularly on a weekly basis, but he also seems to be more appreciative of it all — the fans, the golf, and the chance for his kids to see him play. That was evident in the big hugs he shared with his kids, Charlie and Sam, after his Masters win, and also in the big smile he wore all week at the PNC Championship as he played in the family event with 11-year-old Charlie — with both wearing matching outfits all week.

On Saturday, the two combined to shoot a 10-under 62 to climb the leaderboard, with Charlie stealing the show with some ridiculous shots that were very reminiscent of his dad.

The younger Woods has developed quite the reputation for being an awful lot like his father, both in his sweet swing and his penchant for trash-talking on the course — particularly with Justin Thomas who the younger Woods has become friends with.

All of that was on display on Sunday in the final round, as he continued to show off his sensational swing for an 11-year-old, pumping drivers down the fairway and sticking approach shots closer than even his dad.

He even has his dad’s flair for the dramatic and showmanship, offering vintage Tiger fist pumps, club twirls, and walking in putts.

After their round ended, with Charlie sinking a short birdie putt on the 18th, he and Tiger shared a hug as they capped off quite the weekend together in Charlie’s first competitive rounds, where he flaunted a swing that make it hard to think he’ll be anywhere but on the tour in a decade or so.

For Tiger, we once again got to see a side that used to rarely get shown publicly, as he thoroughly enjoyed ceding the spotlight to Charlie and reveled in watching his son hit great shots and make big putts.

Canelo Alvarez hadn’t fought in over a year prior to Saturday night, as the former pound-for-pound king dealt with promoter issues, ultimately splitting with longtime promoter Oscar De La Hoya and Golden Boy to go out on his own.

Alvarez has long promised to fight the biggest and best in the sport, taking on challengers at a variety of weight classes, and after knocking out former light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev, he turned his attention to the super middleweight champion Callum Smith for his bout on Saturday night in San Antonio. Canelo picked apart the much taller Smith, feeling his way around in the opening rounds before closing the distance and stalking Smith back into the ropes over and over, unloading on the champ with flurries, most notably some vicious uppercuts that caught Smith clean.

By the end of the night, Canelo emerged with an easy decision victory, and while Smith never touched the canvas, his face told the story of just getting absolutely dominated by Alvarez. After the fight, Alvarez strolled by Eddie Hearn after dispatching of a third Matchroom fighter in his career and trolled Britain’s biggest promoter by asking “who’s next” referencing the trail of destruction he’d left in Hearn’s stable of fighters.

What’s fascinating about Alvarez’s future is that without a tie to a network or promoter (pending a lawsuit with Golden Boy and DAZN to get out of his DAZN deal), he can truly go around and negotiate for fights with anyone. Errol Spence Jr., the welterweight champ and a PBC fighter, has shown interest in a middleweight fight with Alvarez that would be the biggest fight of the year if they could get that done. There’s also the potential for a trilogy fight with GGG, who is now with Hearn, and plenty of other intriguing possibilities for boxing’s top draw. What other promoters and managers will have to determine is whether a fight with Canelo is worth the money, because of the very real chance that he puts your top fighter through the ringer, making them look rather silly for 12 rounds or less.

It’s been a long time since we saw Dez Bryant throw up the X in an NFL game. The current Ravens wide receiver was once considered one of the NFL’s best wideouts during his prime years with the Cowboys, but hadn’t played football since 2017. Some wondered if we’d seen the last of Bryant after his time away from the game, a career ending suddenly in a sport that isn’t often kind in terms of longevity.

Enter 2020. Bryant found a spot on the Ravens practice squad and eventually worked his way up to the Ravens main roster, but hadn’t been a major factor yet and had also yet to find the end zone. That is until Sunday’s contest against the Jaguars when Lamar Jackson, escaping pressure from the pocket, found a diving Bryant for a touchdown. He threw up the X and it was like we traveled three years into the past.

This was a great moment for Bryant. Especially considering that he was threatening retirement after he was suddenly pulled from warmups ahead of the Ravens game against the Cowboys earlier this season due to what turned out to be a false positive COVID-19 test.

For some guys that really would be enough to retire. Getting yourself into game shape requires daily work and is a major strain on the body. A lot of times when players retire it’s not because they can’t perform, but because the work needed to be at that elite level is too much. It’s great that Bryant didn’t retire though, because we got to see him return to what he does best, catching touchdowns on Sunday. Where he goes from here? Who knows, but hopefully he gets to go out on his terms and if he wants to stick around awhile longer, he can continue showing he has value for teams.

The wait for Playboi Carti’s Whole Lotta Red album continues, and while a plethora of rumors have been unearthed about the highly-desired album, little has been confirmed prior to Saturday night. The Die Lit rapper jumped on Twitter to enthusiastically thank Travis Scott for submitting a great verse for an upcoming collaboration the two have together.

“@trvisXX . w0w aMaZinG . L0ve THis V3RSE . rEd rEd rEd !” Carti said in his tweet. Die-hard supporters of both rappers quickly concluded that the collaboration Carti referred to in the tweet is entitled, “Houdini.”

As a result, their fans rushed to Twitter to show their excitement for the track and call for its immediate release.

A Twitter user showed their excitement for the track with a crying-tears-of-joy meme with a caption that simply read, “Travis on wlr.” Another one said, “it’s boutta be so hard i ain’t ready” with the crying face emoji. Other fans shared responses like “HOLY SH*T LETS GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO,” “Stop playing with us bro, I can’t keep waiting,” and “this really finna be album of the year.”

The news about the Travis Scott feature comes after Carti confirmed Kid Cudi would appear on Whole Lotta Red as well. “i fL3w 2 bro ! toLD hiM hiS mUSic iS WORLd nEEdED . V3ry good GUY bEAUtiFUL sPirit,” Carti said in an Instagram post. “HE wILL bE oN THis ALBuM . L0v3 hiM . W3 ALL do.” The album has been rumored for a Christmas Day release so fans may have to wait less than a week to see if Whole Lotta Red is finally released.

Check out more tweets from Carti’s fans below.

If you haven’t watched the Season 2 finale of The Mandalorian at this point in the weekend, it’s probably been extremely tough to avoid spoilers about a certain someone popping up to save the day in Disney+ show. You should probably close this tab and not read any further if you’d like to keep that improbable streak alive until you’ve finished Season 2.

Anyway (spoilers incoming) the arrival of Luke Skywalker to the Disney+ universe in the final episode of The Mandalorian caused a lot of consequences for the show and reaction among fans. But one reaction that was missing was from, well, Hamill himself (sorry). The Luke Skywalker actor was obviously aided by plenty of CGI to help play his younger self, but he was clearly involved with the filming of some of the final scenes of the season.

Hamill initially kept very quiet about his own appearance in “The Rescue,” but he did hint heavily that there was something interesting streaming on Friday with a subtle tweet.

On Saturday, however, he addressed the green lightsaber-toting elephant in the airlock and calling it a “real triumph” that everyone involved had kept the secret that a Skywalker would show up on The Mandalorian for more than a year.

It’s a feat the show had replicated before, as the reveal of Baby Yoda as a character on the show was something that no one seemed to know was coming when the show premiered in 2019. That character’s name, Grogu, was a reveal that had been largely kept quiet in 2020 as well, and in a spoiler-heavy age where it’s hard to keep anything in production from leaking, it certainly is a feat to be proud of for Hamill and those involved with making The Mandalorian.

While it’s been almost two years since Toro Y Moi delivered his last album with 2019’s Outer Peace, the South Carolina native has delivered a decent amount of guest appearances and remixes for his fans. Back with another one, Toro Y Moi brings his talents to Haim’s “3am” track with a new take. The Women In Music Pt. III song by the siblings was originally an airy effort backed by synths and a drowned-out bass. With Toro Y Moi’s remix, “3am” is now a lush effort filled with a heavy dose of life.

Toro Y Moi’s take of “3am” is his second remix of the month after he brought his talents to Deftones frontperson Chino Moreno for a remake of Caroline Polachek’s “Hit Me Where It Hurts.” Prior to that, him and The Mattson 2 connected for their groovy cover of Afro-Filipino artist Joe Bataan’s 1972 track “Ordinary Guy.”

As for Haim, the new remix comes after the siblings joined Taylor Swift on her Evermore album for their “No Body, No Crime” track. The collaboration capped off a year that saw the trio receive two Grammy nominations, one for Album of the Year and another for Best Rock Performance with their track, “The Steps.”

On a lighter note, the band recently got into the Christmas spirit with their holiday parody single, “Christmas Wrapping 2020.” You can listen to the “3am” cover in the video above.

It has been over two years now since Andrew Lincoln exited The Walking Dead TV series, and AMC announced that he would star in his own movie (or series of movies).

In the intervening 25 months, we’ve learned more about what to expect from the Rick Grimes movie. For instance, the second spin-off series, The World Beyond, has been exploring the CRM, the military organization that both abducted and rescued Rick Grimes on The Walking Dead. It also appears that Danai Gurira’s Michonne — who left The Walking Dead earlier in the 10th season — may also appear in the movie. Meanwhile, we’ve also learned that The Walking Dead will end its run after the 11th season in late 2022, and it seems very likely that the Rick Grimes movie will provide a cap to the series.

We have not heard much lately about the Rick Grimes movie since the onset of the pandemic, which obviously delayed production on the film. In an interview with the Associated Press, however, Andrew Lincoln revealed that (if all goes well) shooting should begin in the Spring of 2021.

“It does feel like there is a certain sense of positivity and the cavalry’s coming with the vaccines,” he told the AP. “And there’s a real sort of sense of a renewal, hopefully.”

If shooting begins when Lincoln expects it to start, the timing works such that it should be released around the end of 2022, which is precisely when The Walking Dead series will end. It’s also about four years since Lincoln left The Walking Dead. Moreover, through the partnership with Universal, fans will also get the opportunity to see the Rick Grimes film on the big screen. Presumably, if this is successful, Andrew Lincoln will make the other two planned movies and extend The Walking Dead on the big-screen even as the series winds down and spins-off into the Daryl and Carol series.

(Via Associated Press)

After last week’s rankings came out, the stage was pretty clearly set for how this year’s College Football Playoff will look, and even though most everyone could see what was going to happen coming, when the committee did what it effectively told us it would, folks were still extremely mad about it.

Alabama, Clemson, and Ohio State all won their respective conference championship games, cementing themselves in the Playoff despite a few protests of the Buckeyes only playing six games this season. The only question was who would be fourth, but even with Notre Dame getting stomped out by Clemson in a 24-point loss in the ACC title game, when it came down to who would be in between the Irish, Texas A&M, and AAC champ Cincinnati, we all knew what was coming.

Sure enough, the College Football Playoff committee chose to ride the money train that is Notre Dame over setting up a rematch of A&M and Alabama (which the Tide won 52-24) or putting in Cincinnati, an undefeated conference champion that actually dropped a spot in the rankings after being leapt by a two-loss Oklahoma. As such, we get our fourth Ohio State-Clemson matchup of the last decade, with the Tigers a perfect 3-0 against the Buckeyes since 2013, and the first Alabama-Notre Dame game since the Tide kicked the Irish’s teeth in to win the 2012 BCS National Championship. As for how competitive this go around will be, well, the folks in Las Vegas don’t have high hopes for Notre Dame, as they hoped as 17.5 to 20.5-point underdogs to Alabama.

The table is now set for New Year’s Day, and while there were plenty of people upset that Cincinnati clearly didn’t get a fair shake and even a real look as a consideration, the Bearcats seem to be taking it in stride as something they basically expected. UCF, a rival of Cincy’s in the AAC who have previously been the undefeated Group of 5 team left out of the Playoff, posted a video to Twitter showing that they were ready to start a college football NWO with the Bearcats and fellow undefeated Coastal Carolina now that it’s clear none will ever get a crack at the Playoff.

It’s pretty clear that until expansion to an 8-team format with a guaranteed spot for a G5 team, they’re never getting in, and this might accelerate some conversations among those conferences to consider doing their own thing. However, even if they’re constantly disrespected, the money from the Playoff and the New Year’s Six game is hard to make up on your own and they might just stick around in the current system for it.

And as long as that’s happening, we’ll repeat this every year. Outrage over a system doing exactly what it’s designed to, which is put the teams that will draw the biggest ratings possible together and make just enough of a cast to do so.

Johnny Knoxville is in the news this week after Bam Margera reported that Knoxville and Steve-O were hospitalized on the second day of filming the next Jackass movie after injuring themselves during a stunt. For the record, the stunt — jumping on a full-speed treadmill while carrying a tuba — sounds both hilarious and incredibly painful. Knoxville’s return to headlines, however, inspired me to revisit his appearance on Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert podcast.

On the podcast, in addition to getting into the details behind when Shepard “broke his penis,” Shepard also brought up the stunt that would eventually lead to the Jackass movies. Recall that Knoxville was originally a writer, who pitched an article idea for Jeff Tremaine’s skateboarding magazine, Big Brother (Tremaine would ultimately become the director of the Jackass movies). The first pitch involved a stunt that Knoxville filmed (and would eventually go viral) in which he was “supposed to get shot” while wearing a bulletproof vest.

The stunt, however, didn’t go exactly as planned. “When we got out there,” Knoxville told Shepard, “my friend refused to shoot me, so I had to shoot myself.” This was particularly concerning for Knoxville because he was “broke at the time, and I bought the cheapest vest they had.”

As Knoxville tells it, when he asked for a vest, the sales clerk insisted that it was “the best vest, top of the line,” etc., until Knoxville said, “Good, because I’m going to shoot myself while wearing it.” The sales clerk called someone, however, and a few minutes later, they asked Knoxville not to do it. “Too late,” he said, “I’ve already said I would.”

For those who haven’t seen it, all these years later, the stunt involves a young Johnny Knoxville shooting himself in the chest while wearing a bulletproof vest. It’s the stunt that went viral and would eventually lead to three Jackass movies and counting. In addition to shooting himself, Knoxville also allows himself to be pepper sprayed and tased. Warning: It’s brutal (but funny), and you can watch it right here.

Filming will presumably continue on Jackass 4 in the coming days. The movie is tentatively scheduled for release in the Spring of 2021.

Source: Armchair Expert

Pharrell almost had a shot at working with Michael Jackson in the early 2000s. The Virginia producer reflected on that moment during a recent interview on N.O.R.E. and DJ EFN’s Drink Champs podcast. Jackson came up after Pharrell revealed that Prince rejected one of the songs he sent to the legendary singer. It was here that Pharrell shared that almost all of Justin Timberlake’s debut solo album, Justified, was originally written for the King Of Pop.

“John McClain was his manager at the time,” Pharrell said. “We sent him pretty much all the stuff y’all are hearing on the Justified album. That’s all the Michael stuff.” He added, “All but one song, they were all written for Michael.”

Unfortunately for Pharrell, Michael Jackson and his team were not too fond of the music that was sent to him. “John McClain was like, ‘Man Michael don’t want that sh*t,’” Pharrell recalled. “‘He want that sh*t you’re giving Noreaga….he want that ‘Superthug,’” referencing Pharrell and N.O.R.E.’s iconic 1998 track from the latter’s self-titled debut album.

Elsewhere in the podcast, Pharrell shared his feelings on Drake and Pusha T’s beef. “It still breaks my heart to this day, because I would’ve loved to have heard those guys on a song together or heard a joint project together. I would’ve loved to twist that,” he said.

You can watch the full Drink Champs interview with Pharrell in the video above.