I occasionally get asked by mothers of young children what the secret is to raising great teenagers.
My initial response is that I have absolutely no clue. My kids are who they are IN SPITE of having me as a mother. (The young moms don’t find that answer too helpful.)
Really, the first thing that I will tell you is to disbelieve the myth that teenagers are sullen, angry creatures who slam doors and hate their parents. Some do that, but the overwhelming majority do not. Every one of my kids’ friends are just as happy and fun as my kids are, so I know it’s not just us.
Teenagers are incredible. They are funny, smart, eager to please, and up for just about anything as long as food is involved. They have the most generous hearts and want desperately to be loved and validated. They are quirky and messy and have the best sense of humor.
So, here is my list of “rules” for raising teens. These are the secrets we have found to be successful.
1. Love them fiercely.
Love everything about them, even the annoying stuff. Love them for their actions AND their intentions. Let them know in word and deed how much you adore them. Daily. Love their wrinkled shirts and Axe-body-spray-covered selves. Love their bad handwriting and pimpled cheeks. Love their scattered brains and long limbs. All these seemingly insignificant details are an amazing, magical process at work. It’s like being witness to the miracle of a diamond mid-formation. All this imperfection is going to one day yield a responsible, serious adult. A loving husband and father. Or a wonderful wife and mother. It’s a privilege to be witness to such glorious growth.
See your teenagers as a privilege, don’t see them as a burden. They’re more perceptive than you can imagine. How you feel about them will be no secret. So just love ‘em.
2. Listen and pay attention.
When they walk in the door after school, you have a precious few minutes when they will divulge the secrets of their day with you. Be excited to see them. Put down the cell phone. Don’t waste this time making dinner or taking a phone call. Look them in the eye and hear what they are saying. Make their victories your victories. Be empathetic. It is really hard to navigate high school and middle school. Don’t offer advice at this time unless they ask for it. Don’t lecture. Just listen. It makes them feel important and valued. We all need to feel that way.
3. Say yes more than you say no.
The world is forever going to tell them no. For the rest of their lives, they will be swimming in a stormy sea with wave after wave of “you’re not good enough” and “you can’t do this” crashing down on their heads. If nothing else, I want to be the opposite voice in their lives for as long as I can. I want to instill in them the belief that they are not limited and they can do anything if they’re willing to work hard enough for it. I want to be the YES, YOU CAN in their lives. I want them to leave my house every day feeling invincible.
4. Say no often.
You need to say no to experiences and situations that will set your child up for harm or unhappiness. Don’t let them go to the parties where they will be forced to make a choice about alcohol at age 16 in front of their peers . Don’t let them stay out until three in the morning with a member of the opposite sex. Be the parent. Set up rules for their safety, both physical and moral. You would think this rule goes without saying, but we have known a shockingly large number of parents who don’t.
5. Feed them. A lot.
And not only them, but their friends too. These bodies are growing and developing at an astonishing rate and need fuel to do so — most of which they prefer to be loaded with processed sugar and hydrogenated-something-or-others. When their friends know your pantry is stocked to the gills with treats, they will beg your kid to hang out at your place. This allows you to not only meet and know their friends, but to keep an eye on your teen as well.
6. Don’t sweat the small stuff.
When living with teenagers, it can be so easy to see the backpack dropped in the middle of the living room as laziness. Or the bedroom scattered with dirty clothes as irresponsible. Instead, and before you open your mouth to yell at them, put yourself in their shoes. Find out about their day first. Maybe they are feeling beaten down, and they just need to unwind for a minute and tell you about it. Ignore the mess for a bit and put your arms around that big, sweaty kid and give him a hug. Talk to him about his world. Find out what he did, wants to do, and dreams of doing. THEN, and only then, ask him to pick it up and put it away.
That being said, do I completely ignore the state of my boys’ bedrooms all the time? No, I do not. But I pick my battles, and I pick the appropriate time to fight them. Once every seven to 10 days or so, I tell them their bedrooms need to be picked up. Which they do happily because it’s not the running loop of a nagging mom. They know when I ask, it needs to be done.
7. Stand back and watch the magic happen.
If you let them, these glorious creatures will open their hearts and love you more fiercely than you could possibly imagine. They are brilliant, capable, strong spirits who bring with them a flurry of happiness. They are hilarious and clever. They are thoughtful and sensitive. They want us to adore them. They need us to adore them. They love deeply and are keenly in touch with the feelings of others.
They are just about the greatest gift God gave to parents.
This article was written by Christie Halversson and originally appeared on 08.20.19
When you’re a tequila writer, you risk falling too far down certain rabbit holes sometimes. Writing about tequila, I’ve come across all kinds of different bottles — limited run expressions, the world of additive vs. additive-free tequilas, and the occasional rare bottle. Wich is a lot of fun but it can sometimes put you out of touch with what people see at their local grocer, liquor store, or bar.
I can give you a great gifting option, point you in the direction of bottles that are worth chasing down, and even introduce you to bottles that might shift how you perceive “good tequila.” But ask me my opinion on some of the best-selling tequilas on the market and… I might need a quick drink to jog my memory. So we thought it would be fun to put some of the top-selling expressions on the market to the blind taste test and ranked the results.
This article is as mainstream as it gets, baby!
Methodology:
To determine which brands were “best sellers” we referenced the online retailer Drizly’s latest list of the top-selling tequilas of 2023. Our tasting class in order from #1 best seller to #10 best seller is:
Casamigos Blanco
Clase Azul Reposado
Espolón Blanco
Casamigos Reposado
Don Julio 1942Añejo
Patrón Silver
Jose Curvo Especial Silver
Don Julio Blanco
1800 Silver
Espolòn Tequila Reposado
Once we had all ten bottles, I took a seat in my dining room and had my girlfriend prepare 10 unmarked pours in a random order. Here’s what resonated for my unique palate and… what didn’t.
Also Read: The Top 5 UPROXX Tequila Posts Of The Last Six Months
Nose: A medley of roasted agave and vanilla bean on the nose, it almost has a slight baking spice quality to it. Very inviting, like fresh cookies out of the oven.
Palate: A warm chocolate quality begins our journey, it starts sweet and then quickly turns into a spicy burn with green tea and green pepper flavors dancing on the tongue.
Finish: Peppery celery and zesty citrus dominate the finish. Highly vegetal and almost juicy.
Taste 2:
Dane Rivera
Nose: I see a faint straw color and the scent is dominated by nutmeg and the slightest hint of oak.
Palate: Slightly fruity coffee and cloves splash on the tastebuds with a slight earthy burn, a hint of tropical fruit, and a touch of grass.
Finish: A quick finish, there is a nice oaky vibe with a bit of roasted agave, but it doesn’t stick around.
Taste 3:
Dane Rivera
Nose: All over the place, I can smell some roasted agave, but there is a noticeable sweetness here as well, and a strong almost kerosene-like quality to it.
Palate: Silky with a mix of tart pineapple and juicy orange juice, with some bitter lettuce-like flavors keeping the sweetness from being too out of control.
Finish: Black pepper with an artificial lime finish. Goes down incredibly smooth.
Taste 4:
Dane Rivera
Nose: I wouldn’t know it by the color, the pour is too shallow, but from the smell alone I can tell this is an añejo. And since there is only one añejo on this list, I know it’s Don Julio 1942.
The nose is pure dessert — chocolate, caramel, and vanilla mingled with a warm roasted agave scent and a bit of the barrel.
Palate: Smooth and cinnamon spicy, the vanilla is a strong and dominating presence with rich toffee notes. I keep coming back to one word here: dessert. There is a noticeable luxuriousness here that is a joy to drink.
Finish: The finish is pure oak and agave, most of the sweetness dissipates at the end but it has a pleasing smoothness. This is wince-free tequila.
Taste 5:
Dane Rivera
Nose: Sweet vanilla frosting with gentle notes of honey and very slight whispers of oak.
Palate: Stunningly sweet, that vanilla frosting smell translates into the flavor heavily, along with some caramel notes and a lot of white sugar. Tastes straight-up sweetened by something that doesn’t belong in the bottle.
Finish: Smooth, silky and sweet. I’m not getting a whole lot of agave here, but I can still taste just a hint of it along with some very mellow oak notes.
Taste 6:
Dane Rivera
Nose: Black pepper, green grass and agave dominate the nose. There is a subtle harshness to the scent that makes my eyes water a bit, especially after the sweetness of the last pour.
Palate: Very nice on the palate, I’m tasting strong asparagus notes mixed with a zesty orange rind flavor, a bit of vanilla sweetness, and more black pepper.
Finish: I like the finish here, it’s harsh and spicy, but in the best way. It continues to burn on the tongue once you’re done with it. A cool sensation.
Taste 7:
Dane Rivera
Nose: Harsh on the nose, I’m getting a heavy dose of kerosene, burnt plastic, and nail polish remover.
Palate: A lot of spice with white pepper. It has a cheap vodka-like burn to it.
Finish: The burn is intense, which makes it a bit hard to latch on to any flavors on the finish. I’m tasting a touch of agave under all the alcohol harshness, enough to know that this is tequila and not something else.
Taste 8:
Dane Rivera
Nose: There is a strong, almost artificial vanilla presence on the nose kissed with warm roasted agave notes, and a bit of brown sugar.
Palate: That agave in the nose is present on the palate mixed with an almost bitter vanilla flavor, a hint of cinnamon, and soft barrel notes.
Finish: Buttery with some citrus zest, and some earthy black pepper giving it a nice spicy kick.
Taste 9:
Dane Rivera
Nose: Agave and acetone, a weird chemical cleaner quality here that wafts from the glass.
Palate: A strong and pronounced burn followed by a mix of black pepper and citrus notes and a touch of mint.
Finish: Very harsh on the finish with a strong burn that takes away a lot of the character. I’m getting an artificial sweetness lurking on the backend.
Taste 10:
Dane Rivera
Nose: This last run of tequila has been a bit tough. I’m getting alcohol on the nose again but this time there is some cooked agave here as well and a bit of citrus zest that tickles the nose. Almost sneeze-inducing.
Palate: Much better on the palate, I’m getting strong roasted agave notes, black pepper, a touch of butter, and a lot of green grass.
Finish: Very butter, with a vegetal quality that is quite nice. The nose fooled me on this one, I thought I was in for a rough ride.
Not at all surprised to see that Jose Cuervo’s Silver ranked last for me. This is the sort of tequila you’re going to want to reserve for big-batch mixes and frozen margarita machines. It’s harsh and not very pleasing, I wouldn’t even suggest you shoot the stuff — it’s rough!
I’m surprised it remains a best seller when for just a few dollars more there are more drinkable bottles out there. The agave goes through acid thermal hydrolysis cooking (yum?) and is a mixto — meaning it’s not made from 100% blue agave.
The Bottom Line:
This is frat-house, stomach-burning, tastebud-melting tequila. It’s dirt cheap, though — so if you’re throwing a party and need a lot of tequila but don’t want to break the bank, this is the play.
You hate to see the cheap stuff rank at the bottom of the list (it would be fun to be surprised!), but it is what it is. This has some of the same harsh qualities as the Cuervo but is considerably more drinkable in my opinion, with a more clear agave flavor. The tequila is produced at NOM 1122, Casa Cuervo, where the agave is cooked in a high-pressure autoclave, roller mill extracted, and fermented in stainless steel tanks.
Yes, it’s a bit pricier than the Cuervo Especial but this is a significant step up in flavor.
The Bottom Line:
It’s a lot more pleasing than the below $20 bottles. A cheap tequila that you can shoot without worrying about your tastebuds burning off.
I’m shocked that Patrón ranked this low for me. Ultimately it was that artificial quality on the nose and the finish that held it back for me.
Patrón’s Silver is made with blue agave cooked in stone brick ovens and tahona extracted, fermented in wood fermentation tanks, and carbon filtered at NOM 1492, Patrón Spirits. There was a time when most of the general public considered Patrón to be top-shelf tequila, I think that’s down to its sweetness and drinkability.
The Bottom Line:
Sweet and easily drinkable, perhaps too much so. It disappears in a cocktail.
Another surprise for me, I would’ve assumed Espolón would have held its own a bit better in this lineup but it looks like it’s not going to crack the top five. Again, that had to do with a pronounced harshness on the nose.
This tequila blanco is produced at NOM 1440, Campari Mexico, using agave cooked in a low-pressure autoclave and roller mill extracted before being fermented in stainless steel tanks and cold filtered. Espolón likes to bill itself as ‘additive-free’ because it’s fermented without fibers but that designation has not been recognized by Tequila Matchmaker.
The Bottom Line:
For the price, I think it’s the best tequila you’re going to find. Unfortunately, it couldn’t hold its own against some of the pricier bottles in this taste test.
This was the biggest surprise of the tasting and hopefully serves as an argument that higher prices don’t always equal better tequila. Clase Azul is one of the most hyped brands in the scene and that’s due to this admittedly beautiful bottle it comes in. I won’t lie, it makes for a great gift, and its easy drinkability will lead a lot of people to think this is what good tequila should taste like but… I’m going to push back on that.
It’s entirely too sweet. All the bright and beautiful characteristics of agave feel like they’re missing here. It’s hard not to like it because it’s so easy to drink but you’re paying for the bottle design here.
Clase Azul is produced at NOM 1595, Casa Tradición using agave that is cooked in stone brick ovens and roller mill extracted before being aged in American White Oak barrels for up to eight months.
The Bottom Line:
It makes for a great gift and is a conversation starter, but it is so sweetened that it masks all the bite and character of agave.
Don Julio’s Blanco is pretty solid, I think for the price I could find a lot of options that I’d recommend above this, but I’m happy to see that the general public is buying this brand in droves, because at the end of the day its still good tequila.
Don Julio’s blanco is made from 100% blue agave cooked in stone brick ovens, roller mill extracted, and fermented in stainless steel tanks at NOM 1449.
The Bottom Line:
A significant step up from the flavors of the bottles ranked below this one. You get a lot of agave notes and grassy sensations with this clean unaged expression.
Clooney’s Casamigos continues to wow me! This is the top-selling bottle of tequila according to Drizly, and while I’d like people to lean away from celebrity-backed brands (Clooney sold his share long ago) in favor of less corporate entities, from a flavor standpoint, this is solid tequila.
It’s produced at NOM 1609, part of Diageo, where the agave is cooked in stone brick ovens, roller mill extracted and fermented, and rested in stainless steel tanks. This tequila is made with deep well water which gives it a lot of minerality.
The Bottom Line:
This isn’t the best-selling tequila just because Clooney’s name is on the bottle, it has an addictive bright and ~ sort of… spikey ~ flavor profile.
I didn’t want to put the two bottles of Casamigos side by side but that’s just the way the cookie crumbled. The main difference between Casamigos’ blanco and repo is the more mellow flavor and silkier texture of the latter.
To make the reposado, Casamigos ages its blanco tequila for 7 months in American white oak barrels, which give it a soft straw color.
The Bottom Line:
A slight step up from the Casamigos Blanco. I like the mellow vibe and barrel notes it adds to a margarita vs the unaged version.
I figured Espolón would hold its own against the bottles in this lineup, but I never imagined it would make it to the number two spot. Ultimately, what I like about this over the Casamigos version is the more complex character — I’m tasting a lot of fruity notes, more grass, more burn, more of everything! Yet it still has that mellow easy-on-the-palate finish that brings you back for more.
Produced at NOM 1440, Campari, Espolón’s reposado is aged for a very brief 3 months in American white oak barrels.
The Bottom Line:
Mellow and drinkable, but with a lot of bright agave characteristics. An astounding bottle for the price.
It’s not entirely a surprise that Don Julio 1942’s Añejo took the top spot here. Not only is it the priciest bottle on the list, but I pretty much knew from the first sip that this was going to be the number one choice. There is just an elevated quality here that sets it in another class from the rest of the bottles in this blind taste test.
I do wonder how this would stack up to a strictly añejo-focused blind taste test. As as enjoyable as it is, it’s a bit sweeter than the typical tequila I go for. I am not sure I would choose it amongst a similar grouping of bottles.
The tequila here is produced at NOM 1449 and uses agave cooked in stone brick ovens before being roller mill extracted, fermented in stainless steel, and aged in bourbon barrels for two and a half years, giving it some noticeable whisky-esque qualities. If you love that smooth whiskey experience, you’re going to love Don Julio.
The Bottom Line:
A great sipping tequila and a bottle that I think almost everyone would enjoy, from tequila-drinking novices to people with a more experienced palate. The real question is, how does this stack up with other aged expressions in this price range? We’ll need to investigate!
Through her career, Britney Spears has gone through hell and back. And now, she’s telling all in her upcoming memoir, The Woman In Me. Over the course of the past few years, fans have played a big role in Spears’ newfound freedom, after launching the #FreeBritney movement, which ultimately led to courts ending her 13-year conservatorship in 2021.
In the book, Spears speaks about her time in a rehabilitation facility, according to New York Times, who reported receiving excerpts of the book. She spoke about how her father forced her to go the facility, and threatened to take her to court if she didn’t.
It was in this facility that she learned about the #FreeBritney movement.
“That was the most amazing thing I’d ever seen in my life,” Spears said. “I don’t think people knew how much the #FreeBritney movement meant to me, especially in the beginning.”
Elsewhere in the memoir, she opened up about the aftermath of her conservatorship and the long-term emotional and physical consequences.
“Migraines are just one part of the physical and emotional damage I have now that I’m out of the conservatorship,” said Spears. “I don’t think my family understands the real damage that they did.”
The Woman In Me is out 10/24 via Simon And Schuster. Find more information here.
The Detroit Lions are one of the best stories in the NFL this season, posting a 5-1 record that is tied for the best mark in the league. While Detroit’s roster is filled with talented players, one of the best is Amon-Ra St. Brown, who emerged as a budding star with 106 catches and more than 1,100 yards in 2022. This year, St. Brown is averaging more than 90 receiving yards per game and, by all accounts, he is a key piece of Detroit’s offensive success along with Jared Goff and others. However, St. Brown had a tough day at the office this week, and it came as a result of his collegiate affiliation.
St. Brown was a fourth-round draft pick out of USC in 2021, and he clearly feels an attachment to his university. In fact, St. Brown and Lions linebacker Julian Okwara made a friendly agreement — he made it very, very clear this was not a bet — before last week’s battle between USC and Notre Dame, where Okwara played his college football. Unfortunately for St. Brown, USC was blitzed to the tune of a 48-20 drubbing in South Bend, and that meant that St. Brown had to pay up.
On Thursday, St. Brown’s penance became public when he dressed up like a leprechaun in the Lions locker room and answered questions from the media in the outfit.
“Everything about this is trash.”#Lions WR Amon-Ra St. Brown is not having a fun time paying off a bet with Julian Okawara after his beloved USC dropped a big one to Notre Dame on Saturday. pic.twitter.com/5kcnfJNcyl
This is obviously harmless, but it is also tremendous content. St. Brown did what anyone should do when they lose a friendly wager and he leaned into the bit. Okwara also appeared to deeply enjoy himself, which is also what should always happen in this instance. Also, the vibes continue to be immaculate for the Lions, and Detroit will put its 5-1 record on the line against the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday afternoon.
There’s one question that is looming over the NBA’s brand new In-Season Tournament: Who is going to care about this? Essentially, it’s a brand new competition that is getting folded into the NBA regular season, so there are questions about whether or not any of the players will take this really seriously, especially because (presumably) all of their focus and attention will be on winning the NBA Finals later in the year.
Is that a fair question? Who knows! The season hasn’t even started yet, so this is all speculation at this point. But if there is one bright spot for the league, it’s that one team is apparently prepared to take the competition very seriously.
“I said to [Golden State Warriors general manager] Mike Dunleavy about a month ago, I said, ‘Hey Mike, what do you think about this in-season tournament?’” Warriors president Brandon Schneider recalled during the broadcast of the team’s preseason win over the Sacramento Kings on Wednesday. “He said, ‘Well, Draymond Green and Chris Paul told me we’re gonna win it.’ I said, ‘OK, that’s all I needed to know.’”
I have spent a solid 10 minutes going back and forth on whether or not this is a surprise. Beyond the fact that Green expressed some frustrations with the payout players will receive for the Tournament, plenty of folks wondered whether the old guard — guys specifically like Green and Paul — would care about competing for this because of how important winning the NBA Finals is for them. At the same time, Green and Paul are insane competitors who want to win everything, presumably see the value of being the first In-Season Tournament winners, and for Paul specifically, I assume he was in meetings with Adam Silver about this for years during his time as the president of the NBPA and got sold on the idea. At the very least, a nice trip to Las Vegas in December is quite the incentive.
The really good news for the league here is that if a team like the Warriors is going to care about this, that should have ripple effects. Obviously, Golden State is a draw on national television, and the league would surely love if people are tuning into the In-Season Tournament because Steph Curry and co. go on a run. And of course, if a team like the Warriors essentially validates this as a thing worth taking seriously, it’s not hard to see that having ripple effects across the league.
Meek Mill and Rick Ross’ upcoming joint album Too Good To Be True officially has a release date: November 10. In a new pair of videos depicting the album’s recording process, the longtime collaborators appear to be locked into the studio, where they receive visits from DJ Khaled and Diddy, who hype up the release before title cards reveal the album’s release date.
Meek and Ross first promoted the project’s impending release with their single “Shaq & Kobe,” later announcing its title and tell Apple Music’s Ebro Darden about its creation.
The project will be released by Ross’ Maybach Music Group imprint in a new partnership with Gamma, a music startup founded by veteran music execs Larry Jackson and Ike Youssef with funding from Apple and A24. The album will see Meek and Ross join forces again for the first time since 2019’s Port Of Miami 2, where Meek appeared on “Bogus Charms.”
However, those rumors appeared to be unfounded; late last year, Ross joined Meek onstage to help celebrate the 10th anniversary of his debut album Dreams & Nightmares.
Too Good To Be True is out 11/10 via Maybach Music Group / Gamma.
Martin Scorsese’s latest flick Killers of the Flower Moonis heading to theaters this week, but for those of us who don’t want to train our bodies to sit through nearly four hours of movie theater soda, you might have to wait a little bit of time.
The film has had a pretty busy release history. After being shown at Cannes earlier this year, the film was on track for a limited release this fall, but thanks to the fact that movies are back and better than ever, the movie will get a wide release, including IMAX, before eventually streaming on Apple TV.
While we don’t have an exact date yet, here’s what we know. Previous Apple TV films like Jennifer Lawrence’s Causeway landed on the streamer just a week after release, while other Apple TV films have taken multiple weeks. Scorsese’s last film The Irishman landed on Netflix just three weeks after its initial theatrical run, though that was a limited release, and there was a whole lot of tension there.
Due to the buzz of the movie, there’s a good probability that Killers of the Flower Moon will be in theaters for some time, so it will be quite a while until we get to stream from home. If you really want to see it ASAP, you might have to run out to your local theater. Maybe they still have Eras Tour merch!
After Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce made a surprise appearance at last weekend’s Saturday Night Live premiere, speculation began running wild that the power couple really did just show up and the cast and crew scrambled to include them in the episode hosted by Pete Davidson. According to SNL star, Bowen Yang, the rumors are true.
While promoting Dicks: The Musical on Thursday’s episode of The View, Yang confirmed to co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin that Swift and Kelce magically emerged at the 30 Rock studio to the surprise of everyone.
“This did not come about in any way!” Yang said via Decider. “No one was told that they would be there.”
“I’m going to my makeup chair after dress rehearsal, I see a couple people talking to the two tallest people in the world, and then I realized it was them,” Yang recalled. “To see them individually as tall people I go, ‘Amazing,’ but when they’re next to each other, it’s a force multiplier. These two people, it’s The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. I’m in the Redwood Forest. It’s amazing.”
“But there they are. I mean yeah, they just showed up,” Yang said in conclusion. “It was incredible. It just reminds you that SNL and The View are the kinds of shows where live TV is beautiful, people drop by, things happen.”
Let’s cut right to the chase here: we know Killers of the Flower Moonis gonna be long. Not only is 2023 the year of long movies, but Killers is also a Martin Scorsese film, which already adds an extra 50 minutes of stoic stares. Then you tack on an extra 30 for some violent sequences and maybe 4 more minutes of Jesse Plemmons being weird, and a few extra hours of sitting at that same dang table, and that’s how long the movie is. It’s worth it!
Killers of the Flower Moon clocks in 196 minutes, which is the length of about 66 full-length TikToks. This is actually longer than Oppenheimer, but we don’t need to compare the two since that’s already being done enough.
The movie will star longtime muse Leonardo DiCaprio alongside Kiky Gladstone, Robert De Niro, Jesse Plemons, John Lithgow, Brendan Fraser, Tantoo Cardinal, Cara Jade Myers, JaNae Collins, and Jillian Dion.
While it’s a long one, there won’t be an intermission. In fact, Scorsese is pretty sure you can handle more than three hours in a seat. “People say it’s three hours, but come on, you can sit in front of the TV and watch something for five hours,” Scorsese said earlier this week. He’s right! Let’s sit him in the theater for Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour for 3 hours and see how he feels.
Killers of the Flower Moon is in theaters on October 20th.
The Detroit Pistons made the Eastern Conference Finals in 2008. It marked the sixth year in a row the team made it to that point, and over that stretch, they made the NBA Finals twice and won it once. Since then: 15 seasons, three playoff berths. The most recent one came in 2019 — with the Sacramento Kings making it last year, Detroit is currently tied for the second-longest postseason drought in the league.
The bad news for the Pistons is that the Eastern Conference is going to be brutal this year, and odds are, they’re not going to be able to break through to the Play-In Tournament. The good news, though, is that this has the potential to be a year where Detroit lays a really great foundation, one that lets them get back to being a perennial playoff contender.
Biggest Question: Can Cade Cunningham Be A Star?
Cade Cunningham’s sophomore campaign came to an end on Nov. 9, 2022. Cunningham, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2021 NBA Draft, suffered a stress fracture in his shin that required surgery and limited him to only 12 games of action. It was a brutal twist of fate for Cunningham and the Pistons — he was supposed to use this year to build on his rookie campaign and build his chemistry with his potential backcourt mate for the next decade-plus, Jaden Ivey.
There was a silver lining to this cloud, as Ivey came into his own as the season went along and looks like the dynamic, explosive guard he was billed to be coming out of Purdue. But Cunningham is the potential face of the franchise, the sort of jumbo playmaker with scoring chops that every team covets right now. Losing out on a year of development — and, frankly, a year of watching him play basketball — really stinks, even if the Pistons weren’t viewed as a potential playoff team in the Eastern Conference.
The good news for Detroit is that Cunningham is back and healthy. By all accounts, Cunningham was magnificent while playing with the USA Basketball Select Team that helped prepare the senior side ahead of the FIBA Basketball World Cup — “He looked great,” Steve Kerr said, per The Athletic. “The injury is clearly behind him and it’s great to see him healthy. He’s a guy who can really control the game from the point guard spot with his size and physicality.”
There’s an opportunity for Cunningham to take a big step forward under new head coach Monty Williams — remember, Devin Booker made his first All-Star team after he took over in Phoenix. If he can, it’s going to make the Pistons’ rebuild look awfully promising, and turn them into an up-and-coming team to watch as we enter 2024-25.
X-Factor: Figuring Out Their Core
Detroit has … we’ll say a lot going on. Again, it’s not like this is a team that will be expected to compete for a title at some point in the next 20 months or anything like that, so this season is all about figuring out who is and is not at the center of Williams’ plans going forward. Cunningham seems to be a lock, as does Ivey. Jalen Duren, whose bright spots last year were incredibly bright, seems a safe bet. Ausar Thompson, who went fifth overall in the 2023 NBA Draft, has superstar potential.
But what about everyone else? Namely, what will they do with the younger players on their roster? James Wiseman, Killian Hayes, and Isaiah Livers are potential restricted free agents next offseason. (Not young guys, but Joe Harris, Alec Burks, and Monte Morris are all unrestricted free agents next summer, too.) Marvin Bagley will hit the unrestricted market in 2025. If you assume a Cunningham contract extension is coming and they don’t make any trades, the only players the team will have on the books in 2025-26 are Cunningham, Duren, Ivey, Thompson, Marcus Sasser, and Isaiah Stewart.
(Stewart, as an aside, is an interesting case here, as he’s only 22, has shown a willingness to shoot threes, and brings energy and toughness every night. He’s due $15 million a year, every year, through his team option 2028, which is not a ton of money considering where the salary cap is going. He’s either part of their core going forward or he’s a potentially fascinating trade chip.)
There are obvious questions about whether or not the team tries to turn any those aforementioned veterans — along with Bojan Bogdanovic — into more future-facing stuff over the course of this season. But above all else, Detroit is in the process of figuring things out with those youngsters, and having clarity about how they all fit together by the end of this season is crucial.
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