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Games 1 and 2 of the Western Conference Finals between the Los Angeles Lakers and Denver Nuggets were two opposite ends of the basketball spectrum. Game 1’s offensive showcase made way for Game 2’s defensive-minded, cold-shooting affair. LeBron James, Anthony Davis, and Nikola Jokic combined for 100 points on 35-for-56 shooting in Game 1. Thursday night, they totaled just 63 points on 22-for-55 shooting. Denver led for 47 minutes in Game 1. Los Angeles led for 32 minutes in Game 2.

Among the few commonalities this week were the Nuggets winning both contests and Jamal Murray shredding the Lakers’ defense for a pair of 30-point escapades. The 25-year-old has once again shown his knack for leveling up in the playoffs, averaging 34 points (68.4 percent true shooting), 7.5 rebounds, five assists, and 3.5 steals against the Lakers.

Through 2.5 quarters of Game 2, an encore from his 31-point Game 1 seemed nearly implausible for Murray. After opening the night 2-for-3 with six points, he misfired on 11 of his next 12 attempts and was laboring through a 3-for-15 showing filled with short and off-center misses. He very clearly looked like a person trying to play a professional sport with an ear infection. But then, he turned ablaze. He buried eight of his final nine shots, including seven straight. He splashed home four triples amid that flurry. His 3-for-15 slog slammed on the brakes and U-turned into an 11-for-24, 37-point supernova display.

After Los Angeles assigned Davis to Aaron Gordon so he could roam on Jokic as a helper midway through the third quarter, the Nuggets’ offense lost some luster, though it already struggled to manufacture all night. Jokic, who scored 21 of his 23 points before the nine-minute mark of the third, missed a slew of reliable shots and was 1-for-8 down the stretch. Davis’ patrolling and Gordon’s discomfort against that approach muddied the waters for everyone involved.

Murray stepped up with 23 fourth-quarter points. The sixth-year guard is presenting substantial issues for Los Angeles’ defense, primarily through two means: pick-and-roll and handoffs. When the Lakers employ drop coverage against him, he’s torching them. Whether it’s Davis or James, Murray is finding the requisite space to get to his jumper and hurl flames. Davis playing at the level or full-on switching has worked better.

The Lakers are toggling between going under and over on Murray’s screens. They started out with the former in Game 1, shifted to the latter late, and opened that way in Game 2 before reverting back to their opening gambit for spurts. Presumably, the intention is to take away Murray’s airspace in the midrange, where he loves to operate. Yet he shot 39.3 percent on 244 pull-up triples during the regular season and has canned 37.5 percent of his 64 off-the-bounce long balls these playoffs. In this series, he’s 5-for-11 on pull-up threes. He’s quite comfortable stopping and popping from deep.

When Los Angeles has elected to fight over the top, Murray is content to probe into his midrange haven, shooting 8-for-12 (66.7 percent) on two-point pull-ups this series and 43-for-83 (51.8 percent) in the playoffs. The chemistry he possesses with Jokic in ball-screens amplifies the space he finds. James in drop coverage as the small-ball 5 with Davis resting was untenable on Thursday night. But the main alternatives — switching a small onto Jokic or trapping to give him a 4-on-3 — are even less palatable. If Jokic and Davis’ stints aren’t going to align, the Lakers must find a remedy for the non-Davis minutes, though that’s been a dilemma all playoffs.

But right now, there may not be a bigger dilemma for Los Angeles than figuring out how to deal with Murray. The dude’s in a shot-making groove, which helped rescue the offense Thursday.

While Murray and Jokic have fostered unspoken, intrinsic chemistry in pick-and-rolls, the heart of their connection resides in dribble handoffs. Whereas the Lakers stymied much of the Golden State Warriors’ dribble handoff-heavy attack last round, they can’t adhere to the same defensive principles anymore with Jokic triggering the action. Against Golden State, they top-locked shooters and ball-handlers to deny the handoff and sagged off whichever big man, Draymond Green or Kevon Looney, was facilitating them because neither is a credible shooting or scoring threat.

Jokic, however, is, and he’s developed innate synergy with Murray on cuts when defenses deny those handoffs. Davis has to press up against Jokic and the guards are left to lock-and-trail instead. As a qualified beneficiary, Murray is exploiting the problems Jokic poses for Los Angeles.

Denver is mixing in some free-flowing handoffs and the traditional Chicago action, but its staple is Rip DHO* involving Murray, Jokic, and Gordon. The Lakers are hesitant to switch the initial screen because it’ll leave Gordon with a deep seal against a mismatch and Jokic can seamlessly feed that entry pass for buckets.

(* — This may not be the official name, but the “Rip” part stems from the Rip/back screen Murray sets before transitioning into the dribble handoff, hence Rip DHO.)

Regardless of the predicament it puts them in, they’re also just defending it really poorly and failing to communicate effectively. This is a longtime component of Denver’s Jokic-centric offense. It had to be a prevalent part of the pre-series film. The Lakers cannot botch the coverage on it like they have through two games, nor should they have even mishandled it as much as they have thus far. Murray is taking advantage, as he’s done throughout his career playing off of Jokic.

Jokic has never shared the floor alongside another current All-Star since entering the NBA, at least by the literal definition. But each of the last two times Murray’s suited up in the playoffs, he’s performed like one. Over his past 32 postseason games, he’s averaging 26.8 points (61.2 percent true shooting), 6.5 assists, 5.1 rebounds, and 1.2 steals a night. If he put up these numbers through the first 32 games of a regular season, Murray would walk into an All-Star nod.

Despite some hiccups defensively (particularly in Game 1), he’s elevated himself to begin these Western Conference Finals, even by his own lofty standards. Following a pair of dynamite 30-balls, Murray has the Nuggets two victories away from the franchise’s first Finals berth. He’s further solidifying himself as a bona fide co-star next to the league’s foremost superstar in Jokic. It was true in the Bubble. It was true in 2020-21. It was true the final three months of this season. And it’s absolutely true right now.

Earlier this week, rapper Big Sean made a rare appearance on Twitter. Though he’s dialed back his social media presence in recent years, he took to the social media channel on Thursday (May 18) to share a special message, timely for Mental Health Awareness Month.

“To everybody stressed the f*ck out or overwhelmed cause y’all busy… just remember, It’s much more stressful when things ARENT happening versus stress bc they are,” he said. He continued, seemingly hinting that he was hard at work on new music. “Ok, back to work… but take care of you too.”

Though it’s not clear that he specifically shared this sentiment in honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, he and his longtime girlfriend Jhené Aiko are both advocates of mental health.

While Sean is of the mentality that keeping busy is indicative of having a lot going for oneself, he’s also a proponent of maintaining balance.

A month prior to the aforementioned tweet, he reminded his fans, “No matter how busy you are, you gotta live your life.”

It’s been almost three years since Sean released a proper album, however, he’s recently been keeping fans satisfied with guest appearances. He is featured on Kaytranada and Aminé’s song, “Master P,” from their collaborative album Kaytraminé. He also collaborated with Larry June & The Alchemist on a song called “Palisades, CA.”

Quentin Tarantino seems dedicated to fulfilling a pretty sad pledge: that he will only direct 10 movies before retiring from filmmaking. If he sticks to his guns, he may go out on top. The Movie Critic, his alleged swan song, sounds pretty batty. Even his potential penultimate film was one of his best. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood was a rare non-franchise box office bonanza, leaving such a mark that, four years after its release, Tarantino can do things like announce the death of one of its (of course fictional) protagonists.

On Friday, the Twitter account for Video Archives, the podcast Tarantino runs with his Pulp Fiction co-writer Roger Avary, had an announcement: Rick Dalton had died. He was 90 years old.

“We are saddened by the news of the passing of actor Rick Dalton, best known for his roles in the hit TV series Bounty Law and The Fireman trilogy,” the message read. “Rick passed away peacefully in his home in Hawaii and is survived by his wife Francesca. RIP Rick Dalton 1933-2023.” They also promised a memorial episode was en route.

Rick Dalton, of course, does not exist. He’s the fallen movie star Leonardo DiCaprio played in Hollywood. He was a hard drinker and chain-smoker, but Tarantino has speculated that, despite peaking in his late 20s/early 30s, he eked out a living in the entertainment industry well into middle age. Apparently he even made it to 90. Also perhaps surprising is that he and his Italian starlet wife Francesca stayed together for some 54 years. Perhaps he got his stuff together and lived a long and happy life. If so, good for him!

Tarantino expanded upon Hollywood in his novelization, which was really more of a novel and which even had a different story arc than the movie. The climax wasn’t even the thwarted Manson murders. The book never talks about The Fireman trilogy referenced in the tweet, so it appears Tarantino and Avary will soon be talking about Dalton’s entire (fictional) career, which may have some peaks on top of valleys.

In the meantime, pour one out for Rick Dalton. One wonders if Cliff Booth is still knocking about.

(Via Entertainment Weekly)

The AI arms race seems to be in full swing and everyone wants a piece of the action. Since Chat GPT launched on the scene six months ago, dozens of applications and extensions have claimed to harness GPT 3.5’s incredible language processing capacities. Google has responded by releasing its own AI software, BARD, to compete in the arena. (Try Bard out here and see if you prefer it to Chat GPT. The main difference is that Bard has access to real-time internet data.)

While dozens of extensions, bells, and dubious whistles have been available in the App Store for months professing to be powered by Open AI, the developer itself has never offered an official IOS App. That is, until now. On May 18th, Open AI launched a free Chat GPT App available in The US on the Apple Store. Just like the web model, the free-to-use version operates on the standard GPT 3.5 model, whereas GPT Plus users have access to the improved GPT-4 technology (available for $20 a month).

So what does the App do?

Open AI’s statement reads: “Since the release of ChatGPT, we’ve heard from users that they love using ChatGPT on the go.” For this reason, the App has hopped on to the IOS scene. To serve this “On-the-go” demand, the app integrates Whisper, Open AI’s speech recognition system that enables voice input. Think a really evolved Siri, like HAL from Space Odyssey. Not only is the app free to use, but it also syncs your history across devices, according to Open AI.

While it’s currently only available stateside, Open AI plans to release the App to additional countries in the coming weeks. With this new accessibility, the company will continue to gather feedback and take further steps in improving this powerful tool. “But wait, what if I have an Android?”Fear not, Open AI plans to offer it there as well.

If you haven’t tried Chat GPT, give it a go here. If faster responses, improved capabilities, and access to early features are something that seems desirable, consider subscribing to Open AI for the new GPT-4 technology. Regardless of whether it’s the subscription or the free version, this app looks to be handy and the next step in the ever-evolving AI scene.

It’s been two years since Ted Cruz abandoned his freezing constituents for a sunny trip to Cancún. It might be the most notable thing he’s has ever done. Any time the Texas senator does anything that might even faintly prompt a Cancún joke, social media takes the bait. Every now and then he makes a joke about it, in an attempt to show he has a sense of humor. It rarely goes well, as witness his latest attempt.

On Friday, Cruz took to Twitter to post a picture of him in Midland, Texas. There he happened upon a restaurant called Cancun Grill. Har har. So he had a picture taken of him standing next to the neon sign, a big smile on his face, once again trying to prove he’s a good sport about that time he fled his state during a freak winter storm, raced back after massive backlash, then blamed it all on his daughters.

Cruz is not known for his sense of humor and this latest volley at joke-making did not go over well.

Just as a reminder, the event that Cruz is joking about happened in mid-to-late February of 2021, when a severe winter storm led to the worst energy infrastructure collapse in Texas history. There were statewide power outages. Nearly 250 people died, though some estimates go as high as 700. While his constituents froze and/or lacked drinking water, Cruz was spotted at an airport bound for the Mexican vacation spot. The backlash was severe, but it didn’t stop him from continuing to behave like Ted Cruz.

On her fifth studio album, Gag Order, Kesha isn’t holding back. Having gone through the wringer by way of public lawsuits and various forms of scrutiny, she puts her anger and her hurt in full view by way of her most vulnerable body of work yet.

On one of the album’s standout tracks, “Hate Me Harder,” Kesha makes it known that she is unfazed by any of the words her alleged abusers, and pushes them to say their worst.

“If hating me helps you love yourself / Do your worst, baby, gimme hell / Hate me harder / Hate me harder / There’s nothing left that I haven’t heard / And I can take it, so make it hurt / Hate me harder / Hate me harder,” she sings on the song’s chorus.

In the song’s accompanying visualizer, she is seen singing, as a hand grasps her throat, symbolizing that she won’t keep silent, no matter what kind of hate she receives.

“I have put every ounce of my truth into this album,” said Kesha in an Instagram post upon the album’s release. “The stakes have never felt higher. When creating it with Rick Rubin, I wanted it to sound like life or death, because that’s how it has felt. I wanted to give a sound to the feelings.”

Gag Order is out now via Kemosabe Records. Find more information here.

One fun element of Inside the NBA is that they’re pretty good at incorporating tweets from people who are watching the show. As they explained to us earlier this year, they’re constantly on the search for stuff that makes their broadcast a little better, as they’ll find a good and relevant tweet, put it up on the screen, and get the guys to react to it without knowing what’s coming.

The best stuff in this segment is, as always, the stuff that makes the dudes on set laugh the most. We got a pretty good example of that on Friday night after Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals between the Miami Heat and the Boston Celtics, as a conversation about the Denver Nuggets led to someone with the username “Jenna Tuhls” tweeting at the gang with a gif of someone dipping a chicken nugget into some sauce.

Charles Barkley was sidetracked by the choice in sauce, which got him to say the user’s name. Shaquille O’Neal, meanwhile, picked up on the name right after Chuck said it, and made it a point to get him to say it again while he laughed hysterically on his side of the desk.

“Oh my god,” Barkley said as Shaq laughed. “You’re such an idiot.” Anyway, they did, indeed, also talk about basketball on Friday’s show.

Much has been made out of Jimmy Butler and Grant Williams going face-to-face in the fourth quarter of Game 2 between the Boston Celtics and the Miami Heat. At the time, Boston was ahead and riding high after a three by Williams to give them a six-point lead. Butler came down the floor on the ensuing possession, scored against Williams, got fouled, and the pair got into each other’s faces, which beget a monster run by Miami en route to a 111-105 win.

Williams battled against Butler down the stretch, but the Heat star kept taking him 1-on-1, and despite his best efforts, Williams couldn’t consistently prevent him from scoring. It’s a thing that just happens when you’re playing against Butler, especially when he’s cooking in a playoff game, but regardless, Butler seemed to get a whole lot of joy out of it. After the game, cameras caught him screaming about the Celtics thought Williams was “the answer to the Jimmy Butler problem.”

After doing a postgame hit with TNT, Butler was once again caught screaming about Williams as he started to make his way into the locker room.

Butler had 27 points on 12-for-25 shooting on the night. With the win, the Heat managed to win both games in Boston to start the series to go up, 2-0, as things shift to Miami for Game 3 on Sunday.

When the new Disney+ show, The Muppets Mayhem, hit the streaming service with the first season this month, fans were sure to have some celebrity cameos alongside their favorite puppets. And, as the series centers around Dr. Teeth And The Electric Mayhem‘s band working with a record label to make an album, a lot of the surprise guests are famous in the music world.

Chris Stapleton is the first to appear in the opening episode, as one of the first talking heads to share how the fictional band influenced his music. Others in this segment include Lil Nas X and Tommy Lee — who jokingly flashes his “Mayhem” tattoo as a fake nod to the band.

Later in the show’s sequence, the Muppet music crew attends a party where Steve Aoki is the DJ and Billy Corgan from Smashing Pumpkins performs.

Another DJ, Zedd, and Sofia Carson (Disney’s Descendants) play a larger role in the series. Nora, played by Lilly Singh, wants Zedd to produce the band’s album. Carson arrives in the picture as a singer, when the group ultimately decides to give their song to her — and it becomes a massive hit.

Kesha also stops by to help the Muppets along their journey, while she’s trying to collab with them. Ziggy Marley also tries to help the Electric Mayhem find the right direction for their song, putting his own spin on something Kesha originally performed slower. Other collaborators as potential ideas in this part include Desiigner and Deadmau5.

Other mentions for musicians in the rest of the series are The Bangles’ Susanna Hoffs and Paula Abdul.

Last, but absolutely not least, “Weird Al” Yankovic appears in the show as the band is presumably having a drug hallucination. But, of course since it’s Disney+, they just ate some expired marshmallows. What a silly band!

Things get heated when the Boston Celtics and the Miami Heat play high-stakes basketball games against one another, which has become a common occurrence in recent years with their frequent postseason matchups. In the fourth quarter of a tense Game 2 in the Eastern Conference Finals, we saw a pair of players go face-to-face and have to be separated.

Grant Williams found himself checking Jimmy Butler, which has been a pretty difficult assignment this postseason for, well, everyone. Despite Williams’ best effort, Butler was able to bulldoze his way into the paint, navigate his way around, and get a bucket while drawing a foul. The two immediately got in one another’s faces and started jawing, and even after they were pulled apart, the two continued to exchange pleasantries.

Because this is Jimmy Butler we’re talking about here, not long after, he decided to go at Williams again by burrowing into the paint, rising up, and finishing through contact. After he got the bucket, there was only one thing Butler could do: bust out a too small gesture.

Our hunch is that, as long as this series goes on, members of the Celtics and Butler are going to have moments like this with one another.