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The Denver Nuggets escaped with a narrow win over the Houston Rockets on Saturday but, in the first half, standout forward Michael Porter Jr. was forced to the bench after just seven minutes of on-court action. The 23-year-old Porter Jr. was then listed as out with “low back pain” in advance of Denver’s game against the Miami Heat on Monday, leading to head coach Michael Malone being asked about Porter Jr.’s status before tip-off. Within that availability, Malone’s comments were ominous in nature, indicating that Porter Jr. will be out “for the foreseeable future,” even while acknowledging that he could be “back in a week.”

Porter Jr. has endured two back surgeries in his young career, adding another layer of complication to the proceedings. It is too early to know if the issues are related, but Porter Jr. has also struggled mightily in the early portion of the season. After a breakout 2020-21 campaign in which he averaged 19.0 points and 7.3 rebounds per game with elite-level shooting efficiency, Porter Jr. is shooting just 35.9 percent from the floor and 20.8 percent from three-point range through nine games. That standout 2020-21 season also paved the way to Porter Jr. inking a nine-figure contract extension with the Nuggets.

That small sample size is not necessarily indicative of ongoing struggles, but Porter Jr.’s back could also be a potential explanation. At the very least, this development is disconcerting for the Nuggets, particularly as they navigate the early portion of the season without Jamal Murray. The hope would be that this is a blip on the radar and he could return quickly, but it is too early to tell, as Malone noted with as much clarity as he could.

Leonardo DiCaprio hasn’t played bad all that often. He’ll go to the dark side for Quentin Tarantino (Django Unchained) and Martin Scorsese (The Wolf of Wall Street), but he generally prefers if audiences see him at least intending to do good. But the serial dinosaur bone collector may be adding another monster to the pile.

According to Deadline, DiCaprio is in final talks to play Jim Jones (note: not the rapper), one of the most notorious cult leaders of the 20th century. A political activist and preacher, Jones led the Peoples Temple, whose members perished in a mass-suicide in a commune called “Jonestown” in Guyana. It’s the basis of the phrase “drink the Kool-Aid,” for that is what Jones’ associates laced with poison so that his flock would slip off this mortal coil together. (Though some reports claim it was actually the more thrifty alternative Flavor Aid.) Jones himself took his own life by gunshot.

The project, simply entitled Jim Jones, will be penned by Scott Rosenberg, the longtime Hollywood screenwriter whose credits include Con Air, Gone in 60 Seconds, Kangaroo Jack, and more recently Venom and the Jumanji films.

Jones was a complicated figure, whose church was active for over two decades before its grisly end. He started Peoples Temple in the mid-50s, preaching for diversity and aligning his flock with socialist and Civil Rights causes. Its descent into a suicidal cult has prompted numerous documentary and narrative films, among them Ti West’s The Sacrament, featuring Joe Swanberg and Amy Seimetz and concerning a thinly-veiled Peoples-like cult.

In the meantime, DiCaprio will have two slightly less despairing movies coming out: Adam McKay’s Don’t Look Up, about a comet set to destroy Earth, and Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, about the mysterious murder of Native Americans in the 1920s. He may also be appearing in the American remake of the Oscar-winning Danish drinking movie Another Round.

(Via Deadline)

Aaron Rodgers might return to the field next Sunday when the Packers host the Seahawks (who are getting Russell Wilson back), but no matter what Rodgers does on the field going forward, his reputation will forever be linked with his actions and comments off of it this past week.

Rodgers tested positive for COVID-19 and was forced out of Sunday’s loss to the Chiefs because he is unvaccinated and had to enter the mandatory 10-day quarantine period. The news that Rodgers wasn’t vaccinated came as a surprise to many, as he had previously stated he was “immunized,” but we learned that meant he had tried “alternative treatments,” which the league informed him did not change his status. Rodgers had not been following all of the NFL’s policies for unvaccinated players, and then went on to give a wild interview on the Pat McAfee Show in which he spouted off a lot of vaccine misinformation and claimed he got advice from Joe Rogan rather than doctors.

Many have taken Rodgers to task over the past few days, including Terry Bradshaw, Saturday Night Live, and Howard Stern, but no one more thoroughly picked apart Rodgers than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who published a piece to his Substack on Monday that took the time to point out all the lies Rodgers spread in his interview with McAfee. It’s a worthwhile read in full, as he provides numerous citations to actual scientific studies that debunk Rodgers’ claims, but, like many of us, the part where Rodgers said he took his advice from Rogan had Kareem hung up.

Instead of consulting immunologists, he consulted anti-vaxxer and podcast host Joe Rogan, who also contracted the virus. If he ever requires open-heart surgery will he hand the scalpel to romance writers because they know about matters of the heart? While many who came into contact with him thought he was vaccinated, Rodgers had embarked on his own regimen to boost his “natural immunity.” He failed, as any scientist could have told him—and as they have been publicly telling us for over a year. University of Michigan microbiologist Ariangela Kozik explained that achieving “natural immunity” through these homeopathic methods is a non-starter because vaccines inform our immune system what the virus looks like so the body can build its own protection.

It is an incredible line from Abdul-Jabbar and he goes on to explain not just why these actions from Rodgers endangered himself, teammates, and others he interacted with, but also the impact things like this can have on the public’s trust in athletes as a whole, noting that Rodgers plays into the “dumb jock” narrative incredibly easily here.

After several years of back-and-forth between the two collaborators turned rivals, the feud between Drake and Ye may soon come to an end, apparently thanks to Houston hip-hop impresario J Prince. Prince posted a video on Instagram of himself and Ye at Rothko Chapel in Houston in which Kanye reads a prepared statement on his phone requesting for Drake to join him onstage in Los Angeles at a benefit show advocating for the release of Chicago gang founder Larry Hoover.

“I’m making this video to address the ongoing back-and-forth between myself and Drake,” Kanye explains. “Both me and Drake have taken shots at each other and it’s time to put it to rest. I’m asking Drake on December 7 to join me as a special guest to share the two biggest albums of the year live in Los Angeles with the ultimate purpose being to free Larry Hoover. I believe this event will not only bring awareness to our cause but prove to people everywhere how much more we can accomplish when we lay our pride to the side and come together.”

According to Prince’s caption, he didn’t “plan” to meet Kanye at Rothko Chapel but did so at the behest of Hoover, who apparently wanted to see the two rappers bury the hatchet. Prince wrote, “Ye received this well and said thanks because he never had anyone that sat him down and explained things to him the way I did,” noting that he is “looking forward to all of us working together in unison to elevate our communities around the world.” Hoover was the co-founder of the Chicago Gangster Disciples gang and was sentenced in 1997 to a seriously unrealistic 150–200 years in prison for a laundry list of charges including drug conspiracy, extortion, and murder. He has since reportedly turned over a new leaf, advocating community charity and criminal justice reform.

As of press time, there has not been a response from Drake, but fans on social media have already begun speculating about the possibility of an end to the feud, as well as wondering how much J Prince’s menacing reputation factored into Ye’s low-key demeanor in the video compared to his most recent boisterous appearance on Drink Champs.

In any event, we’ll see if Drake plays ball and what ultimately comes of it. Worst case, Ye and Drake will put their petty disagreements to rest — even if one of them had to be forced into it by one of the most fearsome figures in rap history.

Last week, Josh Hawley made waves when he focused on a matter that’s truly tearing the country apart. No, not the Trumpist misinformation, spread in part by him, that drove legions of the former president’s supporters to attack the Capitol building. His major worry is that men are no longer masculine enough, at least not for him, and that they’re too busy with video games and porn. He was naturally dragged for this take, and so in a recent interview with Axios, he did what all conservatives do when confronted over their ideas: He doubled down. And thus so did people on social media.

The Missouri congressperson, whose own state dislikes him and whose attempts to rehab his insurrectionary image haven’t gone so hot, sat down with Axios, where he talked about making revived masculinity — and not, say, spreading voter fraud lies — his pet issue. Hawley claimed that men are being blamed for America being “systemically oppressive.”

He also repeated his much-mocked claim about what men are doing instead of being manly men. “We’ve got to say that spending your time not working — and we have more and more men who are not working — spending your time on video games, spending your time watching porn online, doing nothing, is not good for you, your family, or this country.”

Axios asked him to elaborate on a couple points. One: What, to him, even is a man? “Well, a man is a father,” he replied. “A man is a husband. A man is somebody who takes responsibility.”

Another sticking point was Hawley’s claim that progressive/feminist ideas are directly responsible for men retreating to video games and onanism, if that’s even what they’re doing. “I think the liberal attack, the left-wing attack on manhood says to men, ‘You’re part of the problem,’ it says the your masculinity is inherently problematic, it’s inherently oppressive.”

When pressed if his policework was based on hard data or just a “hunch,” Hawley said it had something to do with “de-industrialization,” then attempted to connect the evolution of employment in America and the world with watching Pornhub.

“I think you put together lack of jobs, you put together fatherlessness, you put together the social messages that we teach our kids in school, I think we’ve got to confront that and its effects,” he said.

When Hawley’s doubling down was made public, some on social media worried about his priorities.

Or wondering if by going after video games and porn he was simply telling on himself.

Others wondered if it was traditionally masculine to whine about a perceived dearth in masculinity.

Some wondered if perhaps the idea of masculinity has simply evolved.

Others generally mocked him.

You can watch a clip of Hawley’s Axios sit-down in the video below:

(Via Axios)

Not everyone in Hollywood is nice, but those who are can be really, really nice. Will Smith appears to be among the latter. The superstar has a new memoir en route, simply called Will, and between excerpts and media appearances, we’ve been learning a lot we didn’t know about him. Some of it is worrying (he once contemplated suicide and thought about killing his father). Some of it is juicy (he considered amassing a “harem,” then thought otherwise). But here’s one story that is unambiguously heartwarming.

As per The Hollywood Reporter, Smith was not exactly happy when Warner Bros. announced they were moving their entire 2021 slate to day-and-date releases, which is to say in theaters and on HBO Max at the same time. That included King Richard, the biopic in which Smith plays Richard Williams, father to tennis legends Venus and Serena. That also meant the cast could potentially make less money, as streaming could — and often has — eaten into theatrical profits.

Smith, of course, would be fine. He’s unimaginably wealthy. But his costars aren’t. So Smith took a payday that could be as high as $40 million and cut everyone some checks — what THR refers to as “a nice bonus,” on top of what they were already receiving from Warner.

Everyone was, of course, extremely grateful. In a recent chat with Access Hollywood, cast member Tony Goldwyn gushed about the erstwhile (and about to be replaced) Fresh Prince:

“I’ve been doing this for over 30 years. I have never worked with anyone as generous as Will. What you said [he gave bonuses/gifts to all of the talent] is true. When this movie, when Warner Brothers decided not to release it, to put it out on streaming, there was a lot of controversy as people know and we just got a call from Will saying, ‘I’m going to make this right.’ I’ve never experienced it, I was floored. I just couldn’t believe it.”

But Smith didn’t stop at bonuses. According to young actress Layla Crawford, he bought some cast members new phones and other goodies:

“He gave us Polaroid cameras and different treats all the time. He’s just such a generous and sweet person. He also gave us iPhone 12 Pro Max gifts in boxes. We ripped them open and everyone started crying. I literally cried my eyes out — it was the best gift ever,” she explained. “Will Smith is a blessing, I learned so much from working with him.”

In summary: Will Smith isn’t perfect, but at the end of the day he’s one of the good ones.

(Via THR)

When you cram a mass of humanity onto a stadium floor, and those humans are fans of the performer on stage in front of them, anything can happen. People have been crushed in mosh pits before—the Who and Pearl Jam concerts have seen multiple fans trampled to death in a concert, for example.

So when eight people were killed and dozens more injured at rapper Travis Scott’s Astroworld Musical Festival in Houston last Friday, it was definitely tragic but not totally unprecedented. What was hard for people to grasp was how the tragedy was handled in real time by the people with power to do something about it.

Viral video shows two young concertgoers desperately trying to get a cameraman to stop the show because people were dying. One of them, Seanna Faith McCarty, pleaded with him to tell someone to stop the show, pointing toward the crowd and saying that people were dying. Another concertgoer, identified on Twitter as Ayden Cruz, stood on the ladder of the camera platform and also yelled at the cameraman to stop the show.

Watch:

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“Stop the show” and the staff did nothing. This shit is fucking heartbreaking #AstroWorld vc:@JanthonyOliverapic.twitter.com/5vVZKLKV7h

— Ashmelyud83cudde9ud83cuddf4 (@Ashmelym)
1636211245

Here’s another angle of the attempt to alert the crew member to the deadly situation on the ground.

People even rushed the camera men, and they still continued the show. n#ASTROWORLDFestpic.twitter.com/vIw4pMr7CG

— Ethan Froneberger (@LDCMOA)
1636183082

However, no one stopped the show. According to Insider, at one point, Scott can be heard over the loudspeaker saying: “Who asked me to stop? You all know what you came here to do.” Insider also reports that concertgoer Cody Hartt said he alerted security that people were being crushed, and they allegedly responded, “We already know, and we can’t do anything to stop the show. They’re streaming live.”

McCarty detailed the story of how she ended up on the camera platform, desperately trying to get someone to stop the show and do something about the deadly conditions in the crowd.

She described how she and her friend had wanted to be close to the stage, but ended up a ways back, on the side near a walkway. They were surrounded by chest-high metal barriers, and she said after waiting two hours for the concert to start, “Every gap was filled. Where your feet were placed was where they stayed.” The energy of the crowd rose as the start time neared.

“Within 30 seconds of the first song, people began to drown—in other people,” she wrote.

“There were so many people. Tall men, women. Women and men where the only thing they could see was the back of the person in front of them. The rush of people became tighter and tighter. Breathing became something only a few were capable of. The rest were crushed or unable to breathe in the thick, hot air. My friend began to gasp for breath, and she told me we needed to get out. We tried. There was nowhere to go. The shoving got harder and harder. If someone’s arms had been up, it was no longer a possibility to put it down. So, people began to choke one another as the mass swayed. It became more and more violent.”

She went on to describe how people were screaming for help and begging security for help.

“None of that came,” she wrote. “We continued to drown. More and more. One person fell, or collapsed, it doesn’t matter how it started. Once one fell, a hole opened in the ground. It was like watching Jenga tower topple. Person after person were sucked down. You could not guess from which direction the shove of hundreds of people would come next. You were at the mercy of the wave. I watched my friend be dragged away from me and lost sight of her. I began to realize in that moment that there is a way to die that no many people know about. Being trampled to death.”

McCarty described the “shrieks of animals” and “sinkholes of people” all around her. She was shoved toward the ground and saw the body of a man, followed by “layers of fallen people.”

“I felt a primal fear rip through me, and I’m not sure anyone understood the magnitude of the situation below,” she wrote. “I screamed there were people on the floor. There were people. Unconscious. Being trampled by every foot that slammed into the ground as each individual tried to keep themselves upright.”

A man finally grabbed her and pulled her out and away from the sinkhole of people. She was able to make her way to the back of the crowd, where she found people “just standing there. Like nothing was happening. Like people weren’t dead a few feet from them.”

She spotted the cameraman on the platform and climbed the ladder to get his attention. She pointed to the hole, telling him people were dying. He told her to get off the platform.

“I screamed over and over again,” she wrote. “He wouldn’t even look in the direction, so I pushed the camera so it pointed toward where I had just come from. He became angry. He called someone else up. I told him the same thing. People were dying, we needed to stop the music, we needed help, we needed attention towards the mass because I thought if only these people were aware, maybe they would do something. The other man grabbed my arm, and told me he would push me off the 15ft platform with no sides if I didn’t get down. I told him to help. I told him people were dying. I showed him where. He wouldn’t look in the direction either. I was in disbelief. Here were two people that could actually do something. Had the power to do something. Cut the camera, call in backup, pause something. They did nothing.”

Then the crowd started booing at her. “They pointed their fury at me, unleashed a rage,” she wrote. “I screamed people were dying over and over. No one would listen.”

Finally, she climbed down from the platform and called 911. The operator told her they were calling the medical team in. She told them over and over that the concert needed to be paused to give the crowd light and awareness of the deaths. Nothing happened.

Two medical workers arrived and McCarty explained what she’d seen. They said they’d gone in and seen nothing. Two girls who had also been in the pit were nearby and explained what and where it was and they all led them to it. They climbed over the barrier and went through the people.

In her post, McCarty reassured readers that her friend made it out okay. But at least eight concert-goers were killed in the melee and 25 were taken to the hospital, including a 10-year-old in critical condition, according to USA Today. The names of the victims has been released: Mirza Danish Baig, 27; Rodolfo Peña, 23; Madison Dubiski, 23; Axel Acosta Avila, 21; Franco Patino, 21; Jacob Jurinek, 20; Brianna Rodriguez, 16; and John Hilgert, 14.

Here’s to the people like Seanna McCarty who did everything in their power to get help for the people trapped in and trampled by the crowd. In the face of a frenzied mob, keeping your head and having the courage to take action is admirable, especially considering how many people neglected their basic sense of humanity in this situation.

Very few days — and sometimes hours — go by without Marjorie Taylor Greene making headlines. It’s not because the Georgia representative is doing her job; she’s been booted from most congressional committee seats over her deranged beliefs and habit of harassing colleagues. But she has a lot of time to tweet or say something bizarre to reporters. But even for her this one’s leftfield: On Monday, she went off on an epic tweet thread in which she tried to find “common ground” with the Islamic faith, to the bafflement of everyone.

It began innocently, with the possibly doomed Greene talking about how her job sometimes involves her visiting various government facilities, like jails. But on a recent trip to a D.C. prison, she discovered something surprising: Among the reading material inmates, who are of various faiths, are provided includes The Final Call, the newspaper put out by Nation of Islam minister Louis Farrakhan. (Greene simply called it “Louis Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam newspaper.”)

Is it surprising to see a noted conservative praising a) the Islamic faith, which the GOP has spent the last 20 years demonizing and b) noted anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan? It sure is! But she found one thing they can agree on: The far right and Louis Farrakhan both hate life-saving vaccines that have emerged in the midst of a once-in-a-century public health crisis.

Oh, and they both love horse drugs, too. Among the other things Greene learned by flipping through Farrakhan’s paper is that “the Nation of Islam sees the use and benefit of Ivermectin and is very angry that our media, Democrats, and Dr Fauci have attacked the drug and refuse to save people’s lives by not promoting it and shunning the use of it.”

Greene made sure people knew she was “strongly opposed to radical Islam.” But there was a but. “But I do believe in freedom of religion guaranteed to us by our Constitution.” And so she offered an olive branch to the Nation of Islam on the basis that both groups see eye-to-eye on vaccines and horse drugs.

It’s hard to make a dent in the news cycle nowadays, but even with Bari Weiss’ weird substack university and Ted Cruz still railing against Big Bird, a far right extremist joining up with Louis Farrakhan stuck out.

Then again, Greene does believe in “Jewish space lasers,” so maybe she and Farrakhan would get along.

Maybe you saw the Squid Game meme floating around last week jokingly asking people to name five feature-less French Montana tracks. The Twitter trolls can cool their jets, because when French Montana releases They Got Amnesia, his fourth full-length album, on Friday, they’ll see that 10 of its 20 tracks have no featured guests. And while the Bronx rapper took it upon himself to respond, he doesn’t have anything to prove as a singular force.

That being said, the tracklist (below) for They Got Amnesia dropped today and the list of featured guests is eye-popping and shows how well-respected of a collaborator he is across the spectrum. In addition to the already released “Panicking” with Fivio Foreign, the album will feature appearances from Rick Ross, Doja Cat, Saweetie, John Legend, Pop Smoke, Drake, and a whole lot more.

They Got Amnesia is out 11/12 via Coke Boys, Bad Boy, Epic. Check out the full tracklist below and pre-order it here.

1. “ICU”
2. “How You King?”
3. “FWMGAB”
4. “I Don’t Really Care”
5. “Splash Brothers” (feat. Drake)
6. “Touch The Sky” (feat. John Legend & Rick Ross)
7. “Mopstick” (feat. Kodak Black)
8. “Stuck In The Jungle” (feat. Pop Smoke & Lil Durk)
9. “Panicking” (feat. Fivio Foreign)
10. “Handstand” (feat. Doja Cat & Saweetie)
11. “The Paper”
12. “Tonight Only”
13. “Didn’t Get Far” (feat. Fabolous)
14. “Business”
15. “Push Star” (feat. Coi Leray)
16. “Striptease” (feat. Ty Dolla $ign & Latto)
17. “Bag Season” (feat. Lil TJay)
18. “Prayer” (Skit)
19. “Appreciate Everything”
20. “Losing Weight”
Bonus: “FWMGAB Remix” (feat. Moneybagg Yo)

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

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Lyla suffers from complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) in her leg. The pain is “worse than childbirth and getting something amputated,” she told Rocket. But her passion for baking was a helpful distraction.

The dream team rolled up to Lyla’s bake sale, which had been created to fundraise money for pain treatment. Rocket asks, “Do you think you would be able to bake for us?” and the little girl’s face instantly lights up so bright it could melt glaciers.

@charlie This little girl with a rare disease has no idea her entire life is about to change in 24 hours…🥺❤️ #fypp #kindness #foru ♬ IMPERIAL PIANO – Treia Music

As the video shows, Lyla’s baking is more than a hobby. It’s a God-given talent. She effortlessly mixes, rolls and decorates cookies by hand, complete with bright pink frosting to look like adorable pigs. All with a smile on her face. With skills like that, it’s no wonder that her dream is to own her own bakery someday.

Little does Lyla know that “someday” will be as soon as tomorrow.

“Lyla has no idea that we’re surprising her with her own bakery for 24 hours, and we’re gonna try to raise 100,000 dollars.”

And not just any bakery, a bakery owned by Lia Holt, winner of TLC’s “Next Great Baker.” Holt told Fox News “As soon as I met Lyla, my heart just melted. I’m like, I was a kid and my dream was to be a baker, own a bakery. Now, I can’t wait to help make her dreams come true.”

As Rocket leads a blindfolded Lyla to her soon-to-be bake shop, he tells her “I have a surprise for you.” The blindfold lifts, and Rocket tells her that for the next 24 hours, the bakery Lyla sees will be hers, and that the entire city is invited to buy her cookies. Lyla’s reaction is nothing short of heartwarming.

@charlie This girl suffering from a rare disease has no idea her entire life is about to change in 24 hours…🥺 #fypp #kindness #foru ♬ Happiest Year – Jaymes Young

But wait! There’s more!

Rocket had one more surprise. After learning about Lyla’s fondness for pigs, the TikTok star surprised her with a baby piglet of her very own. I don’t know which is more endearing: the swaddled piglet or the girl’s sweet happy tears after getting everything she’s ever wanted.

The bake sale was held on Sunday, Nov. 7 and the money earned went toward her CRPS pain treatment. If you want to support Lyla’s dream, you can do so through this website.

Rocket finds people to help like Lyla through his Dreamr app. On his website, he writes:

“We dream of a world where there is an abundance of opportunity for everyone. We dream of a world where our fellow human beings remember that in their heart lives a profound force of limitless potential. It is our core belief that if the world can inspire a dream within someone, it is within their power to achieve it.”

He encourages you to share your own dream on the app, which you can find and download here.