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She might only be 5’2, but Lady Gaga is hitting some lofty marks lately, and that’s not just in the Chromatica community, either.

Introduced by none other than Jennifer Hudson, Lady Gaga was honored today with the Yolanda Denise King Higher Ground award. This award is part of the larger Beloved Community awards organized by The King Center, that seek to uphold the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other activists following in his footsteps and working toward justice and civil rights.

Gaga was recognized both as an artist and the co-founder of the Born This Way foundation, which advocates for mental health and provides resources for marginalized groups with a focus on the queer community. She was also commended for her work last summer during the Black Lives Matter movement, and how she advocated for PPE gear to be distributed to healthcare workers to help keep them safe during the pandemic.

“I dedicate this award to Black, Brown and Indigenous people,” Gaga said during her speech. “Triumphant people, whose resilience is the life force of every beloved community in this country. Black, Brown and Indigenous people continue to thrive in the midst of systemic oppression, thrive with radical joy, unapologetically creating full and beautiful lives despite the systems of white supremacy that are intended to keep them from doing so.” Later, she explains how unlearning has been a part of her own process and speaks directly to her white fans saying “as white people we have a responsibility to unlearn.”

Check out the whole speech below.

Justin Tucker very well might be the best kicker in NFL history. Whenever the Baltimore Ravens have needed three points at basically any point in his NFL career, Tucker has lined up and generally gotten the job done. For his career, Tucker has connected on 90.7 percent of his field goal attempts, and this year, he only missed three times in 29 tries.

We say all of that to say this: It is weird when Tucker misses a field goal, and even weirder when he misses more than one, and even weirder when Tucker hits one off the uprights. So naturally, in the first half of the Ravens’ conference semifinal game against the Buffalo Bills in Orchard Park, Tucker managed to do something he’s never done before, and not necessarily in a good way.

Baltimore started the game with the ball and put forth a lovely 12-play, 52-yard drive that took nearly seven and a half minutes off the clock. They called on Tucker to put points on the board from 41-yards out, but the 15 mile per hour Buffalo wind threw him off ever so slightly and he doink’d one off the left upright.

In the immortal words of Howie Day, even the best fall down sometimes, and the good news for Tucker is that he got a chance at redemption in the second quarter, lining up from 46 yards out for a boot. But to continue the Howie Day joke from the last sentence, Tucker made the ball collide with the right upright this time.

To be fair to Tucker, Bills kicker Tyler Bass also missed one wide right, and since hitting an upright is more impressive than missing wide, I suppose there is something oddly admirable about this. Still, Tucker’s as reliable as they come, to the point that this is the first time in his career that he’s ever failed to make two kicks inside of 50 yards in the same game.

Despite all of this, it is probably safe to assume that if the Ravens need a field goal to win later in the game, Bills fans are going to be pretty scared of No. 9 getting the chance to put his foot through the ball.

You’ll never believe this, but James Harden is still extremely good at basketball. Harden made his debut as a member of the Brooklyn Nets on Saturday evening against the Orlando Magic, and despite the fact the team was not at full strength — Kyrie Irving is still away on hiatus — Harden and his old running mate in Oklahoma City paired up to put on a show in a 122-115 win.

Harden, in particular, looked impressive, as he put up gigantic numbers despite not practicing with his new teammates before today. The Beard scored 32 points, dished out 14 assists, and pulled in 12 rebounds in the win, making him the first player in league history to have a 3o-point triple-double in his first game with a new squad. In fact, Harden became only the seventh player to register a triple-double in their first game.

It’s still pretty evident that Harden needs to figure some stuff out — he had a season-high nine turnovers in the win — but the big thing is that he looked far more loose and comfortable than he did at any point this season in Houston. Even when he was putting up big numbers, Harden was just visibly not happy with the Rockets, and it was fun to watch him show that he can be the MVP-caliber force we know he can be at his best.

This is something that is much easier to accomplish when you have a productive running mate, and Kevin Durant makes for one heck of one. Durant was sensational against the Magic, scoring a game-high 42 points on 16-for-26 shooting and hitting the 40-point mark for the first time as a member of the Nets.

As an added bonus, Durant managed to set a franchise record with his performance.

The Nets are, of course, not a finished product yet, as Harden needs to get fully integrated with his new squad and Irving’s return looms large. Saturday represented the first step on what will be a long journey, though, and the good news for Brooklyn is it did not trip up.

Like many teams in the National Hockey League this season, fans are not currently watching Colorado Avalanche games in person. That creates an interesting opportunity to use technology at the team’s home arena in new ways as hockey continues amid the coronavirus pandemic.

As Awful Announcing noticed, the Avs played some intermission games on the ice projector at Ball Arena, mostly because there’s no need to use it for anything else these days. Conor McGahey, the Avs play-by-play announcer, tweeted earlier in the week that he was quite literally playing Solitaire between intermissions because there’s no fans in the stands to entertain.

That technology, which is usually used to project videos onto ice to create some very fun visuals, was basically turned into a ridiculous way to show off that you’re good at the card games that come standard with basically every PC.

But they got a bit more creative a day later, with McGahey playing Pong at the break.

It’s a fun bit we certainly hope continues, but some fan-less team out there could get creative and use all those cameras in the building to play something more interactive with fans. I’m sure a team would be up for a game of Jackbox with fans voting on their favorite picks. Just not Cyberpunk 2077, OK?

[via Awful Announcing]

Neil Young entered the seventh decade of his career with the release of his 40th album, Homegrown, a thirteen-track effort comprised of songs he recorded between 1974-1975 which he delivered to fans last year. Now in 2021, it seems like the legendary rocker is prepared to do something similar for his upcoming album. Young announced a new live album and concert film, both entitled Way Down In The Rust Bucket, set to arrive next month. Both the live album and concert film were recorded during a 1990 show with Crazy Horse in Santa Cruz, California which was held shortly after he dropped his 18th album, Ragged Glory.

Ahead of its release, Young shared a trailer for the album as well as a live recording of “Country Home.” “In true Crazy Horse fashion, the incendiary show ran across three sets and over three hours, with songs like ‘Love And Only Love’ and ‘Like A Hurricane’ hypnotically stretching past ten minutes,” a description of the live album read. “The Catalyst gig also marked the first time ‘Danger Bird’ – a cut from Young’s 1975 album ‘Zuma’ – was played for a live audience, thundering on into psychedelic six-string fireworks.”

Fans will be able to get their hands on the project on February 26. With it, they’ll also have a 4xLP box set, a 2xCD set, and a deluxe edition box set that includes a DVD, four LPs, and two CDs. A digital edition of the album will also be made available on the official Neil Young archives site.

You can watch the live album’s trailer and listen to the live cut of “Country Home” above.

Way Down In The Rust Bucket is out 2/26 via Reprise. Pre-order it here.

Neil Young is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Three years removed from her 2017 debut, Stranger In The Alps, Phoebe Bridgers returned to 2020 with her sophomore album, Punisher. Her second album was well-received by critics as well as her supporters, so much so that some are already anticipating her third album.

And one musician showed their excitement in a creative way thanks to a video they shared on Twitter. Jensen McRae shared a synopsis for what she believed would be the opening track to Bridgers’ third album and McRae delivered a “preemptive cover” of the potential track to back up her theory.

“In 2023 Phoebe Bridgers is gonna drop her third album & the opening track will be about hooking up in the car while waiting in line to get vaccinated at dodger stadium and it’s gonna make me cry,” McRae said in a January 14 tweet.

In addition to the tweet, McRae shared the cover below the tweet with the caption that read, “this is my preemptive cover of what I imagine it will sound like.” A number of fellow fans of Bridgers shared their reactions to the video with one calling it, “HILARIOUS, ACCURATE, AND FUCKING EXCELLENT ALL AT ONCE.” Bridgers herself caught wind of the cover and was seemingly blown away by it and she quoted it and said, “oh my god.”

The interaction came after Bridgers got a tattoo of a sword and a note that a fan gave her after a show.

You can watch the cover and see Bridgers’ reaction above.

Max Holloway (22-6) defeated Calvin Kattar (22-5) by unanimous decision in his return to the Octagon in the main event of UFC Fight Night from Fight Island.

After his controversial loss to Alexander Volkanovski in their rematch for the featherweight crown in 2020, Holloway opened the new year with a performance to remember. Holloway’s characteristic slow opening was gone from the first bell, as the former champ struck with precision, speed, and power. Holloway attacked the body of Kattar and snapped jabs early. He found his range in the second round, opening up a nasty gash on Kattar’s head with elbows and a flurry of strikes, nearly finishing his opponent.

In the third, Kattar showed some fight, but it was Holloway yet again landing devastating significant strike after another. Holloway looked to finish the bout in the fourth round, but Kattar, wobbling against the fence, showed just enough to keep Herb Dean from stopping the main event. Holloway continued to change levels in the fifth and final round, attacking Kattar’s body before snapping a combination up top. Holloway even stopped in the final round to turn to the commentary team and yell, “I’m the best boxer in the UFC,” while slipping strike attempts from Kattar.

To put Holloway’s unprecedented appearance in context, he attempted more strikes (more than 700) than any fighter has in one fight in UFC history.

Holloway’s win should propel him back into the title picture, with another attempt at UFC gold following the reported Volkanovski-Brian Ortega bout reportedly slated for March. And despite having gone five rounds, he made it clear he’d stay at Fight Island if one of the four hotly-contested lightweight bouts need a last-minute replacement.

Caris LeVert was a man in demand earlier this week, with the now-former Brooklyn Nets guard getting moved to the Houston Rockets in the James Harden deal before getting flipped to the Indiana Pacers. He’s a fascinating fit in the Pacers’ backcourt, but we’ll have to wait to see how he pairs with Malcolm Brogdon in Nap Town.

Indiana announced on Saturday evening that LeVert, while undergoing a physical upon his arrival with team, is going to be out indefinitely after a “small mass” was discovered on his left kidney. There is no word on specifics, but the team announced that he will undergo further testing to determine what is going on.

“On behalf of my family and myself, we want to thank the Indiana Pacers for their support and guidance,” LeVert said in a statement. “We are grateful for their extreme thoroughness during the physical process and I am looking forward to joining the team and being part of this great organization as soon as possible.”

Hopefully any and all testing reveals that this is nothing particularly worrisome and LeVert is able to stay happy and healthy moving forward. The 26-year-old averaged 18.5 points and a career-high six assists in 12 games with the Nets prior to his trade.

Don Lemon and Chris Cuomo are trying their best to have fun with their time on CNN despite the new news being, well, troubling in recent weeks. The co-hosts are at the helm of the network’s late night coverage of all things political, and lately that’s meant Donald Trump inciting a coup attempt and lots of nonsense about the election.

But on Friday, they couldn’t help but make reference to a bit of viral news Lemon himself was part of. Though it didn’t take long before team fell into laughter. On Friday, a media report about CNN’s coverage of the election made a bizarre reference to Lemon as “openly Black.” He is, of course, a Black man, but it’s a weird phrasing to equate being Black to, say, a sexual orientation or religious belief.

As Lemon’s name and the phrase “openly Black” trended on Twitter, he couldn’t help but notice and make it clear the incident would be mentioned on the show on Saturday.

And sure enough, Lemon said he had an “announcement” to make on the show on Friday.

It’s the very impressed “wow” from Cuomo that breaks Lemon, and the rest of the segment is filled with laughter. Cuomo is really the perfect comedic foil here, starting with the assurance that whatever he says on live national television would be “just between us” and the “I don’t know what to say” to carry the moment while Lemon composes himself.

Later on Twitter, Lemon certainly had his fun with the hashtag #openlyblack as well.

All jokes aside, though, it does seem like Lemon has something more he wants to say about the incident and plans to do so after the weekend.

James Harden won’t have to wait to get a chance for a first impression with the Brooklyn Nets. Prior to the team’s game against the Orlando Magic on Saturday evening, the Nets announced that Harden, who was acquired earlier this week in a four-way deal that saw his time with the Houston Rockets come to an end, will be available to suit up.

On Friday, Nets coach Steve Nash said that Harden will be inserted into the starting lineup as soon as he is able to play, and prior to the game against Orlando, he confirmed that will be the case. As Malika Andrews of ESPN noted, it will be the first action of any kind that Harden has with his new teammates, as he was unable to practice with the team prior to Saturday’s game.

It will not be the fully-formed version of the Nets, as Kyrie Irving still will not be able to take the floor due to his extended leave of absence, but at the very least, this should afford the opportunity to see what Harden looks like alongside Kevin Durant. We’ll have to wait for Irving’s return to see what the team looks like at its theoretical best, and in the meantime, Harden will get to get the rust off alongside his old Oklahoma City Thunder teammate.