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XXL‘s annually anticipated list of hip-hop Freshmen has hit the ‘net and as usual, garnered a tremendous response as those in the know celebrated their emerging faves and everyone else groused about being out of the loop. Of course, along with those reactions, the list also brought an inevitable third response: Fans expressing disappointment that their own favorite artists didn’t quite make the cut.

Of course, with only 12 spots to go around — a number that has fluctuated throughout the years but hasn’t strayed too much in either direction — someone you like is bound to get left off the final list. This year’s list, consisting of 24kGoldn, Baby Keem, Calboy, Chika, Fivio Foreign, Jack Harlow, Lil Keed, Lil TJay, Mulatto, NLE Choppa, Polo G, and Rod Wave, has the distinction of being about as close to perfect as these things have ever been, with no evidence of the “political” addition.

All of these artists definitely deserve to be here, and as we find out over the next few weeks which artists turned down spots or missed the availability window, it’s important to congratulate everyone who did make it for their accomplishment and acknowledge the hard work and luck it takes to get this far. Sometimes it’s just a matter of timing, as some artists big moments came just after the list was finalized.

That said, it’s always fun to play “What If?” with the list, especially because so many artists could qualify for a spot. However, let’s call the below seven artists something like a shortlist of names to watch for next year’s installment of the Freshman Class. Just because they missed out this year doesn’t mean they don’t deserve your attention now — and who knows? Maybe next year, you’ll be seeing these names on the big stage and thinking, “Hey, I know them!”

D Smoke

The inaugural winner of Netflix’s Rhythm + Flow, D Smoke is much more than just a reality competition TV star. The Inglewood-bred teacher-turned-rapper comes from a musical family that includes TDE singer SiR and put out two projects since the show aired that proved his win was no fluke and he has plenty of soul. Since then, he’s appeared on NPR’s Tiny Desk and performed at the BET Awards, so it’s only a matter of time until he’s as widely known as the judges whose respect he earned.

Deanté Hitchcock

Following in the footsteps of fellow ATLiens like Gunna, JID, Lil Yachty, and now Mulatto, Deanté definitely deserves a place on the list after breaking the surface with his standout major label debut Better earlier this year. Hitchcock was one of 100 or so artists invited to the Atlanta recording sessions for Dreamville’s Revenge Of The Dreamers III. He’s also closely associated with Spillage Village, the crew consisting of Dreamville Peach State locals like JID and Earthgang, and Better proved that he can carry a full-length project with poetry and poignancy.

Don Toliver

It looks like it takes a tad bit more than a Travis Scott co-sign to make the Freshman Class. After appearing on Travis’ fan-favorite third studio album Astroworld in 2018, Toliver followed up with his Donny Womack mixtape in 2018 and debut studio album, Heaven Or Hell, this year. Maybe putting out his mixtape on the same day as his label boss’ monster hit album caused him to get overshadowed a bit, but with “No Idea” and “After Party” gaining popularity on TikTok, this Cactus Jack signee can probably expect way more attention by this time next year.

Guapdad 4000

The Bitcoin Batman was one of the standout artists to guest on Revenge Of The Dreamers III, stealing the show on songs like “Don’t Hit Me Right Now”, “Wells Fargo”, and “Costa Rica.” Toward the end of 2019, he released his debut studio album Dior Deposits, holding his own alongside the likes of 6lack on “Prada Process” and Chance The Rapper on “Gucci Pajamas.” Over the course of 2020, he displayed his unparalleled work ethic with the RonaRaps series and Falcon Fridays, and he’s constantly teasing new music with features from everybody’s favorite rappers. There’s no doubt he’ll be able to finnam his way onto next year’s Freshman list.

Flo Milli

In a case of bad timing, Flo Milli’s debut album Ho, Why Is You Here? landed at the end of July, long after the Freshman Class issue was being written up and edited. Of course, there’s no way the editors had any clue that she would parlay the TikTok success of her viral singles “Beef FloMix” and “In The Party” into such a massive reception that saw her being quoted by everyone from City Girls to Janelle Monae. Her quirky relatability and ferocious sense of humor have made her the heir apparent to the “next big female rap star” seat formerly occupied by Cardi B, Megan Thee Stallion, Mulatto, and Rico Nasty.

Jucee Froot

As another Memphis product, Jucee Froot‘s in good company in vying for a Freshman roster slot. The difference between her and Key Glock or NLE Choppa is that she’s received even higher profile looks than they have, securing a spot on the Insecure soundtrack and sounding off on the Birds Of Prey album. With women emerging so powerfully in hip-hop these days, Jucee’s going to have a lot of very powerful voices rooting for her. Along with co-signs from her city’s godfather, Juicy J, and everyone’s favorite punk-rap rabble rouser, Rico Nasty, Jucee’s also got the bars to stick for a good long while.

Key Glock

Don’t count Key Glock out. While he may have fallen short this time around, he’s also built a back catalog of fan-favorites to call on when the time comes, dropping the joint mixtape Dum And Dummer with his mentor Young Dolph last year, then following up with not one, but two mixtapes in 2020: Yellow Tape and Son Of A Gun. With each project, his buzz grows louder and at the rate he’s releasing them, it won’t be too long before that buzz is an undeniable cacophony of fans demanding placement in the next Freshman Class — or that he outright bypass it altogether.

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

Sen. Kamala Harris of California was announced as Joe Biden’s running mate for the 2020 presidential election on Tuesday, becoming the first Black woman and first person of Indian descent ever to be tapped as the vice presidential nominee by a major party.

“I have the great honor to announce that I’ve picked @KamalaHarris — a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants — as my running mate,” the former-Vice President tweeted. “Back when Kamala was Attorney General, she worked closely with Beau [Biden’s son who passed away in 2015]. I watched as they took on the big banks, lifted up working people, and protected women and kids from abuse. I was proud then, and I’m proud now to have her as my partner in this campaign.”

There was much rejoicing for the historic selection, including in the Maya Rudolph household, because it means she has a steady gig until at least November. And maybe four years after that. The Big Mouth star has portrayed Harris multiple times on SNL, including the season 45 premiere, earning praise from the senator. “That girl being played by @MayaRudolph on @nbcsnl? That girl was me,” Harris tweeted. And now “that girl” is going to see herself a lot on SNL (either in studio or virtually).

Congratulations to Kamala, Maya, Paul Thomas Anderson, and everyone really.

(Via CNBC)

On Tuesday afternoon, the Big Ten announced it was postponing its football season to hopefully be played in the spring. It was the culmination of weeks of back-and-forth that has seen players call for the creation of a players association and uniform guidelines and safety protocols, while university presidents, medical experts, and lawyers seemingly reaching the conclusion that there’s little room for football without taking on a tremendous risk.

Later in the afternoon, word emerged from the Pac-12 that they would be following suit in putting an end to the dream of fall football and pushing it back to (hopefully) the spring. On top of football, the Pac-12 will also halt all fall and winter sports through the end of the calendar year, re-evaluating the situation closer to January.

This was the expected result, as the two conferences had long been tied together as the two teams looking most skeptically on a season, and once the Big Ten announced its decision the Pac-12 swiftly came to the same conclusion. Now all eyes shift to the Big 12, ACC, and SEC, the latter two have been pretty vehement about playing football this fall. There are risks on all sides of the equation and like so much with the current situation in the world, there’s not a perfect answer. Still, given the emerging research connecting COVID-19 to heart problems like myocarditis and the unknowns of long-term impacts, the Big Ten and Pac-12 decided that it was not worth the liability to have football this season.

On the other side, as Clemson star QB Trevor Lawrence and others have pointed out, the regular testing and having football as the reward for good behavior and following protocols is something that would likely keep many players in line. However, the issue lies in the fact that once students are on campus, all it takes is one player going to a party or not following social distancing or mask protocols on campus to potentially bring it into the locker room between tests (given that while three days a week is robust, it cannot catch everything), which figure to be some of the closest confines of allowed indoor space on campuses, for it to potentially infect much of the team and bring those risks of severe symptoms or post-COVID recovery health problems into play. This was something Larry Scott noted in the Pac-12 release.

Scott noted that while the Conference’s detailed plan to keep student-athletes safe was working in accordance with the Pac-12 COVID-19 Medical Advisory Committee guidelines and state and local government orders, the situation was becoming more challenging: “Unlike professional sports, college sports cannot operate in a bubble,” he said. “Our athletic programs are a part of broader campuses in communities where in many cases the prevalence of COVID-19 is significant. We will continue to monitor the situation and when conditions change we will be ready to explore all options to play the impacted sports in the new calendar year.”

“We know that this is a difficult day for our student-athletes, and our hearts go out to them and their families,” added Scott. “We have made clear that all of their scholarships will be guaranteed, and that as a Conference we are strongly encouraging the NCAA to grant them an additional year of eligibility.”

Without a bubble, we’ve seen how team sports are at risk with what’s happened in Major League Baseball with the Cardinals and Marlins, and the current student-athlete model figures to shut down the opportunity to create an athletics bubble, as it would indicate they’re somehow different from other students. The result is a system unwilling to change facing a situation that requires adaptation, and as such they continue kicking the can and hoping, eventually, football as it is can return.

For years, Will Smith refused to entertain the thought of a Fresh Prince of Bel-Air reboot, revival, spin-off, whatever you want to call it. His official line is that it would happen “when hell freezes over.” However, the mega-star actor/rapper/producer abruptly changed his tune back in October 2019 when he announced that a new series is in the works, and that day has finally come, but with a twist.

While the original Fresh Prince was a half-hour NBC sitcom with memorable dramatic moments peppered in, this new reboot will be an hour-long drama simply titled Bel-Air. The project has been in the works ever since Smith saw the viral YouTube video of the same name and immediately teamed up with its creator Morgan Cooper to hash out a full series based on his more serious approach to the beloved sitcom. Via The Hollywood Reporter:

Bel-Air is described as an hourlong dramatic retelling of the beloved ’90s sitcom that leans into the original premise of Will’s complicated journey from the streets of West Philadelphia to the gated mansions of Bel-Air. With a reimagined vision, Bel-Air will dive deeper into the inherent conflicts, emotions and biases of what it means to be a Black man in America today, while still delivering the swagger and fun nods to the original show.

Despite the fact that HBO Max is currently the home for the original Fresh Prince episodes, there’s no guarantee that it will be the home for Bel-Air. Smith’s production company Westbrook Studios shopped the series to Peacock and Netflix who, along with HBO Max, have all entered bids to land the unusual reboot that will no doubt draw in long-time Fresh Prince fans. Of course, the biggest question is how do you make the Carlton Dance full of even more dramatic tension, and the answer is you don’t. It’s impossible.

You can watch the original Bel-Air video below:

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)

There may not be a more highly-anticipated Xbox release on the horizon than Halo Infinite, the latest chapter in the beloved Halo series. Fans have been waiting since 2015, when Halo 5: Guardians hit shelves, for the latest release in the Master Chief saga, but unfortunately for those hoping to fire up their Xboxes before the calendar turns to 2021 and play the game, they’ll have to wait a little while longer.

In a statement released on Tuesday afternoon, Halo Infinite studio head Chris Lee announced that the COVID-19 pandemic will force the game to be put on the shelves until some time in 2021. No specific release date has been given.

The game has been development for years, with a trailer hitting Twitter back in 2018. The belief was that the game would drop sometime in the final quarter of 2020 — gameplay was unveiled during a recent Xbox Series X showcase, while news also came out that multiplayer will be free-to-play when it comes out on the Series X. However, as Lee indicated in his statement, it appears that the game needs some final polish before it is made available to games, saying “the extra time will let us finish the critical work necessary to deliver the most ambitious Halo game ever at the quality we know our fans expect.”

Congratulations! If you clicked on this article you are officially old, because there probably isn’t a single person born after the year 2000 who even remembers what a VHS tape is, let alone a Blockbuster Video. Once you stop panicking, get ready for another shock because while Blockbuster closed almost all of its stores across the country between 2013 and 2014, one store stood standing. The last remaining Blockbuster, which is located in Bend Oregon, somehow managed to survive the conversion from VHS to DVD to BluRay to streaming services, and a global pandemic.

To celebrate its indomitible spirit (thank Bend’s home rental market and inconsistent fiberoptic infrastructure, which combine to create a consistent need for DVDs), the owners of Bend’s Blockbuster are offering residents of Deschutes County the chance to live every ’90s kid’s dream and stay a night in the video store.

“Our BLOCKBUSTER store is open because of the incredible local community in Bend and we’ve been grateful to have the support of those beyond our town as the coronavirus has impacted our business,” writes store manager Sandi Harding in the property’s listing.

For the Airbnb listing — which will consist of three one-night stays from September 18-20 and accommodates four — the store’s main floor space has been converted into a makeshift living room, complete with a big television, pillows, bean bag chairs, a fold-out couch, and shelves stocked with an assortment of movies as well as a break room full of NERDS, Raisinettes, and popcorn. The listing also includes all of the essentials you’ve come to expect from any good Airbnb listing, like WiFi, central A/C, free parking, as well as some of the more modern accommodations like face coverings, disinfectant wipes, and an “endless” supply of hand sanitizer.

Harding also assures guests that between each stay the store will be cleaned in accordance with Airbnb’s Enhanced Cleaning Protocol, which itself is informed by recommendations from the CDC. Even with the safety measures in place, we don’t blame Harding from limiting this listing to local residents only for now. Who knows, if all goes the store may open to outsiders for future travel once the pandemic is behind us and we can actually begin safely traveling again.

Residents of Oregon’s Deschutes County will be able to try their luck at scooping up a listing beginning on August 17th, at 1 pm sharp at the property’s listing.

Lil Yachty has managed to stay more than active since the pandemic began. Not only did the rapper successfully implore fans to follow through on some head-turning dares on Instagram, but Yachty also dropped the third and final installment of his Lil Boat album series. The record boasted big-name features from the likes of Drake, Young Thug, and, of course, Future. Now, Yachty has tapped Future to collaborate on a lively video for their track “Pardon Me.”

The “Pardon Me” video doesn’t deviate too far from Yachty’s other Lil Boat 3 visuals. Filmed to look like a VHS-era montage, the visual follows both of the rappers as they embark on a series of antics with their crew. “Pardon me, I just went crazy on a freak / Pardon me, I cook that bon appétit / Pardon me, I bought Chanel for ten G’s,” Future raps.

In other Yacthy news, the rapper recently vented his frustration over a VMA nomination snub even though his “Oprah’s Bank Account” video garnered well over 20 million YouTube views. “VMAs is dumb wack for that sh*t,” he said, adding: “N****s don’t be giving me no f*ckin’ respect.”

Watch the “Pardon Me” video above.

Lil Boat 3 is out now via Quality Control. Get it here.

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

With the NBA restart in Orlando moving ever closer toward the conclusion of its seeding games, there are still plenty of unanswered questions remaining about playoff positioning and which teams in the West will be fighting for a postseason berth, as the race for the No. 8 seed has grown increasingly complicated.

We’ve had a lot of pleasant surprises from teams and players who have had unexpected success so far in Orlando and have certainly made the most of a unique opportunity that has presented all sorts of challenges, logistical and otherwise. But because the bubble is very much its own thing, the league said earlier this month that its annual awards would be decided by the performances prior to the shutdown in April. They announced the finalists for those awards this week.

Thankfully, the bubble will now have its own set of awards that will honor the standout players who have made their mark in Orlando through the eight seeding games. The NBA announced on Tuesday that it will have its own version of the All-NBA teams and will even select a Player of Seeding Games, similar to the regular-season MVP award.

Via NBA.com:

A panel of sportswriters and broadcasters who have been on site covering the season restart will select the Kia NBA All-Seeding Games Team and the Kia NBA Player of the Seeding Games. The media panel will vote for five players for the All-Seeding Games First Team and five players for the All-Seeding Games Second Team, choosing a total of 10 players at any position from either conference.

The main difference here is that there will be two teams instead of the usual three like in the All-NBA awards, but the logic follows that there are fewer teams to choose from, 22 rather than the usual 30 during the regular season.

Still, there have been a host of players who have been exceptional in Orlando so far — Devin Booker, Luka Doncic, T.J. Warren, Michael Porter Jr., Damian Lillard, just to name a few — that deserve the recognition, so credit to the NBA for creating a scenario that will acknowledge their performances during one of the most unique scenarios the league or the players have ever seen.

Making posthumous videos for an artist is a challenge. Given that they’re not around to participate, options are limited for how to visually represent them. Sometimes they actually started making the visual before their passing and there’s enough existing footage to use, or you can use other archival clips. There’s also animation, which has become more popular during the pandemic and the social distancing it has necessitated. The later is the route Juice WRLD’s estate went for the visual for his new The Weeknd collaboration, “Smile.”

The 3D-animated clip shows the rapper’s girlfriend Ally laying in bed looking at photos of the two of them, cutting back and forth between that and shots of him performing the track in scenic environments. The Weeknd also makes an animated appearance, emerging from a crashed car to sing his part of the song.

This collaboration would have been a dream come true for Juice. In September, before his passing, he put a wish out into the world, tweeting, “Me and The Weeknd would make a diamond record…”

He would surely have also been happy to see how well his debut album has performed. During its opening week, Juice had five songs charting in the top ten of the Hot 100, which was only the third time that has ever happened in the history of the chart.

Watch the “Smile” video above.

After becoming a breakout star for his romantic turn in Netflix’s To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before, Noah Centineo is ripped and ready for his upcoming action roles.

In a recent set of photos posted to Instagram, the actor showed off his newly sculpted muscles and joked about whether he should start training again. Centineo is currently set to star as He-Man in Masters of the Universe, a live-action film based on the classic 80s character. But if you think bulking up to play the most muscle-bound hero of them all is a daunting task, Centino will also be going toe-to-toe with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in Black Adam. It might not be a bad idea to keep the training going.

You can see Noah Centineo’s full body transformation below:

As for which role Centineo is bulking up like this to shoot first, well, that is sort of mystery right now. Masters of the Universe was originally supposed to begin filming in July 2020, but production was scuttled by the pandemic. Since then, there has been little movement on the project, which could be stuck in development hell again where it’s languished for years.

Black Adam, on the other hand, is looking slightly more concrete, but it sure feels like The Rock has been talking about the movie for five years now. That film was also supposed to start shooting in July, but it, too, fell victim to the ongoing production woes in Hollywood. However, while Black Adam missed its July start date, that month saw Centineo officially added to the cast as Atom Smasher. On top of that, The Rock is scheduled to make an appearance at DC FanDome where he’ll presumably have an update on Black Adam and how soon DC Comics fans can expect to see the former wrestler trade blows with the newly ripped Centineo.

(Via Noah Centineo on Instagram)