It’s been almost two-and-half months since the NBA season went on hiatus amid the COVID-19 pandemic, but there is growing optimism that we’ll see a return to action sometime toward the end of July. The league and is working together with the owners and players to hammer out a scenario in which they might safely resume play in a bubble location, such as Walt Disney World Orlando.
But that doesn’t mean everything is going back to normal. Large-scale gatherings in public spaces are still mostly inadvisable, if they can be avoided, which is why we continue to see events all across the spectrum cancelled or postponed. The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame ceremony, where Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, and Tim Duncan are set to be enshrined, is the latest casualty.
The annual event was originally slated to take place at its location in Springfield, Mass. in late August, although officials had tentatively pushed it until October in the hope that things might get back to normal by then. That hasn’t happened, and so on Wednesday, Hall chairman Jerry Colangelo announced that the enshrinement ceremony will be moved until sometime in the spring of next year.
Jerry Colangelo, the chairman of the board of the governors for the Hall, told ESPN on Wednesday that enshrinement ceremonies for the Class of 2020, one of the most star-studded lineups ever which includes Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett and the late Kobe Bryant, will be moved to spring of 2021.
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“We’re definitely canceling,” Colangelo said. “It’s going to have to be the first quarter of next year. We’ll meet in a couple of weeks and look at the options of how and when and where.”
Each year, the Hall in Springfield hosts the three-day event that involves nearly 3,000 visitors, making social distancing measures nearly impossible. It figured to be a highly-emotional event, given the tragic passing of Lakers legend Kobe Bryant earlier this year. Colangelo also clarified that the enshrinement ceremony for the 2021 class will be held separately at a later date to be determined.
(ESPN)
We’ve been waiting for it to happen since the moment they were finally released from their long-suffering WWE contracts, and Wednesday’s Dynamite finally gave it to us. The Revival of Scott Dawson and Dash Wilder are officially on the All Elite Wrestling roster.
The Butcher and The Blade (in their finest, post-Memorial Day whites) were attacking The Young Bucks when the artists formerly known as The Revival — now known as “FTR,” with the names Dax Hardwood and Cash Wheeler … Dax and Cash, like Ax and Smash, get it? — made the save. A black truck pulled up to Daily’s Place, and one of the best tag teams in the world finally stepped into the promotion where they’ll be able to make good on those Twitter promises and, God willing, have good matches again.
You can watch a clip of their debut below.
Really good to see the Shatter Machine again.
It’s interesting to see FTR finally show up after all this time to be in the same ring as the Young Bucks without attacking them, but we’re sure there’ll be time for that. The big winner here is the AEW tag team division, and a couple of former tag champs who’ll never have to shave each other’s backs and get “Ucey Hot” on their balls ever again.
Lindsay Lohan has been not-so-quietly attempting a comeback, releasing her first new music in fifteen years, doing talk show appearances, even saying she’d love to do a Mean Girls 2. One thing she won’t be doing is popping up on the hit Hulu series Ramy, but that’s only because she disappeared.
In a new interview with Entertainment Weekly, the show’s star and co-creator Ramy Youssef talked about some of the surprising appearances in his forthcoming second season. One was porn star Mia Khalifa. Lohan was almost another.
“We had an idea that it wasn’t just her, but we were interested in this idea of people that you don’t really think are Muslim,” Youssef told EW. “We actually cast Lindsay Lohan, because Lindsay had this whole thing about converting to Islam. And so we had cast Lindsay and I talked to her and she was down, and then, you know, like Lindsay does, we just kind of stopped hearing from her. [Laughs] I was trying to get ahold of her and she was on the call sheet, and I guess she couldn’t make it. I don’t know, I never heard from her.
“You can’t try and put Lindsay in a box, that’s what I know,” he added. “Lindsay is going to be Lindsay.” But Youssef says there are no hard feelings. “She is one of my favorite Muslims.”
(Via EW)
One would assume a Martin Scorsese movie — sorry, “picture” — starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro would be a no-brainer, especially after last year’s The Irishman (to say nothing of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood). But Hollywood isn’t known for making sense. Recently it was reported that the filmmaker’s next project, Killers of the Flower Moon, was having trouble getting an official go after losing original distributor, Paramount Pictures. But after shopping it around town, reports Deadline, Scorsese is back at Paramount with help from Apple.
Scorsese, who reportedly got $150 million from Netflix to make The Irishman, is again asking for a comic book movie-sized budget, between $180 million and $200 million. When Paramount — possibly un-easy about forking over that much dough for a non-franchise product — balked at the price, the legendary filmmaker was courted by all the majors, as well as Netflix. He wound up getting the cash from Apple, while Paramount Pictures will distribute to theaters that will presumably be open by the time Scorsese has wrapped. (Netflix, rather infamously, did not give The Irishman a wide theatrical release, with most of its viewers watching it at home.)
Killers of the Flower Moon is adapted from the David Grann book of the same title — a mystery about a series of murders amongst wealthy Osage Native Americans in 1920s Oklahoma, which investigation led to the establishment of the FBI. DiCaprio and De Niro would play two of the leads, the former reuniting with the director for the first time since 2013’s The Wolf of Wall Street. For De Niro it would be his ninth go; The Irishman was in fact his first collaboration with the noted comic book movie critic since 1995’s Casino. As for the two actors, it will be their third movie together, after 1993’s This Boy’s Life and Marvin’s Room from 1996.
(Via Deadline)
Welcome to this week’s Wednesday Night Wars open discussion thread. This week it’s an AEW Dynamite featuring Iron Mike Tyson and the fallout from Double Or Nothing against an episode of NXT featuring Matt Riddle facing Timothy Thatcher in a cage with Kurt Angle as the special guest referee, a rare appearance from Charlotte Flair, and more.
On tonight’s cards:
AEW Dynamite
- a battle royal where the winner gets a TNT Championship match against Cody Rhodes on June 3
- an “Inner Circle Pep Rally”
- Matt Hardy and the Young Bucks vs. Joey Janela and Private Party
- SCU (Scorpio Sky and Frankie Kazarian) vs. Jimmy Havoc and Kip Sabian
- Britt Baker discussing her injury
- details about Brian Cage’s upcoming AEW World Championship match at Fyter Fest
NXT
- Matt Riddle vs. Timothy Thatcher in an “NXT Fight Pit” match, with Kurt Angle as the special guest referee
- Interim NXT Cruiserweight Title Tournament Match: KUSHIDA vs. Drake Maverick vs. Jake Atlas
- Io Shirai and Rhea Ripley vs. Charlotte Flair and a partner of her choice
- Adam Cole having a, “live negotiation with William Regal regarding The Velveteen Dream”
- more parking lot kidnappings, maybe
As always, +1 your favorite comments from tonight’s open thread and if we get enough comments, we’ll include 10 of the best in tomorrow’s Best and Worst of NXT and AEW reports. Make sure you flip the comments by selecting “newest” in the drop down menu under discussion, and enjoy the show!
