Michael Sam, who made international headlines last spring as the first openly gay athlete to be drafted to an NFL team, has been signed to the Dallas Cowboys practice squad, having passed his physical exam, team officials said today.
Sam, 23, who was signed to the St. Louis Rams as a seventh-round draft pick, but got cut from that team over the weekend, came out to the public at the end of his NCAA season at Mizzou earlier this year.
After being cut by the Rams, no NFL team stepped forward to pick the defensive lineman up–until yesterday. Sam flew to Dallas on a moment’s notice last night, for today’s physical, and Sam will wear jersey #46 for the team this season.
“Michael Sam is just too good–he was the [SEC Defensive player of the Year] at Mizzou, there’s just no way he can’t play at the NFL level,” said Super Bowl winning, former Baltimore Ravens QB Brandon Ayanbadejo, a longtime advocate of LGBT rights.
After coming out, Sam’s draft ranking plunged, leading many observers to wonder if the NFL was really ready for an openly gay player. “the fact that no team took the opportunity to sign Sam after the Rams cut him, speaks volumes,” OutSports editor Cyd Ziegler observed, but added, “The Cowboys make a great fit for him.”
Although Dallas is in the heart of a state seen by the LGBT community as among the most homophobic in the country, Cowboys officials “welcome [Sam] to our football family, as we do every other player who signs with us.”Head coach Jason Garrett said Sam would be an asset to the club. “We just want to give him a chance to come in and help our football team,” Garrett noted. “That’s where our attention is (football). What people say outside the organization is up to them.”
The Cowboys joined NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell’s Respect At Work program, developed with the help of Wade Davis, an out former NFL player who now heads the You Can Play project.
The program is designed to create a “safe, welcoming environment” for gay athletes. Sam’s addition to the Cowboys’ practice squad also opens up opportunities for him to make the main team, whose defensive line has performed poorly in recent years.
Sam says the Cowboys were his favorite team while he was growing up in Texas. article by Nathan James via gbmnews.com
Sylvester Stallone’s fictional character, Rocky Balboa, in the memorable film, “Rocky” is what many will conjure up when they think about a Philadelphia-born prizefighter, but the City of Brotherly Love is working on changing that. Artist Stephen Layne is in the final stages of completing a 9-foot tall, 1,800-pound clay sculpture of the late boxing great Joe “Smokin’ Joe” Frazier as a tribute to the hometown champ, according Fox 23. The former World heavyweight champ, who passed away three years ago at age 67 from liver cancer, was actually born in Beaufort, South Carolina but settled in Philly and called the city home.
The statue project came to fruition two years ago but there were stumbling blocks along the way. The original sculptor passed away and then fundraising efforts to pay for the endeavor hit a brick wall. Finally, Layne was commissioned to finish the project, after four private donors ponied up $160,000, and the process resumed again in March.
Frazier, who was an Olympic gold medal winner in 1964, had a stellar boxing career that ended with a record of 32-4-1, with 27 knockouts. He was, however, most noted for his professional matches with Muhammad Ali, another titan of the ring. As a matter of fact, two of Frazier’s losses were during matches with Ali, including the legendary 1975 “Thrilla In Manilla.”
The sculpture will be placed about five miles south of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and Frazier’s daughter, Weatta Collins, is reportedly working with tourism officials to have her dad’s memorial will be included on sightseeing maps.
The statue will reportedly be unveiled next spring. article by Ruth Manuel-Logan via newsone.com
Chicago’s Jackie Robinson West All-Stars (Photo: TWITTER)
The Jackie Robinson West All-Stars are still the pride of Chicago, even after a tough loss to South Korea in the Little League World Series championship game. The Jackie Robinson West team put up a valiant fight, including a late rally in the bottom of the sixth inning, but in the end it was not enough to hold off the mighty bats and dominant pitching performance from the Seoul team, which handed the South Side Chicago sluggers an 8-4 loss.
According to the Associated Press, normal Sunday activities in Chicago were on hold for a few hours while the all-black Jackie Robinson West ballplayers, who “made their first appearance in 31 years in the Little League World Series” and had stolen the nation’s heart on their way to the championship game, took the field.
Several hundred supporters gathered at TV watch stations to root for the team, which, until the final game, had dominated all comers.
AP notes that despite the defeat, several fans gathered at the South Side community center gym and roared and cheered just as if their boys had won. “They showed what heart they have. The city could not be prouder of them,” Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel told AP.
Jackie Robinson West’s run was a nice break for an area that has been ravished by poverty and violence.
“I have never seen the community come together like this,” Eldridge Dockery, 44, told AP. “We’re usually behind our walls or gates—but this team brought us out, talking and celebrating together.”
According to news station WGN-TV, a parade is planned for the team on Wednesday.
The Positive Influence Basketball league has more than 800 players on 68 teams. They play for eight weeks during the summer. (BRYAN THOMAS FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES)
Behind Lincoln Center, at the heart of a semicircle of tall brick buildings with a dome of leafy trees, on the dull playground of the Amsterdam Houses, the basketball league playoffs were underway.
Youth basketball has been a tradition in this public space on the Upper West Side since at least the 1960s, when Samuel N. Bennerson II, whose name is engraved on a sign along the iron gate, created the Betterment League. The leagues that followed continued to voice their mission in their names: the Brotherhood on Urban Survival in the 1970s; Amsterdam Action in the 1980s; and Positive Influence Basketball, which the league’s commissioner and game commentator, Andrew Blacks, founded nearly a decade ago. Summer is the only time the league gets to play; its teams are essentially shut out of playing a winter season. The indoor basketball courts of nearby schools, Mr. Blacks said, have been booked up by adult leagues.
Most of the playground’s swings are gone. So is the sandbox, and the chess and checkers tables. The small jungle gyms, layered in paint, are chipped and rusted. Programs for teenagers at the Lincoln Square Neighborhood Center across the street dried up years ago.
But none of that mattered on a beautifully mild summer night as spectators hung by the fence. Others watched from cloth folding chairs on the sidewalk or courtside benches, including Rose Daise, a gray-haired woman known as Miss Rose. As legend has it, she has never missed a league game. “It’s my entertainment,” she said. “It’s good to see them doing something.”
Andrew Blacks, 38, grew up in the Amsterdam Houses. He founded the Positive Influence league nearly a decade ago. (BRYAN THOMAS FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES)
The Brooklyn-based Turbo Squadron, in blue, played Castle Athletics from Harlem, in red; both were 3-2. One team’s season would end that night.
“Oh, baby,” Mr. Blacks yelled as the ball sailed out of bounds. Four minutes 10 seconds remained in the two-point game. “Let’s get back at it,” he shouted, pacing the sideline.
Success for the league is measured outside of points. It is in the stacks of college acceptance letters; the teenagers who help keep the game books; the 14-and-under home team, the Amsterdam Sonics, who once brought back a Rucker Park championship, a high honor in playground basketball; peer mentoring; and the young men who show up from as far away as Albany with fresh confidence. The night before, with his team down by 15, a 19-year-old shooting guard from Harlem took over the game and scored 42 points to lead his teammates into the playoffs.
“I always tell them,” Mr. Blacks said of his players as he set up before the game last week, “ ‘It’s not about your last play. It’s about your next play.’ ”
The season ended last Friday with an awards ceremony on the court. Mr. Blacks handed out navy blue Nike sweatsuits and book bags adorned with the Positive Influence Basketball league logo to the top two teams.
The league will not return until next summer. During that time, some of the players will scatter, Mr. Blacks said, some of them for good. The league used to run winter games in the gyms of nearby Martin Luther King Jr. Education Campus and Public School 191, Mr. Blacks said. But in recent years, he said, those courts have continuously been booked by private adult leagues.
“The neighborhood was changing,” Mr. Blacks said, “but they were forgetting the youth here. They got more money than us, but we’re still here.”
Mr. Blacks, 38, is short and stocky, with an easy grin. He grew up in the Amsterdam Houses playing point guard in the Amsterdam Action Association and in the Public Schools Athletic League. Most people in the community know him as Peach, a nickname given to him as a boy by his aunt, he said, for the roundness of his head. He tours the world as a member of the production crew with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, a field, he noted, that he entered through a relationship he formed on the basketball court.
Edmon Archer, 68, founded a league at the Amsterdam Houses playground in the late 1970s. He coaches a team for the Positive Influence league. (BRYAN THOMAS FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES)
One summer, when Mr. Blacks returned home from college, he found that the league had ended and that the playground “was going to waste.”
He started the Positive Influence Basketball league with about 60 children from the Amsterdam Houses. The league has been funded through donations like backboards and rims from Spalding, coaches’ fees, fund-raisers, grants, offerings such as ice from a nearby grocery store and his own money.
The league now has more than 800 players on 68 teams. They play for eight weeks during the summer in six divisions that include elementary school students, high schoolers and college students. Most are teenagers from Manhattan, but they also come from the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island.
Mr. Blacks has watched many of them grow up. “They’re not my kids legally,” he said, “but these are my kids.” He added, “The main thing in this league is confidence and hope.”
This past season, the Positive Influence league had to cancel at least eight games because of rain. And in recent years, Mr. Blacks said, he has turned away hundreds of youths because he does not have enough court space.
At Martin Luther King Jr. Education Campus one recent evening, in an adult league, a team from a finance company in Manhattan played basketball against a pickup squad of solo players, organized by the Fastbreak NYC sports league.
The Jackie Robinson West Little League Team. (Facebook/Little League Central Region)
According to thegrio.com, an all-black little league team from Chicago has been invited to represent the Great Lakes region in the Little League World Series.
The Jackie Robinson West League, founded in 1971, and named after the iconic ball player, has helped to keep baseball accessible to underprivileged kids. The Jackie Robinson West All-Stars bring much-needed good vibes and a great deal of hope to the people of Chicago. Even Mayor Emanuel noticed, saying, “The Jackie Robinson West All-Stars have excited an entire city with their dedication and athleticism, and everyone should have the chance to see a Chicago team play in the Little League World Series for the first time since 1983.”
“This is stuff of legends,” said renowned Cincinnati Reds player Barry Larkin on ESPN. Major League Baseball’s David James, a senior director of the Reviving Baseball In Inner Cities (RBI) program, knows all about the team’s story, and it delights him to see them return to the biggest stage in Little League. “All of us at MLB are talking about that team,” said James, a native of Williamsport and a former head of the Little League Urban Initiative. “It’s really good for the game.”
This year’s Jackie Robinson West team has come to the attention of Curtis Granderson, a Mets right fielder, who knows all about the hardship that the boys on this team face every single day, having grown up in Chicago’s south suburbs. Granderson began playing baseball in the Lynwood Little League.
“The cool thing is the way people talk about it,” Granderson reflected. “Like, ‘Wow, there is an all-black team out there; I didn’t know there was an all-black team playing.’ The fact that people don’t realize that there is a black team means that people are under the assumption that black kids aren’t playing baseball. Hopefully, this could be something that sheds light both in the African-American community and the non-African-American community.”
While diversity is often talked about and praised in baseball, the game’s costs have not stopped increasing and as a result have been beyond the wallets of a large and growing number of future players after Little League. The expense of playing, since teams who travel have become standard even prior to reaching high school, might extend to thousands of dollars each year. That is why there are programs to help inner-city areas maintain a team. article edited by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (follow @lakinhutcherson)
Having already played the corner man to one of the greatest boxers of all-time in “Ali” starring Will Smith, Jamie Foxx looks ready to get back in the ring and take on the lead role to portray one of the most recognizable boxers and sports figures of this generation.
Foxx is attached to play Mike Tyson in an untitled biopic that Terence Winter (“Wolf of Wall Street”, “Sopranos”, “Boardwalk Empire”) is set to script. Rick Yorn, who is Foxx’s manager, will produce the movie.
As one of the most polarizing figures in sports, producers are eager to tackle Tyson’s life story. Known for the power and ferocity he displayed in the ring, Tyson became not just the top boxer at the end of the ’80s but one of the most popular sports figures, with a rough around-the-edges personality he displayed both in and out of the ring.
After losing his heavyweight title in 1990 following the upset loss to Buster Douglas, Tyson’s life began to spin out of control, including a six-year stint in prison after being found guilty of rape. Tyson returned to boxing but never quite returned to form, and became more known for his losses to Evander Holyfied (a match which made headlines when Tyson bit off part of Holyfield’s ear) and Lennox Lewis.
After leaving boxing in 2005, Tyson still had hurdles to overcome, such as his 2003 bankruptcy and the death of his young daughter. In recent years, he has kept out of trouble.
He premiered a one-man show in Vegas in 2012 that he later took to Broadway with the help of Spike Lee and released a memoir “Undisputed Truth” that made the New York Times bestseller list.
Though it’s unknown exactly which parts of Tyson’s life Winter will focus on, he has plenty of material to cover over the past 30 years. HBO tackled the story before with the 1995 pic “Tyson” starring Michael Jai White, but no one has tried to adapt his story as a feature film, though boxing is a popular sport for films.
Foxx played Dwight “Bundini” Brown in “Ali” and also cocky quarterback Willie Beamen in Oliver Stone’s “Any Given Sunday.” Winter, on the other hand, is no stranger to taking on controversial figures after receiving an Oscar nom for adaptation on Wall Street bad boy Jordan Belfort’s life in “The Wolf of Wall Street.”
Foxx can be seen next in Sony’s reboot of “Annie.” He is repped by CAA and LBI Entertainment. Winter is repped by CAA and is currently working on the final season of HBO’s “Boardwalk Empire.” article by Justin Kroll via Variety.com
Former New Orleans Hornets Coach Byron Scott, left, shares a laugh with referee Pat Fraher during a game against the Seattle SuperSonics in 2005. (Elaine Thompson / Associated Press)
The Lakers have officially hired former Laker Byron Scott as their next coach, ending a search of almost three months by choosing a familiar name to Lakers followers. Scott comes with a built-in advantage over the last two Lakers coaches because he didn’t replace Phil Jackson in 2011 and wasn’t chosen instead of Jackson in 2012.
He also has a solid relationship with Kobe Bryant and the Buss family, not to mention familiarity with Lakers fans who remember his role on three championship teams in the 1980s.
Scott, 53, has a four-year deal for $17 million, with a team option for the fourth year. The Lakers will formally introduce him as their coach at a news conference scheduled for 11 a.m. Tuesday.
“I am ecstatic to once again be a Laker and to have the opportunity to work alongside [Lakers General Manager] Mitch [Kupchak] and the Buss family,” Scott said in a statement released by the Lakers. “I know firsthand what it takes to bring a championship to this city, and as someone who both grew up in L.A. and played the majority of my career here, I know how passionate and dedicated our fans are. I will give everything I have to fulfill the championship expectations that our supporters have for us, and that we have for ourselves.”
Basketball star Carmelo Anthony got his max contract from the New York Knicks, now he’s looking much further ahead.
ESPN is reporting that Anthony announced the creation of M7 Tech Partners, a venture capital firm whose partners are Anthony and the former CEO of Bertelsmann, Stuart Goldfarb, who heads the world’s largest direct marketer of music, video and books.
“M7″ reportedly stands for “‘Melo Seven,” Carmelo’s nickname and jersey number with the New York Knicks. The sports network also notes Anthony is intrigued with wearable and connected devices. A media statement says M7 will be an early-stage seed fund for digital media and consumer technology.
Anthony also tells them he’s been interested in tech devices “for as long as” he can remember and his firm will be on the lookout for ventures focused on leadership that resonates with clients.
Both Anthony and Goldfarb reportedly haven’t decided how much cash they will use to back ventures in the near future, however, news of the company’s creation came with another announcement; their firm is now an an equity partner with Hullabalu, an interactive children’s story company.
The Wall Street Journal says, “M7 will not have any limited partners or other outside investors, and does not plan to take a lead position in any future portfolio companies.” Hullabalu was founded by Suzanne Xie in 2012. Biz Journal reports the company raised a $1.8 million seed round last year.
Anthony agreed to a $124 million deal with the Knicks a little over a week ago. article by Richard Spiropoulos via blackenterprise.com
Former heavyweight champions Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield have come a long way since 1997, when Tyson bit off a piece of Holyfield’s ear in the third round and was disqualified in their infamous championship rematch. Over the years, they have put their ill feelings for each other to bed and even appeared in a recent television commercial spoofing the biting incident.
Tyson, who will hand Holyfield his Hall of Fame trophy, called the opportunity to present Holyfield a “privilege and high honor.”
Holyfield is also looking forward to it. “That’s great,” he said of Tyson’s participation.
Rich Marotta, a longtime boxing broadcaster and president of the Nevada Boxing Hall of Fame, said: “This is the kind of thing we showed is possible in boxing last year at our inaugural induction ceremony — former and even current rivals coming together under the same roof to celebrate boxing. Everyone checks those rivalries at the door. Tyson presenting Holyfield is sheer magic.”
Holyfield is being enshrined in the non-Nevada-resident category, along with George Foreman and Roberto Duran, as voted on by a 35-member panel.
Tyson was inducted in the Nevada resident category in the inaugural ceremony in 2013. Holyfield and Tyson both fought many of their biggest fights in Las Vegas.
The rest of the 18-man class of 2014, which was announced in February, includes Sonny Liston and Cornelius Boza Edwards (Nevada-resident boxers category), Jack Dempsey and Archie Moore (pioneers), Joe Louis (adoptive Nevada resident), trainer Miguel Diaz (non-boxers), Richard Steele and Kenny Bayless (officials), Col. Bob Sheridan and Kevin Iole (media), Bruce Trampler (promotions), Chuck Minker and Luther Mack (executives), and Clifford Perlman and Steve Wynn (special contributors). article by Dan Rafael via espn.com
New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter receives a standing ovation from fans and players upon being taken out of the MLB All-Star Game in the fourth inning Tuesday at Target Field in Minneapolis. (Jim Mone / Associated Press)
As Derek Sanderson Jeter graced his final All-Star game, what made the moment special was what it was not. Not contrived. Not manufactured. Not choreographed by a video board operator with his button on the oversized clapping hands, or by event planners with a budget fit for a royal wedding.
There will be time for all of that. The New York Yankees will make sure of it. Bless the Minnesota Twins for not intruding on the moment with a gaudy ceremony. This was an understated evening — at Target Field, if not on television — the chance for the players to say farewell to the retiring Jeter in their own way.
“That was much better,” Jeter said, “than if there was something that was scripted.” RELATED: “Re2pect” Commercial Honoring Derek Jeter below:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X03_bNuihLU&w=560&h=315]
The Mike Trout comparisons are not really about ability and talent. Trout has more now, at 22, than Jeter ever had. The face of the game is the one that plays hard, keeps his head down, and acts as an ambassador for his sport without a hint of controversy. Jeter gets it. He gathered the players on the American League team before the game, to say thank you to them. Trout gets it too. “We should be thanking him,” Trout said, “for what he brings to the game.”
When the AL took the field, Oakland Athletics third baseman Josh Donaldson waited behind, so Jeter could have the whole left side of the infield to himself. When Jeter led off for the AL in the bottom of the first, St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Adam Wainwright lingered on the mound so Jeter could enjoy the cheers — not just from the fans, but from the players on the top step of each dugout.
Jeter doubled, matching his total of extra-base hits this month. Not long after, Wainwright told reporters he had given Jeter “a couple of pipe shots” — that is, grooved a couple of pitches.
Michael Sam, who made international headlines last spring as the first openly gay athlete to be drafted to an NFL team, has been signed to the Dallas Cowboys practice squad, having passed his physical exam, team officials said today.
The former World heavyweight champ, who passed away three years ago at age 67 from liver cancer, was actually born in Beaufort, South Carolina but settled in Philly and called the city home.
Basketball star Carmelo Anthony got his max contract from the New York Knicks, now he’s looking much further ahead.
