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    Miami Heat attack ‘hateful’ speech after Trump’s lies about Haitians

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    The Miami Heat have issued a statement defending the Haitian community amid rumours and threats from the far right in the US.The NBA team posted a message of support on social media on Monday amid false claims that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio have eaten pets and wildlife.“The Miami HEAT staff, like Miami itself, is a diverse and brilliant mix of vibrant cultures, including members of our Haitian community,” the team wrote in the statement. “The false narrative around them is hurtful and offensive and has sadly made innocent people targets of hateful speech and physical threats. Our Haitian employees, fans and friends deserve better.”The Heat ended the statement by writing: “ansanm nou kanpé fò”, or “together we stand strong” in Haitian creole.Miami has a large Haitian community, many of them based in the neighbourhood of Little Haiti.The widely debunked lies around the Haitian community in Ohio were amplified when they were repeated by Donald Trump during his television debate with Kamal Harris last week.“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats,” said Trump. “They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”David Muir, one of ABC’s moderators for the debate, quickly corrected the former president.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“You bring up Springfield, Ohio, and ABC News did reach out to the city manager there,” said Muir. “He told us there had been no credible reports of specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community.”The city of Springfield believes the rumours may also have arisen from a case in Canton, Ohio, where an American with no known connection to Haiti was arrested in August for allegedly stomping a cat to death and eating the animal.Hospitals and government buildings in Springfield have been the subject of bomb threats linked to the rumours in recent days. More

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      U.S. Men’s Basketball Was Tested. Stephen Curry Had the Answer.

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      Scott Cacciola and Stephen Curry had French defenders draped all over him like shrink wrap, but it hardly mattered. Fans across the world had seen this show before; only the stage was different. Playing in his first Olympics, Curry made the most of the moment, sinking a series of late 3-pointers — each more preposterous than the last — to lead the United States to a 98-87 win over France in the men’s basketball gold medal game.James Hill for The New York TimesJames Hill for The New York TimesCurry, the longtime face of the Golden State Warriors, scored 24 points as the United States won its fifth straight gold medal. He had plenty of help from fellow N.B.A. stars like Devin Booker and Kevin Durant, who scored 15 points apiece, and LeBron James, who added 14 points and collected his third gold medal — this time with flecks of gray in his beard.James Hill for The New York TimesJames Hill for The New York TimesJames Hill for The New York TimesThe United States has now won gold in men’s basketball at eight of the last nine Olympics, a stretch of dominance that dates to 1992 with the formation of the so-called Dream Team at the Barcelona Games.James Hill for The New York TimesJames Hill for The New York TimesSince then, the sport’s global growth has meant that the talent gap has closed. Yes, the Americans won all six of their games in Paris. But they were threatened in the semifinals by Serbia, a team headlined by Nikola Jokic, the three-time N.B.A. most valuable player, trailing by as many as 17 points before escaping with a victory.James Hill for The New York TimesThat left the United States with a chance for gold against France, which was led by Victor Wembanyama, 20, one of the N.B.A.’s emerging stars. At 7-foot-4, Wembanyama caused problems for a host of American defenders. He scored a game-high 26 points, but it was not quite enough — not against Curry, who made 8 of 13 3-pointers, and not against a U.S. team that was pushed but was not about to be broken.James Hill for The New York TimesJames Hill for The New York Times More

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      Their Parents Fled War. Now South Sudan’s Young Team Is in the Olympics.

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      When South Sudan’s young basketball team took to the court for an exhibition game against America’s basketball royalty, there were few expectations that they could hold on against the likes of LeBron James and Stephen Curry. Then they lost by just one point, 101-100, stunning not only their loyal followers, but also the team’s players, who had grown up revering the N.B.A. stars.The South Sudanese will face the United States again Wednesday, this time at the Paris Olympics, and with the Americans now on notice, the odds are distinctly against the African team. But for many of their fans in Africa and elsewhere, that is beside the point.The way they see it, it is a bit of a miracle that a team of refugees and their descendants, whose home country is just 13 years old and has suffered through devastating wars, made it to the Olympics at all.Despite having no place of their own to train, the team won the only slot open to Africa for men’s basketball. They already beat the odds by not only coming within a hair of winning against the Americans — James made the winning layup with just 8 seconds remaining — but also by beating Puerto Rico in their first match of the Games in Paris.“South Sudan and its people are known all over the world now,” said Aninyesi Tereza Mark, a 33-year-old university lecturer in the South Sudanese capital, Juba. “We are very proud of them and we are happy.”South Sudan is the world’s youngest country. It won its freedom from neighboring Sudan only in 2011, and since then, has suffered through a civil war that has claimed the lives of some 400,000 people and displaced more than 4 million. While a shaky peace deal has been in place since 2018, inter-communal violence persists. Poverty and corruption are endemic.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Warner Bros. Discovery Is Said to Match Amazon’s Bid for NBA Rights

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      The company, a longtime broadcaster of N.B.A. games, is trying to keep the lucrative broadcast rights as the league negotiates a new contract.Warner Bros. Discovery said on Monday that it had matched a rival offer to air N.B.A. games, a move aimed at allowing the company to keep the lucrative broadcast rights it has held for decades.The competing offer was from Amazon, which has offered to pay the league a little more than $1.9 billion per season, according to two people familiar with the discussions who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss contract talks.“We have reviewed the offers and matched one of them,” Warner Bros. Discovery said in a statement. An N.B.A. spokesperson said, “We’ve received W.B.D.’s proposal and are in the process of reviewing it.”Warner Bros. Discovery did not identify which broadcast package it matched, but said its current contract allowed it to keep the rights if it matched competing offers. This so-called matching rights provision is “an integral part of our current agreement and the rights we have paid for under it,” the company’s statement said, adding, “We look forward to the N.B.A. executing our new contract.”The N.B.A. has negotiated new rights contracts to broadcast its games the season after next. Last week, the league’s board of governors approved deals with Disney, Comcast and Amazon which are expected to bring in about $76 billion over the next 11 years. Disney, the parent of ESPN, and Warner Bros. Discovery paid roughly $2.66 billion annually under the old deal. Warner Bros. Discovery has been broadcasting N.B.A. games since the 1980s. Its channel, TNT, is home to the beloved show “Inside the N.B.A.” in which former players Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith and Shaquille O’Neal banter about the N.B.A. with Ernie Johnson, the show’s host.If the N.B.A. declines to accept Warner Bros. Discovery’s matching efforts, the two sides will continue conversations, and Warner Bros. Discovery could pursue legal action, according to one of the people familiar with the discussions.Amazon’s package of games would include one conference finals series every other year, split with Comcast; the league’s newly renamed in-season tournament; and the play-in tournament.Amazon would stream all of its games on its Prime streaming service, which could represent a tension point in the matching discussions. Warner Bros. Discovery primarily broadcasts games on TNT, though it did simulcast all TNT games on the streaming service Max last season.The company had an exclusive negotiating window, as did Disney, which also broadcasts N.B.A. games under the current contract. But while Disney reached an agreement with the league during that time, Warner Bros. Discovery did not.“Regrettably, the league notified us of its intention to accept other offers for the games in our current rights package, leaving us to proceed under the matching rights provision,” the statement from TNT Sports read.The N.B.A. sent the rival contracts to Warner Bros. Discovery on Wednesday, giving the company five days to submit an offer to match. More

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      Brittney Griner Announces Birth of Son

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      Less than two years after her release from a Russian penal colony, the W.N.B.A. center and two-time Olympic gold medal winner said that her son was born on July 8.Brittney Griner, the W.N.B.A. center and two-time Olympic gold medal winner, announced on Friday that she and her wife, Cherelle Griner, have welcomed their first child, less than two years after the basketball star was released from a penal colony in Russia and made her return to the sport for the Phoenix Mercury.Griner, 33, discussed the birth of her son during an interview on “We Need To Talk,” a CBS Sports show, saying that he was born on July 8, weighing 7 pounds, 8 ounces. Earlier this year, the couple said that they planned to name their son Bash.On social media, Griner and her wife had posted about their excitement about the pregnancy. After the “We Need To Talk” host asked what Griner was looking forward to about parenting, she revealed that her son had already arrived.“They say as soon as you see him, everything that you thought mattered just goes out the window,” Griner said. “And that’s literally what happens.”Griner will head to Paris for the 2024 Olympics to play for the U.S. women’s basketball team, with the first game scheduled for July 29 against Japan. She said that she was disappointed that she had to leave her newborn but that “he’ll understand.”Last month, Griner wrote on social media that she and Cherelle were celebrating their sixth anniversary.The birth announcement comes two months after the release of Griner’s memoir, “Coming Home,” which details the 10 months she spent in a Russian penal colony after being detained in an airport for possession of 0.7 grams of medicinal marijuana oil she had forgotten to take out of her luggage.At the prison, she sewed uniforms for the Russian military and survived on spoiled food.Griner was released in a December 2022 prisoner swap negotiated by the Biden administration. She had been sentenced to nine years in the penal colony.“My life became a blur of sweeping and dusting, cleaning and praying, hoping I could somehow get home,” Griner wrote in her memoir.In her first game back in the W.N.B.A. in 2023, Griner scored a team high of 18 points. This year, she returns to the United States women’s national roster. Griner won Olympic gold medals with the team in 2016 and 2021. More

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      NBA Agrees to Massive Rights Deals With Disney, Comcast and Amazon

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      The agreements, set to begin after next season, could potentially pay the league about $76 billion over 11 years.The National Basketball Association’s Board of Governors has approved a set of agreements for the rights to show the league’s games, Commissioner Adam Silver said on Tuesday, moving one step closer to completing deals that would reshape how the sport is watched over the next decade.Mr. Silver declined to discuss any financial details or even the companies involved, though there have been reports for months that Disney, Comcast and Amazon were close to deals with the league. TNT, which is owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, has shown N.B.A. games since the 1980s, but its prominent on-air personalities like Charles Barkley talked during the playoffs about how they worried that the network would lose the rights after next season, the last covered by the current nine-year TV deal.The companies are expected to pay the N.B.A. a total of about $76 billion over 11 years. On average, ESPN would pay the N.B.A. about $2.6 billion annually, NBC around $2.5 billion and Amazon roughly $1.8 billion, according to three people familiar with the agreements, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the financial details.The Board of Governors voted to approve the deals at its yearly meeting in Las Vegas. The N.B.A. must now present the deals to Warner Bros. Discovery, and once that happens, the company will have five days to match one of them to remain in the mix.“We did approve this stage of those media proposals, but as you all know there are other rights that need to be worked through with existing partners,” Mr. Silver said.Warner Bros. Discovery was expected to try to match Amazon’s offer, according to two people familiar with the company’s thinking, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the delicate nature of the negotiations.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Mark Cuban backs Biden. Why was he so keen to sell the Mavs to Trump megadonors?

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      In another era it might have been hailed as a laudable example of bipartisan bridge-building – a Republican megadonor partnering with a staunchly anti-Donald Trump entrepreneur.But in today’s politically polarised environment it looks odd, or even hypocritical: Mark Cuban selling the Dallas Mavericks, who are currently flying high in the NBA playoffs, to Miriam Adelson, perhaps the Trumpiest billionaire of them all.At the end of last year, Cuban, who has called Trump a “snake oil salesperson” and pledged to vote for Joe Biden over Trump even if Biden were on his deathbed, offloaded a majority stake in the NBA team for a reported $3.5bn to the Adelson and Dumont families, controllers of the Las Vegas Sands casino company.Adelson is the widow of Sheldon Adelson, a gambling tycoon and munificent patron of right-wing causes who died in 2021. He was the largest donor to the 2016 Trump presidential campaign, giving $25m. He added $5m for the inauguration festivities, a record such individual contribution.The Adelsons spent over $91m in support of Trump’s failed re-election effort in 2020, Politico tallied, as part of a long-term half-a-billion dollar spending spree on Republican causes. Miriam Adelson recently dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago, Politico reported in March. In 2018 Trump awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the US’s highest civilian honour, alongside posthumous decorations for Babe Ruth, Elvis Presley and the conservative supreme court justice Antonin Scalia.Why would Cuban unite with a family that has arguably done more than any other in the donor class to advance the interests of a man he feels is loathsome and bad for America? Well, like any successful entrepreneur, Cuban is flexible.Cuban and Trump have a long history of mutual antipathy dating back to their days as blustery, duelling reality TV stars with a blunt social media presence; Trump has called Cuban “dopey”, among other insults. Their rivalry predictably intensified when Cuban mulled launching his own White House bid. But Cuban is no inveterate Democrat: in 2017 he said he would run as a “Republican before Democrat and most likely Independent” and earlier said that the nascent Trump campaign was “probably the best thing to happen to politics in a long time” because of the real estate mogul’s “honest answers”.Cuban has long been friendly with the Adelsons, who saluted him in 2017 with an In Pursuit of Excellence Award at a gala in Las Vegas. And they offered him a tempting deal. The sale price represents a vast profit for Cuban, who bought the Mavericks in 2000 for $285m. He also retains considerable influence in the day-to-day running of the franchise, preserving a 27% stake and control of basketball operations and acting as alternate governor.More than anything, the sale is a big bet on the future direction of Texas politics and puts the Mavericks at the vanguard of the latest money-making strategies embraced by major league franchises as they diversify income streams at the intersection of sports, real estate and gambling.Another politically-fungible owner, Steve Cohen of the New York Mets, gave $1m to the Trump inauguration fund. More recently he has been hanging out with and donating to the campaign of New York’s Democratic governor, Kathy Hochul, as he seeks approval for a massive entertainment district anchored by a casino next to the Mets’ ballpark.New York is one of 38 states where sports betting is legal, following a 2018 US supreme court decision that struck down a federal ban. Among the exceptions: Texas. Should that change the Adelsons and Cuban will be poised to take advantage, with the Mavericks handily situated in the fourth-biggest urban area in the country, in the nation’s second-most populous state.The company that built the Venetian resort in Las Vegas appears to envision something similarly grandiose for Dallas. “If you look at destination resorts and casinos, the casino part of it is tiny, relative to the whole bigger destination aspect of it. Could you imagine building the Venetian in Dallas, Texas? That would just change everything,” Cuban told the Associated Press.“The advantage is what can you build and where and you need to have somebody who’s really, really good at that. Patrick [Dumont, Miriam Adelson’s son-in-law and president of Las Vegas Sands] and Miriam, they’re the best in the world at what they do,” he added. “When you get a world-class partner who can come in and grow your revenue base and you’re not dependent on things that you were in the past, that’s a huge win.”View image in fullscreenThough there are no guarantees in the real-estate and casino sectors – as Trump could confirm – expansion should provide the Mavericks with new and daily sources of income, reducing reliance on ticket sales and media rights as player salaries soar while the market for regional TV rights is in turmoil.Casinos and sportsbooks are likely to become tempting additions to now-ubiquitous mixed-used development plans for shops, restaurants, hotels and apartments among team owners who view sports as a property play and seek to monetise land around their stadiums.“I think this is kind of the next step, opening the door for legalizing gambling in a state like Texas then being at the forefront – since you already own an NBA team in Texas – to develop and integrate that sports team with a casino, a resort,” says Stephen Shapiro, a professor in the Department of Sport and Entertainment Management at the University of South Carolina.“Some of the barriers between sport and gambling, between the sport leagues and teams and the sport gambling industry have come down, and that’s why you’re seeing these opportunities.”The St Louis Cardinals have explored adding a sportsbook to their Ballpark Village development next to Busch Stadium should Missouri legalise sports betting, according to the Columbia Missourian. Another MLB team, the Oakland Athletics, aim to move to Las Vegas and have partnered with the gaming company Bally’s to develop a site on the Strip that would house a ballpark and a casino resort. The Ilitch family, who run the Detroit Tigers and Detroit Red Wings, already own a casino-hotel in Detroit.Cuban told the Dallas Morning News he wants to build a new arena “in the middle of a resort and casino”. The team’s lease on its current home, the American Airlines Center, expires in 2031. That gives Cuban and Adelson a few years to persuade Texas lawmakers – and then Texas voters, who would need to approve a constitutional amendment – before negotiating for a new venue with civic leaders.Adelson is estimated by Forbes to have a net worth of over $30bn to Cuban’s $5.4bn. Amid a high-powered years-long lobbying effort, she has spent over $4m this year on a political action committee, Texas Sands PAC. In 2022 Adelson gave $1m to the successful re-election campaign of Greg Abbott, Texas’ Republican governor.Meanwhile, Rick Perry, the former Texas governor and ex-Republican presidential hopeful, has acted as a spokesman for an industry advocacy group, the Texas Sports Betting Alliance, whose partners include leading gambling firms and professional sports teams such as the Dallas Cowboys, Houston Rockets and Houston Astros. The Rockets are run by another Vegas casino-owning billionaire, Tilman Fertitta, whose interests include the Golden Nugget chain, while the Cowboys’ owner, Jerry Jones, has tried to build a casino in Arkansas.Yet previous efforts to convince the Republican-dominated and increasingly ideologically extreme Texas legislature to legalise gambling have failed, and the state has lately run a budget surplus, meaning anti-wagering lawmakers are unlikely to shelve their opposition on the basis that legalised gaming is a valuable source of tax revenue.But the ongoing normalisation and growing popularity of gambling across the US puts pressure on Texas and the other holdouts to fall in line and lobbying efforts are sure to intensify ahead of the next state legislative session, which begins in January.This is where Cuban needs Adelson. Logically, a push led by a well-connected billionaire with real-estate and gambling expertise, impeccable right-wing bona fides and a history of largesse towards the Republican Party has a better chance of persuading sceptical conservatives than one spearheaded by the unconventional, Trump-averse, Biden-backing star of Shark Tank.“It’s a partnership,” Cuban told the AP. “They’re not basketball people. I’m not real estate people. That’s why I did it. I could have gotten more money from somebody else. I’ve known these guys for a long time. They’re great at the things I’m not good at.”Equally, since sports franchises are widely viewed not as mere businesses but as beloved community assets, linking with the Mavericks could prove uniquely useful for the casino tycoons.“I feel like having a sports team already provides credibility and legitimacy within the market that maybe the Adelsons wouldn’t have,” Shapiro says. “I certainly could see them being able to leverage the brand and the relationship that the brand already has with the community to open the doors for opportunity that maybe wouldn’t have existed otherwise.” More

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      A Quick Remark Becomes a Region’s Rallying Cry

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      Minnesota Timberwolves fans have picked up on a phrase uttered by their star, and are hardly put off by its mild vulgarity.Dearest Times readers:The following article contains a three-letter word beginning with an A that is considered vulgar. We would avoid the term, but it doesn’t seem possible. Profoundest apologies in advance.OK, deep breath:“Bring ya ass.”In the last day or so, basketball fans and the people of the Minneapolis-St. Paul area in general have been saying it. That includes the city’s basketball star, who launched it, the local tourism council, and many fans gleeful about a great victory.It started with the win: In a do-or-die Game 7, the Minnesota Timberwolves rallied from 20 points down to defeat the defending champion Denver Nuggets, 98-90.Afterward, the winning team’s star, Anthony Edwards, was interviewed by the TV commentator and former N.B.A. great Charles Barkley.“I have not been to Minnesota in maybe 20 years,” Barkley said. Edwards interrupted him: “Bring your —” and so on.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Liberty Sets Attendance Record at Caitlin Clark’s New York Debut

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      The New York Liberty beat the Indiana Fever in front of a record crowd at Barclays Center, with celebrities and basketball legends there to see the star rookie.At Barclays Center on Saturday, during the first half of a game between the New York Liberty and the Indiana Fever, a man on the floor level held up a sign that instructed the crowd to “get loud.” There was no need for the prompt.Some of the raucous crowd was there to watch Caitlin Clark — the Fever’s wunderkind rookie — play her first professional game in New York City, some were Liberty fans, and more than a few seemed to be there to cheer for both sides.There were celebrities sitting courtside, like Billie Jean King, Jason Sudeikis, Megan Rapinoe and the actress Amy Ryan. And there was basketball royalty in the building as well, including Sue Bird, Pau Gasol and Dawn Staley, the coach of the South Carolina women’s basketball team that beat Ms. Clark’s Iowa Hawkeyes in this year’s N.C.A.A. tournament final.Every time the Jumbotron flashed one of the famous faces, the crowd seemed to get even more electric.The building was buzzing for the Liberty’s first home game of the season, which set a franchise record by drawing 17,735 fans. And it was part of an exciting first week of the W.N.B.A. season, with many hoping the arrival of stars like Ms. Clark will usher in a more prosperous and popular era.The New York Liberty, who made it to the W.N.B.A. finals last season, have plenty of fans beyond those who were there to see Ms. Clark.Elsa/Getty ImagesBut a sizable portion of the crowd was clearly there to see Ms. Clark.Noah K. Murray/Associated PressWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More