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    Brittney Griner Trial Likely to End in Conviction, Experts Say

    Courts in Russia heavily favor the prosecution, experts said, pointing to a prisoner swap as perhaps the W.N.B.A. star’s best chance to come home.More than four months after she was first detained, the W.N.B.A. star Brittney Griner is expected to appear in a Russian courtroom on Friday for the start of a trial on drug charges that legal experts said was all but certain to end in a conviction despite the clamor in the United States for her release.“There’s a bias mainly because the Russian judicial system says they really should not go to trial unless the defendant is going to be convicted,” said William Pomeranz, the acting director of the Kennan Institute and an expert on Russian law. “There’s no real idea or expectation that the defendant could be innocent. There’s no presumption of innocence, really.”Russian customs officials said they found vape cartridges containing traces of hashish oil in Griner’s luggage when she passed through a security checkpoint in an airport near Moscow on Feb. 17. The drug charges that Griner faces carry a sentence of up to 10 years at a penal colony.Aleksandr Boikov, Griner’s lawyer, said on Monday that he expected the trial to begin on Friday and last up to two months.“We do not know at this point what evidence they have,” Pomeranz said. “We don’t know how many volumes of evidence they want to read into the record, but usually, in this type of case, it’s formidable and significant.”W.N.B.A. players wearing shirts in support of Brittney Griner.Carlos Gonzalez/Star Tribune, via Associated PressGriner’s detainment arrives at a delicate geopolitical moment during Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine and amid Russia’s strained diplomatic relationships with the United States and some European countries. From the start of Griner’s detainment, her supporters feared that she could be used by Russia during the global conflict.In May, the U.S. State Department affirmed those concerns by declaring Griner had been “wrongfully detained.” That shifted responsibility for the case to the government bureau that leads and coordinates the United States’ diplomatic and strategic efforts on overseas hostage cases.“Brittney has been classified as wrongfully detained since April 29, which means that the U.S. government has determined she is being used as a political pawn and as a result, is engaging in negotiations for her release, regardless of the legal process,” Griner’s agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, said in an email on Wednesday. “As such, our expectation — Brittney’s family included — remains that President Biden get a deal done to bring her home.”Griner’s family and supporters are increasingly imploring President Biden and the U.S. government to secure Griner’s release.Kagawa Colas recently coordinated a letter to Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris signed by groups including the National Organization for Women, the Human Rights Campaign, the National Urban League and the National Action Network. The letter called for the government to strike a deal for Griner’s release.In April, Russia, after agreeing to a prisoner exchange, freed Trevor Reed, a former U.S. Marine who was sentenced to nine years in prison after being accused of endangering Russian police officers during an altercation.Reed’s deteriorating health in Russia most likely played a factor in Moscow’s willingness to release him, said Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon, a Ph.D. student in the history department at the University of Pennsylvania, whose areas of study include African American experiences in the Soviet Union, Ukraine and Russia.“The problem is Brittney, politically, is worth so much more in terms of the trading of prisoners than Trevor Reed because of her profile. So the ask is going to be much bigger, and I think the ask that they’ve been telegraphing in the Russian news is for Viktor Bout,” said St. Julian-Varnon, who has consulted with the W.N.B.A. players’ union about Griner’s detainment.Bout, an international arms dealer, was convicted by an American court and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Russia also has interest in freeing Roman Seleznev, a hacker who was convicted in the United States for running a massive credit card and identity theft operation and sentenced to 27 years in prison. Besides Griner, Russia has also detained Paul Whelan, a former U.S. Marine sentenced to 16 years on espionage charges.Viktor Bout, center, was convicted by an American court and sentenced to 25 years in prison.Reuters“This is the classic dilemma of hostage situations,” said Thomas Firestone, a former Justice Department official who worked in Moscow as a lawyer. “If you negotiate for the release, you may be encouraging future hostage taking. If you don’t, the person may never be released.”Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, told reporters on Tuesday that he and Secretary of State Antony Blinken had spoken to Griner’s wife, Cherelle Griner, in recent days.“The United States government is actively engaged in trying to resolve this case and get Brittney home,” Sullivan said. He added: “It has the fullest attention of the president and every senior member of his national security and diplomatic team. And we are actively working to find a resolution to this case and will continue to do so without rest until we get Brittney safely home.”On Tuesday, Russia announced it had barred Biden, the first lady, Jill Biden, and others from entering the country in response to far-ranging sanctions. The list included four senators: the Republicans Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Susan Collins of Maine and Ben Sasse of Nebraska and the Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand of New York.“Free Brittney Griner,” Sasse said in a statement. “It’s no big deal when Putin throws a tantrum and bans Americans from Russia — but we’ve got a problem when he takes an American prisoner.”What to Know About Brittney Griner’s Detention in RussiaCard 1 of 5What happened? More

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    Is That Steph Curry … or a Work of Art?

    This Instagram account will change how you see basketball.In the flat red frame of a photograph, a woman smiles upward. With the camera, we gaze down upon the whirl of her body. Near her face, a basketball sinks through the net; below her feet, a white line divides the image, like the fold of a pocket mirror. On the other side of the line, the matte red of a basketball court gives way to textured brush strokes, punctuated by lines and grids in black and white. These abstracted shapes reflect, with a difference, the woman’s radiant skill. This image is titled “A’ja Wilson and Team USA Extend Win Streak to 51 | Kandinsky.” You can find it at my favorite place on the internet: the Instagram account @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s.@b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s posts partner a photograph of an N.B.A. or W.N.B.A. player with an accompanying detail, sometimes modified, from an artwork, usually an oil painting. If you (me) feel a nervous frisson around the name’s reference to a famous German design school, don’t worry: @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s never flattens the players into high culture’s dupes, and never flattens their sport into some noble but vague idea of “art.” Instead, @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s’s comparisons recognize professional basketball as a synthesis of labor and creativity, craft and art, practice and personality. I love its vision of the game.The breadth of these images makes clear that most sports media praises a narrow range of characteristics.Using comparisons to explain objects of interest — whether artistic, athletic or both — isn’t a new strategy. But @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s’s posts have a gorgeous uncanniness, rewiring the expectations I bring to the players they depict. Their physical and emotional insights surpass what a “SportsCenter” highlight reel can show. Look: LeBron James swaggering, warped and cerebral like a Lucian Freud self-​portrait; Giannis Antetokounmpo grieving, his loose joints weighted like Jennifer Packer’s seated figure in “Mario II”; Sophie Cunningham triumphant, hair flaring, fierce and radiant like Delacroix’s “Liberty Leading the People” and Botticelli’s “The Birth of Venus.” The breadth of these images makes clear that most sports media praises a narrow range of characteristics. Think of the side-eye cast at Philadelphia’s James Harden, whose stubborn eccentricity is illegible to most analysts. @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s’s images show something different. They dive into the players’ sensibilities and seem to understand that being weird, effete or ambivalent might be part of these athletes’ power. In one @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s post, Harden stares cryptically out of the frame, eyes full of secrets, next to Paul Gauguin’s “The Sorcerer of Hiva Oa.”I realized the force of @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s during the N.B.A. playoffs, which culminated in a collision between the Golden State Warriors’ Stephen Curry, the sweetest three-point shooter the sport has ever known, and the Boston Celtics’ Jayson Tatum, an emerging young star. How to understand these players as people and artists? Rather than asking where Tatum would fit in the pantheon of N.B.A. greats, @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s posted images like “Celtics up 3-0 | Edgar Degas.” Surrounded by Nets players, Tatum stretches into the air, his arm extending toward the basket in an elegant port de bras. His uniform finds its mirror in the tulle skirt of a ballerina, shimmering as she sweeps into an arabesque. Gracefully balanced, the dancer’s leg lifts away from the tilt of her head; Tatum’s muscled shoulder echoes the delicate arch of the ballerina’s toe shoes.Seeing this iconic image of (white) femininity used to complement Tatum’s strength felt like a revelation. The critic John Berger famously observed that in art and life, “men act and women appear.” But @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s’s figures, across gender and genre, define their meaning through what their movement can do. @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s went on to interpret Curry’s play via a series of juxtapositions to dancers: Sometimes he’s lithe and smooth, like Loïs Mailou Jones’s painting “La Baker”; sometimes monumental in strength, like Picasso’s women on the beach. In this context, envisioning Tatum with Degas’s ballerina seems neither a joke nor a too-easy equivalence. Instead, it highlights the precision of his technique. What might the rest of our sports media accomplish if it were equally willing to reconsider gender as a final mark of an athlete’s worth or ability? What stories might it tell about these athletes, or their world, if its attention was focused through @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s’s wider lens?Sports are played to win; that’s part of their pleasure. It may seem odd to chafe against sports media’s rankings, which arguably only track the competitive structure of the game itself. But basketball, like art, is worth more than a final score or a price tag. No simple calculus can determine what a given player might mean to the game or to fans. I love how @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s recognizes the players’ cosmopolitanism and humor alongside their ferocity and sweat, and how all this persists even in defeat. @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s’s way of seeing appeals to me because its comparisons resist both simple equivalence and forced hierarchy. It enriches images on both sides of the frame, making art and athlete seem wilder, more compelling. Criticism, whether of sport or art, doesn’t often manage to capture this thrill. At its best, @b_a_l_l_h_a_u_s can feel like the greatest kind of basketball game, one with both teams playing at their most elegant and strong. One team wins, but it’s seeing everyone’s talents that makes the victory a work of art.Sarah Mesle is a professor, writer and editor based in Los Angeles. She is on the faculty at the University of Southern California and the editor of the Los Angeles Review of Books online magazine Avidly. More

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    Kyrie Irving Decides to Opt Into a Fourth Season With the Nets

    Irving was eligible for a maximum contract extension, but he and the Nets did not reach an agreement on one. Once he officially opts in, they will have until the end of June 2023 to negotiate an extension.The latest episode of Kyrie Irving’s tenure with the Nets has reached a conclusion for the moment.Irving has decided to opt into the final year of his four-year contract with the Nets before Wednesday’s deadline, his stepmother and agent, Shetellia Riley Irving, told The New York Times.Irving will earn $36.5 million next season.“Normal people keep the world going, but those who dare to be different lead us into tomorrow,” Kyrie Irving said in a statement to The Athletic, which first reported Irving’s decision. “I’ve made my decision to opt in. See you in the fall.”Once Irving officially opts into his contract for the 2022-23 season, the two sides will have until the end of June 2023 to negotiate an extension that can be worth near the maximum salary for a veteran player. The Nets will also be able to trade Irving once he formally opts in.When the season ended, Irving affirmed his commitment to the Nets and to Kevin Durant. Given the chance to do so, General Manager Sean Marks did not reciprocate.“I think we know what we’re looking for,” Marks said. “We’ve looking for guys that want to come in here and be part of something bigger than themselves, play selfless, play team basketball, and be available. That goes not only for Kyrie but for everybody here.”Irving was eligible for a maximum contract extension this season, but he and the Nets did not reach an agreement on one.Irving returns to join Durant, the 12-time All-Star and winner of the league’s Most Valuable Player Award in 2014.“When I say I’m here with Kev, I think that really entails us managing this franchise together alongside Joe and Sean,” Irving said, referring to the team’s owner, Joe Tsai, after the Nets had been swept by the Boston Celtics in April in the first round of the playoffs.Irving and Durant arrived in Brooklyn in the summer of 2019, shunning the Knicks, who had created the salary-cap space to sign superstars that summer, too. The promise their union offered would be delayed: Durant was still recovering from an Achilles’ tendon injury he had sustained during the 2019 N.B.A. finals and would miss all of the 2019-20 season.The Nets were willing to wait. Both players had signed four-year deals; they would have plenty of time together.Irving returned to join Kevin Durant, a 12-time All-Star.Brad Penner/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThat season was interrupted by the pandemic, and Irving played in only 20 games, in part because of an injury to his right shoulder. The Nets went to the league’s so-called bubble at Walt Disney World without either player and lost in the first round of the playoffs.Durant returned for the 2020-21 season, healed and just as dangerous to opponents as ever. The Nets traded for James Harden in January 2021, creating what many thought would be an unstoppable superteam.They finished second in the East and nearly made it to the conference finals, losing in seven games to the Milwaukee Bucks in the second round.Then, once again, the pandemic complicated things.Heading into the 2021-22 season, Irving chose not to get vaccinated against the coronavirus, despite a New York City ordinance that would prevent him from playing in Brooklyn without the shot. The N.B.A. required that teams comply with local rules about vaccines.The Nets initially said he would not be allowed to play until he was eligible for all games. Seeing the toll that was taking on their record, they changed course and allowed Irving to play in arenas where he was eligible. He made his season debut on Jan. 5.Ben Simmons, acquired in a midseason trade with Philadelphia, had off-season back surgery and has yet to play for the team.Michelle Farsi for The New York TimesFor a while, the Nets made it work despite Irving’s long absences. Durant, who signed a four-year extension before the season, helped lead the team to the second-best record in the East on the day Irving made his season debut.Then Durant sprained his knee, leaving Harden as the only available star. Harden grew irritated with Irving and eventually asked for a trade. The Nets sent him to Philadelphia, acquiring Ben Simmons just before the trade deadline.Simmons has yet to play for the Nets and had back surgery in May.In March, Mayor Eric Adams of New York altered the city ordinance that had barred Irving from playing in Brooklyn, just in time for baseball season, creating an exception for professional athletes and entertainers. Irving made his home debut on March 27.In all, Irving played in 29 regular-season games last season.When he played, he showed glimpses of the kind of brilliance that made him a coveted player in the past. He scored 60 points in a March 15 win at Orlando, 50 points in a March 8 win in Charlotte and 43 points in a March 23 win in Memphis.But his return did not come soon enough to give the Nets the chemistry they needed to succeed in the playoffs. More

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    For Some NBA Draftees, Making it to the Pros Runs in the Family

    Three of the top five picks in this year’s N.B.A. draft have parents who played professionally, including in the W.N.B.A.When the Houston Rockets selected Auburn’s Jabari Smith Jr. with the third pick of the N.B.A. draft on Thursday, it continued a tradition of basketball as a family inheritance.His father, also named Jabari Smith, played in the N.B.A. in the early 2000s.“My dad just told me it was time to amp it up a little bit, time to work even harder,” Jabari Smith Jr. said of his father’s reaction to the draft. “It’s a new level, whole new game. Just trying to get there and get to work.”For a cadre of N.B.A. players, having a parent or being related to someone who played in the N.B.A. or W.N.B.A. isn’t particularly unusual. And many players who aren’t related to someone who played professionally have parents who played college basketball.This past season, 30 second-generation players appeared in at least one N.B.A. game — a total that represents 5 percent of the league, and is nearly twice as many players as about two decades ago.Jabari Smith Jr., center, with his father, Jabari Smith, left, and mother, Taneskia Purnell, right.Sarah Stier/Getty ImagesSmith was one of several players drafted this year whose father had N.B.A. experience. Among them was the University of Wisconsin’s Johnny Davis, whom the Washington Wizards picked at No. 10. His father is Mark Davis, who played in the N.B.A. briefly after the Cleveland Cavaliers drafted him in 1985. There was also Duke’s A.J. Griffin, picked at No. 16 by the Atlanta Hawks. His father is Adrian Griffin, who played in the N.B.A. from 1999 to 2008, and has since been an assistant coach in the N.B.A. The other was Colorado’s Jabari Walker, a late-second-round pick for the Portland Trail Blazers, the son of Samaki Walker, who played a decade in the N.B.A. and won a championship with the Los Angeles Lakers.W.N.B.A. connections could also be found among top picks. Rhonda Smith-Banchero, the mother of the No. 1 pick, Paolo Banchero, played in the W.N.B.A. Banchero, who was drafted by the Orlando Magic, said his mother “stayed on me, always held me accountable and made sure I was on the right track.” The Detroit Pistons selected Purdue’s Jaden Ivey with the fifth pick. His mother, Niele Ivey, played in the W.N.B.A. and was a recent assistant coach for the Memphis Grizzlies. She’s now the coach of the Notre Dame women’s basketball team.“It’s actually an amazing story to have a mother who’s been in the league,” Jaden Ivey said. “You don’t see too many stories like that, and the bond that we have is special. I thank her for all the things that she’s done for me. I know I wouldn’t be on this stage, I wouldn’t be here, without her.”Niele Ivey, left, played college basketball at Notre Dame before her W.N.B.A. career. She’s now the head coach of the Notre Dame women’s basketball team.Photo by Vincent Laforet/The New York TimesSometimes the connection to professional basketball players isn’t parental. Midway through the first round, the Charlotte Hornets drafted Mark Williams out of Duke. His older sister Elizabeth Williams has been in the W.N.B.A. since 2015. In the second round, the Cavaliers picked Isaiah Mobley out of the University of Southern California, which will be convenient for family visits, as his brother, Evan Mobley, is already on the team. (Brothers are common in the N.B.A. See: the Lopezes, Antetokounmpos, Balls and Holidays.)In some cases, there were recognizable names who weren’t drafted but nonetheless received contracts. Scotty Pippen Jr., who played three seasons at Vanderbilt, is expected to sign a two-way contract with the Lakers. His father, Scottie Pippen, won six championships with the Chicago Bulls. Ron Harper Jr., a Rutgers alum whose father, Ron Harper, won three championships alongside Pippen, is expected to be offered a similar deal with the Toronto Raptors.But while the N.B.A.’s father-son connections were highlighted by this year’s draft class, the phenomenon is nothing new. Consider Golden State’s roster, which featured four second-generation players during the team’s championship run this year: Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Andrew Wiggins and Gary Payton II.And some of their fathers were front and center.Each player has a family connection in professional basketball: For Paolo Banchero, left, it’s his mother; for Mark Williams, center, his sister; and for A.J. Griffin, right, his father.John Minchillo/Associated PressPaolo Banchero hugs his mother, Rhonda Smith-Banchero, who played in the W.N.B.A. Banchero was the No. 1 pick in the N.B.A. draft on Thursday.Arturo Holmes/Getty ImagesAs Payton got set to check into Game 2 of the N.B.A. finals against the Boston Celtics, he spotted his father, Gary Payton, a nine-time All-Star, sitting courtside with Detlef Schrempf, one of his former teammates. Father and son made eye contact — no words needed to be exchanged.“He just shook his head,” Gary Payton II said. “I know that means it’s time. You know, go to work.”And as the final seconds ticked away in Golden State’s championship-clinching win in Game 6, Curry embraced his father, Dell Curry, along one baseline. Stephen Curry broke down in tears.“I saw him and I lost it,” he said, adding, “I just wanted to take in the moment because it was that special.”In fact, the N.B.A. finals offered up a smorgasbord of generational talent. Among the Celtics: Al Horford, whose father, Tito Horford, played for the Milwaukee Bucks and the Washington Bullets, and Grant Williams, whose cousins, Salim and Damon Stoudamire, both played in the N.B.A. This season, Damon Stoudamire was able to keep a close eye on Williams as one of the Celtics’ assistants.Players and coaches have cited a number of factors in the steady, decades-long emergence of father-son pairings, starting with genetics: It obviously helps to be tall. But many sons of former players also benefited from early exposure to the game, from top-notch instruction from the time they could start dribbling and from various other perks. For example, Stephen Curry and his younger brother, Seth Curry, who now plays for the Nets, had access to a full-length court in their family’s backyard, complete with lights.But with certain privilege comes pressure — especially when you share a name with a famous father. Gary Payton II recalled how his father had learned to back off when it came to basketball so that his son could develop a passion for the game on his own. They simply stopped talking about hoops, and that has remained the case.“Nowadays, he really doesn’t say anything,” Gary Payton II said. “We just talk about life, family, other sports and whatnot.”But sometimes it can cause strains, like the one between Tim Hardaway Jr., a Dallas Mavericks guard, and his father, Tim Hardaway, a five-time All Star who played from 1989 to 2003. They have both publicly spoken about how their relationship was made more difficult as a result of how hard the elder Hardaway was on his son about the game.Scotty Pippen Jr., the son of the Chicago Bulls great, Scottie Pippen, was expected to sign a two-way deal with the Lakers after going undrafted.Mark Humphrey/Associated PressIt can also be a strain if your father is the coach, a situation that Austin Rivers was faced with when he played for his father, Doc Rivers, on the Los Angeles Clippers. Doc Rivers played in the league from 1983 to 1996 and is also an accomplished N.B.A. head coach. The younger Rivers called it “bittersweet.” Doc Rivers had his back as his father, but Austin Rivers told The Ringer that “everything else, man, was hell,” because it created an awkward dynamic with his teammates.A similar situation may repeat itself next season: The Knicks hired Rick Brunson, a former N.B.A. player, as an assistant coach and are expected to target his son, Jalen Brunson, one of the top free agents, as an off-season acquisition.Of course, it could work out just fine, as it did for Gary Payton. In the hours after Golden State won it all last week in Boston, he celebrated his son’s triumph by dancing through the hallways at TD Garden. More

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    From Tattoos to Malcolm X T-shirts, N.B.A. Hopefuls Talk Style

    Three top draft prospects — Paolo Banchero, Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams — explained their approach to fashion. “I feel like I don’t really miss when I put fits on,” Holmgren said.Paolo Banchero lifted the right sleeve of his black hooded sweatshirt to point out the green tattoo ink on his forearm. His long arms make up most of the 7-foot-1 wingspan that positioned him as one of the top prospects in the N.B.A. draft on Thursday, but they also tell a story.His right arm is packed with tattoos that depict crucial parts of his upbringing and make statements about his style: the Space Needle and the rest of the skyline of his hometown, Seattle, sit on his right shoulder; “19th and Spruce” is written on his inner biceps as a nod to the Boys and Girls Club where he began playing basketball; and on his inner forearm is the logo for his friend’s Seattle-based Skyblue Collective clothing brand, which he sports often and says is “a part of him.”Banchero has a tattoo on his right arm that reads “19th and Spruce,” a nod to the Boys and Girls Club in Seattle where he grew up playing basketball.Bob Donnan/USA Today Sports, via ReutersBanchero, 19, who led the Duke men’s basketball team to the Final Four this year, uses his tattoos and outfits as a form of self-expression, a subtle way of sending messages. At a pre-draft style event at a Brooklyn barbershop on Tuesday, he wore an all-black luxury designer outfit, which he said was tame compared to what he would put together on draft night.On Thursday, he wore a bright purple suit as the Orlando Magic selected him with the No. 1 overall pick in the draft.Banchero and many of the top players in the 2022 draft class already have a public persona, but it will be boosted immensely if an N.B.A. team signs them. While playing well and winning championships are paramount in how an N.B.A. player is perceived, style and image are a close second. After all, this is the league in which Los Angeles Lakers forward/center Anthony Davis made his unibrow a celebrity in its own right, even trademarking the phrase “Fear The Brow” in 2012.N.B.A. athletes have made it easy for fans to appreciate their fashion sense, turning their pregame entrances into their own version of the Met Gala. Fans on social media quickly share photos and videos from players’ 30-second walks to the locker rooms from cars or team buses at N.B.A. arenas. GQ magazine crowned Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander as the N.B.A.’s most stylish player of 2022, over Phoenix Suns guard Devin Booker, because “the guy cares about getting dressed.”Jalen Williams, a forward from Santa Clara University and a potential first-round pick in the draft, is looking forward to the pregame catwalk. On his cellphone, he has multiple search tabs open for different clothing brands. He laughed and pointed at Jaden Hardy from the G League Ignite, another potential 2022 draft pick, when he saw that they were wearing the same black sweatpants from the brand MNML at the event on Tuesday.Williams said he tried to balance being conscious about what he wore while having fun with his style, because he knew that he would be judged by his outfits and appearance. He incorporates clothing from less popular brands into his wardrobe to encourage those who may look up to him to be “comfortable in their own skin.”Jalen Williams said fashion was important to him — even in video games.Young Kwak/Associated PressWilliams at the N.B.A. draft on Thursday.Arturo Holmes/Getty Images“I think that’s the biggest thing that gets misunderstood in fashion,” Williams, 21, said. “You feel like you have to please whoever or look a certain way, but whatever you like is what you like.”Williams said he also tried to support small brands and promote social-justice issues through his clothing. He sported a jacket from Tattoo’d Cloth, which made custom embroidered jackets for some draft prospects, and tagged the brand in an Instagram story. On Juneteenth, he wore a shirt featuring Malcolm X, and he frequently wears different kinds of apparel supporting the Black Lives Matter movement. “I think as athletes, it’s important to inspire people and kind of spark a change and use our platform,” Williams said. “Sometimes, not even saying anything but wearing the clothes is really important.”Williams’s style goes beyond his outfits, too. As a high school sophomore, he decided to don a single braid while keeping the rest of his hair unbraided, hanging the braid at eye level. That has become a popular style in the N.B.A.“I’m not going to say I started it, but I might’ve started it,” he said jokingly.Fashion has long played a significant role in Williams’s life, back to his childhood when he began using the My Player mode in the N.B.A. 2K video game, in which users create players and can style them for hanging out in a virtual park. He is serious about the fashion choices of his My Player.“You can’t pull up to the park in brown and gray,” Williams said, mocking the generic outfit given to the created players. “No brown shirts!”The Oklahoma City Thunder selected Williams with the 12th pick in the draft on Thursday. He wore a dark pinstriped suit and large sunglasses with his famous single braid draped over them.Chet Holmgren, who is seven feet tall, said it was hard to find clothes that fit his long and lanky frame when he was younger.Kyle Terada/USA Today Sports, via ReutersHolmgren at the N.B.A. draft on Thursday.Arturo Holmes/Getty ImagesFor the seven-foot center Chet Holmgren, who played at Gonzaga and was expected to be a top-three pick on Thursday, being fashionable was a challenge growing up. He could never find clothes that fit his long and lanky frame, and he could not afford the custom-fitted outfits he adored. He ridiculed his most impressive childhood outfit: Nike socks, basic T-shirts, basketball shorts and basketball shoes. In high school, Holmgren said, his style skyrocketed as he turned to resale websites and brands that had clothes in the large-and-tall sizing. Now, he is confident that he is the most fashionable prospect in this draft class.“In my opinion, I’m the swaggiest dude beyond just what I am wearing,” Holmgren said. He further explained that fashion was about more than just the pieces a person was wearing.“You could spend $10,000 on an outfit, but you might have a trash outfit on,” he said. “You might have the right pieces, but if you can’t put them together, the outfit’s not going to be great.”Like Williams, Holmgren is looking forward to the N.B.A.’s pregame runway, and he isn’t apprehensive about his style choices.“I feel like I don’t really miss when I put fits on,” Holmgren said. “So whatever I’m wearing, I’ll be all right.”Holmgren was drafted second overall to the Oklahoma City Thunder. His diamond chain, which featured a pair of dice, shone in Barclays Center as he walked to the stage. He chose dice for his chain, he said, because he was “big on betting on himself.” More

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    NBA Draft: Paolo Banchero Goes No. 1 to Orlando Magic

    Banchero, a forward from Duke, helped his team reach the Final Four this past season. Gonzaga’s Chet Holmgren went to the Oklahoma City Thunder at No. 2.Paolo Banchero knew Thursday would be a special day, the start of his N.B.A. career.He had no idea about the plans of the Orlando Magic, the team selecting first overall in the N.B.A. draft that night. When he found out, just minutes before N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver called his name, he couldn’t believe it.“This isn’t even a dream,” Banchero said. “I feel like this is a fantasy. I dreamed of being in the N.B.A., but being the No. 1 overall pick — this is crazy.”The Magic selected Banchero, a forward from Duke University, with the top pick in Thursday’s draft. He is a 6-foot-10, 250-pound power forward, whose mother, Rhonda Smith-Banchero, played in the W.N.B.A. He was a guard earlier in his basketball career and played football and basketball at O’Dea High School in Seattle.In the minutes before his name was called, Banchero sat at a table on the floor of Barclays Center showing no emotion on his face. The Magic were on the clock and word began to spread that Banchero might be their pick. Cameras crowded around him, but he didn’t outwardly react. Only when he heard his name did his expression change.He lowered his head, looked up and smiled with tears in his eyes.“I was telling everyone I wasn’t going to cry no matter what pick I was picked,” Banchero said. “It just hit me. I couldn’t stop it.”In his only season at Duke, Banchero averaged 17.2 points, 7.8 rebounds and 3.2 assists per game and was named the Atlantic Coast Conference’s rookie of the year.The picks for the rest of the top five: Gonzaga’s Chet Holmgren at No. 2 to the Oklahoma City Thunder, Auburn’s Jabari Smith Jr. to the Houston Rockets at No. 3, Iowa’s Keegan Murray to the Sacramento Kings at No. 4 and Purdue’s Jaden Ivey to the Detroit Pistons at No. 5.Three prospects were thought to have separated themselves at the top of this year’s draft: Banchero, Holmgren and Smith.Holmgren nodded and smirked subtly as he heard Banchero’s name called first. When Silver called his name, Holmgren broke out into a wide smile, stopping for handshakes and long embraces with his family members.“I got a thousand emotions to describe this moment,” Holmgren said during an interview that was broadcast in the arena in Brooklyn. “It’s surreal and everything I expected.”Holmgren, 20, is a rail-thin, seven-foot-tall center who grew up in Minneapolis and was named Minnesota’s Mr. Basketball in 2021. He was a high school teammate of Jalen Suggs, whom the Magic drafted fifth overall in 2021. They each spent one season at Gonzaga.Holmgren led Gonzaga to a 28-4 record and averaged 14.1 points per game while making 60.7 percent of his field-goal attempts. He also averaged 9.9 rebounds and 3.7 blocks per game. Gonzaga entered the N.C.A.A. tournament as the No. 1 overall seed, but was upset in the round of 16.N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver, left, announced Gonzaga’s Chet Holmgren second. Holmgren, a seven-footer, averaged 14.1 points per game while making 60.7 percent of his field-goal attempts.Sarah Stier/Getty ImagesIn the days before the draft, rumors circulated in media reports that Orlando had decided to select Smith first overall. As Smith waited for his name to be called, he looked disappointed. When finally Silver announced his name, another prospect, Louisiana State’s Tari Eason, who played in the same conference, leaped out of his seat to clap for Smith.“I know it was a possibility, so when it didn’t happen, I was surprised,” Smith said of the prospect of his being selected first overall. “You know, all the guys up for the pick are great players. They bring a lot to the table. It was like I said in the other interviews: It was a coin flip. So when it happened, you know, I was just happy for them, clapped for them and just waiting to get my name called.”Smith, 19, spent one season at Auburn after a distinguished high school basketball career in Georgia. He played for the same Amateur Athletic Union team as another No. 1 pick by the Magic: Dwight Howard. Smith’s father, also named Jabari Smith, spent parts of four seasons in the N.B.A. in the early 2000s.Jabari Smith Jr. was named the Southeastern Conference’s freshman of the year and a second-team all-American this past season. Smith is a 6-foot-10 power forward with the ability to shoot from the perimeter. He made 42.9 percent of his 3-pointers and averaged 16.9 points per game at Auburn.The first surprise of the night was the selection of Murray by the Kings at No. 4, given the expectation that Banchero, Holmgren and Smith would go in some order in the top three. The spectators at Barclays Center erupted at the announcement.The first big surprise of the draft came at No. 4, when Sacramento selected the Iowa forward Keegan Murray.John Minchillo/Associated PressMurray is the highest-selected Hawkeye in school history. The 6-foot-8 forward earned consensus first-team all-American honors this past season and finished fourth in Division I scoring with 23.5 points per game. He led the Hawkeyes to a 26-10 record and a first-round appearance in the N.C.A.A. tournament.Ivey spent two seasons at Purdue before declaring for the draft. He averaged 17.3 points, 4.9 rebounds and 3.1 assists per game during his sophomore season.The Magic won this year’s draft lottery after finishing the season at 22-60, the worst record in the Eastern Conference and the second-worst record in the league. Only the Houston Rockets, who had the third pick in this year’s draft after a 20-62 season, won fewer games than the Magic.This year marked the fourth time in the franchise’s history that it made the first overall pick. The Magic drafted Shaquille O’Neal with the first pick in 1992; Chris Webber, whom they immediately traded for Penny Hardaway, in 1993; and Dwight Howard in 2004.The pairing of Hardaway and O’Neal yielded one N.B.A. finals appearance, but no championships for the Magic. Howard also led the Magic to one finals appearance, in 2009.Later in their careers, O’Neal and Howard won championships while playing for the Los Angeles Lakers — O’Neal in 2000, 2001 and 2002, and Howard in 2020.Before Banchero, the last Duke player selected No. 1 overall in the N.B.A. draft was Zion Williamson in 2019. Banchero follows two guards — Anthony Edwards (2020) and Cade Cunningham (2021) — in earning the distinction of being the top pick. More

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    The Dream’s Clean-Slate Strategy Made Space for a Star: Rhyne Howard

    Howard is a top candidate for the Rookie of the Year Award. Atlanta is rebuilding after a few rocky years, on and off the court.The Atlanta Dream were looking to start over.After a couple of rocky seasons — player suspensions, lots of losses, a revolt against a team owner — it was time to try something new.Nothing says clean slate like building a new roster.Atlanta kept only a few players from last year’s team: Monique Billings, Aari McDonald, Tiffany Hayes and Cheyenne Parker.Another piece fell into place when the Dream traded up for the first pick in this year’s draft and selected guard Rhyne Howard from the University of Kentucky. Howard made history as the only former Wildcat to be selected first overall by a W.N.B.A. franchise. Despite the power moves Atlanta made to ensure Howard was a part of their rebuild, she isn’t feeling any pressure to atone for the failings of past Atlanta teams.“I was aware of what has been going on, but we didn’t talk about that,” Howard said in a phone interview earlier this month. “We haven’t, and we didn’t even before the draft because it’s like, it’s in the past now. Everyone here is basically new, so we’re just looking to rebuild, which we have done so far.”Howard diving for the ball against the Phoenix Mercury. She is averaging 16.3 points, 4.3 rebounds and 2.7 assists per game.Christian Petersen/Getty ImagesThe Atlanta Dream are in playoff contention as the W.N.B.A. nears the All-Star break, but just barely. They are 8-8 after beating the Dallas Wings on Tuesday. Their 6-4 start under the first-time coach Tanisha Wright was promising for a franchise with fewer than 16 wins over the last two seasons.Promising, yes, but not satisfying.The Dream haven’t made it to postseason play since 2018, when Nicki Collen led Atlanta to a 23-11 record en route to winning the Coach of the Year Award. It looked as though the heyday of Dream basketball might have returned.After winning only four games as an expansion club in 2008, the Dream earned six consecutive postseason berths, including three trips to the W.N.B.A. finals.However, by 2019 the Dream were again scraping at the bottom of the standings and would not win more than eight games in three straight seasons. There was turmoil off the court as well.In 2020, the Dream caught the attention of the sports and political worlds when the team’s players publicly supported the Rev. Raphael Warnock, a Democrat in Georgia who was running for a Senate seat against the Republican incumbent Kelly Loeffler, who co-owned the Dream.Then last season, the Dream suspended guard Chennedy Carter after 11 games for “conduct detrimental to the team.” That May, guards Courtney Williams and Crystal Bradford were involved in a fight outside of a club in Atlanta. It wasn’t until after the season, when video of the fight surfaced, that the W.N.B.A. suspended them. None are with Atlanta now.Neither is Loeffler, who sold the team in February 2021 after losing to Warnock. There are lots of new faces, including Wright, Howard and General Manager Dan Padover, who was hired away from the Las Vegas Aces in October. A month earlier, the Dream hired a new team president, Morgan Shaw Parker. With every move, the Atlanta Dream have made it clear that there is no looking back, only looking forward.“It really was a way to come into something at the ground floor that I’ve never been able to do,” Padover said. He added: “I viewed it as a challenge, and I also knew I was going to be with really good people, and we were going to bring in really good players.”Howard had averaged 20.5 points per game in the 2021-22 season at Kentucky and left as a two-time SEC player of the year. She was named to the Associated Press first team three of her four years in Lexington.Her transition to the professional ranks has been smooth. Through 16 games, Howard is averaging 16.3 points, 4.3 rebounds and 2.7 assists per game. She was named the W.N.B.A. rookie of the month for May.She leads the Dream in points and minutes (31) per game and is a top candidate for the league’s Rookie of the Year Award. So far, she has validated all that it took for Atlanta to get her.Five days before the draft, Atlanta traded its first-round (third overall) and second-round (14th overall) picks to the Washington Mystics for the No. 1 overall pick. Additionally, the Mystics can swap their 2023 first-round pick for the 2023 first-round pick the Dream acquired in a trade with the Los Angeles Sparks.“When we looked at the trade, we’ve known in the W that it’s really, really hard to get elite-level players,” Padover said. “And when you get an opportunity to get one, you have to really consider it.”He continued: “For us to get a player of Rhyne’s caliber to start this rebuilding process, we didn’t think we could pass it up. And I think the other thing that we looked at was not just the 2022 draft — we looked at the draft from 2020 to 2023, and there weren’t a lot of players that we could compare to Rhyne.”Although there is a lot of excitement for the path ahead, Padover is under no illusions that it will be an easy road. No one on the team has won a championship except for Wright, who won in 2010 with the Seattle Storm.“We do need to get to where we want to get from a competitive standpoint,” he said. “We want to be a consistent playoff team for years to come. We’ll see what happens this year, but I’m not sure we’re there yet.”Dream forward Cheyenne Parker is averaging 11.8 points per game. She leads the team with 1.3 blocks per game.Christian Petersen/Getty ImagesAtlanta had dropped four straight games before beating Dallas on Tuesday. Opponents scored at least 90 points in three of the four losses. In the previous 11 games, only the top-seeded Las Vegas Aces had scored more than 80 points against the Dream.“Defensively, we need to get back to ourselves,” Wright said after a 105-92 loss to the Connecticut Sun last week. Atlanta averages a league-leading 17.7 turnovers per game. The Dream have conceded 15.1 points per game because of turnovers and another 9.3 points per game on fast breaks. But the defensive numbers aren’t all bad: Atlanta is just behind the Connecticut Sun with the third-fewest second-chance points allowed (9.2) per game.Nia Coffey leads the team with five defensive rebounds per game, but Parker and Billings are right behind her with 4.8 per game. Parker also leads the team with 1.3 blocks per game, and averages 11.8 points per game.“What we were dead set on was that we needed to make sure we brought in professionals who were going to be respectful of one another and also make the city and this franchise proud,” Padover said.What will that look like at the end of the regular season? Will a playoff berth or major league award show that Atlanta is moving in the right direction?“A goal of mine is to be rookie of the year,” Howard said, “but just being able to have an impact on this team continuously and consistently and just leading us to where everyone wants to go is enough for me. I’m not going to get any accomplishments without my team.”The Dream will have to fight to remain in playoff contention, but Howard leads all rookies in per-game averages for minutes, points, steals, and 3-pointers and field goals made. Early returns say she can be the elite player Padover and the Dream thought she would be. More

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    Brittney Griner’s Supporters Call on Biden to Strike a Deal to Free Her

    Dozens of organizations representing people of color, women and L.G.B.T.Q. voters called on President Biden on Wednesday to strike a deal for the release of Brittney Griner, the W.N.B.A. star who has been detained in Russia since February.In a letter sent to Mr. Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the groups said Ms. Griner “continues to endure inhumane treatment, deprived of contact with her family.”The letter said the United States “has acknowledged that Brittney is essentially a political pawn in classifying her as wrongfully detained.” And while the signatories cited “deep appreciation” for the administration’s efforts to free Ms. Griner, “we now urge you to make a deal to get Brittney back home to America immediately and safely.”The Phoenix Mercury basketball player was detained in Russia on Feb. 17 on accusations that she had hashish oil in her luggage. At first, Ms. Griner’s camp was worried that publicity could make the situation worse because of tensions between Russia and the United States, including the war in Ukraine.But the group’s approach has changed since the State Department said on May 3 that it had determined Ms. Griner had been “wrongfully detained.” That meant the United States could expend greater efforts toward bringing her home despite the legal action against her in Russia.In recent weeks, players with the W.N.B.A., working with Ms. Griner’s wife, Cherelle, and others, have tried to draw attention to her case.The latest effort, the letter from groups including the National Organization for Women, the Human Rights Campaign, the National Urban League and the National Action Network, was coordinated by Ms. Griner’s agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, who worked with the Democratic strategist Karen Finney and others. The groups, which represent a coalition of constituencies that helped to elect Mr. Biden, are speaking out amid growing frustrations over the pace of the effort to bring Ms. Griner home.“To my understanding, they have not started negotiating her release, and so this letter is very powerful because it’s much-needed support to highlight the fact that we are at the phase where you guys should be making a deal,” Cherelle Griner said.“I wish I could say I have a clear understanding of it,” she said of the White House strategy. “They do a lot of talking in code with me.”The administration, she said, is “debating whether they should start negotiating,” when it has already been determined that her wife was wrongfully detained. “Instead, they’re debating and they’re wasting time from my wife’s life.”White House officials, commenting after this article was published online, said, “President Biden has been clear about the need to see all U.S. nationals who are held hostage or wrongfully detained abroad released, including Brittney Griner. The U.S. government continues to work aggressively — using every available means — to bring her home.”Administration officials have said Mr. Biden’s team is in regular contact with the Griner family and that Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken spoke with Cherelle Griner in May. The special envoy for hostage affairs is also in touch with Ms. Griner’s team.Bill Richardson, the former governor of New Mexico and the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, also has been working to try to free Ms. Griner and another American in Russia, the former Marine Paul Whelan, who has been detained since 2018.Still, Cherelle Griner said she was uncertain about how much the White House was prioritizing the case. She told The Associated Press that she was supposed to speak to her wife by phone for the first time in roughly four months over the weekend, but a logistical problem at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow upended the plans.According to The A.P., the embassy was supposed to facilitate the call between the two women. But when Brittney Griner called the embassy to get patched through to her wife in the United States, there was no answer. Brittney Griner’s lawyers said she tried calling the line 11 times while her wife waited in vain for the call, The A.P. reported.“I was distraught. I was hurt. I was done, fed up,” Cherelle Griner told The A.P. More