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    Prospects Get a Taste of N.B.A. Life During All-Star Weekend

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    Members of a developmental team, the N.B.A. G League Ignite, some still in their teens, participated in the N.B.A.’s All-Star Weekend.Amauri Hardy sat in the stands during the N.B.A.’s All-Star Weekend in Cleveland, watching his little brother, Jaden, on the court with the best young players in the league. He thought about the work Jaden had put into his game and the guts he showed in leaving home as a teenager to follow a nontraditional path into professional basketball.“I’m not sure if he actually realizes how big of a moment it is, but I did because I grew up watching this game a lot,” Amauri Hardy said, proudly. “Just to see him out there with the jersey on with our last name on it, just representing for our whole family.”He added, “He’s been making the best of these moments.”Jaden Hardy, 19, does not play in the N.B.A., though he believes he could have been drafted last year, right out of high school, if the rules had allowed it. Instead, he signed with the N.B.A. G League Ignite, a developmental team in Northern California which allows elite prospects to play professionally in the United States before they are eligible for the N.B.A. draft.This season, playing for the Ignite offered another perk. The N.B.A. included players from that experimental team in their festivities surrounding the All-Star Game. It was a chance for the league to showcase the Ignite, a project now in its second year. It also gave the players, many of them teenagers, an incomparable experience.Four players from the Ignite — Jaden Hardy, Scoot Henderson, MarJon Beauchamp and Dyson Daniels — joined 24 first- and second-year N.B.A. players, 12 from each conference. The players were split into four teams, each with six N.B.A. players and one Ignite player, for a mini-tournament on the Friday of All-Star Weekend. The Ignite players Fanbo Zeng and Mike Foster were scheduled to participate in a shooting competition during the tournament, though Zeng couldn’t participate because of an injury.“I was nervous before the game before I even got out there, but when I got out there it was kind of relieving,” Beauchamp said. He watches the All-Star events every year, he said, “so just seeing myself on the screen is pretty amazing.”While league rules prevent players from going straight from high school to the N.B.A., playing for the Ignite can be a lucrative path for prospects when compared with playing in college — Ignite players can make up to $500,000 for the season. It can be a more familiar one than playing overseas, which some have tried.Scoot Henderson, 18, passing during the Rising Stars Challenge. Because of his age, he is not eligible for the N.B.A. draft until next year.Emilee Chinn/NBAE, via Getty ImagesThey first heard that a few of them would get to participate in All-Star Weekend while at a practice in New York.“I just thanked God, honestly,” Henderson said. “I was very excited. The first thing I did was call my parents and share the moment with them. They were just saying they were proud of me and what I’ve done through my year.”The rest of their teammates attended Friday night’s events, as did family members and friends. Amauri Hardy was both a family member and a teammate — he plays on the Ignite along with his brother. Daniels’s father traveled from the family’s home in Australia and saw his son for the first time in months.This is the second season the Ignite has existed. The team was designed to play a schedule that includes games against other G League teams and international exhibitions. Last year’s team produced two top-10 draft picks — Jalen Green, by Houston, and Jonathan Kuminga, by Golden State.It is made up of prospects and veterans who serve as mentors. They practiced in Cleveland on Thursday and Saturday in preparation for a Sunday afternoon game against the Cleveland Charge, the Cavaliers’ G League affiliate.Practices include competition and camaraderie for this group. They’re all trying to become lottery picks, most of them in this year’s draft.“It’s a little tense in practice sometimes,” Foster said. “They’ve developed into brothers. We got that brotherly fight.”On Friday morning, they sat for the Rising Stars media day. That’s when Jaden Hardy started to really feel part of the weekend.“It was just fun to be able to be out there on the court with those young stars really and just being able to go out there and just laugh and compete,” he said.One of those young stars was guard Tyrese Haliburton of the Indiana Pacers, a second-year N.B.A. player who met Hardy at a camp a few years ago.“I think him being around us, seeing us young guys who are thriving in the N.B.A., I think he’s getting a little bit of a taste of that,” Haliburton said. “And his future is bright, so I’m excited for him to get to the league.”Hardy’s team played against Beauchamp’s in the semifinals, and Hardy’s team won.Beauchamp caught two lobs for dunks from Cole Anthony, a second-year guard for the Orlando Magic.MarJon Beauchamp, left, and Jaden Hardy at the Rising Stars Challenge.Emilee Chinn/NBAE, via Getty Images“I’m sure it had to be a surreal experience,” Anthony said. “Not even playing in the N.B.A., being at N.B.A. All-Star, that has to be one of the dopest experiences a kid can experience. I wish I could’ve been there when I was in college just that year before going into the draft.”Among the players Henderson was most excited to play with Friday night was LaMelo Ball, the N.B.A.’s 2020-21 rookie of the year.When Henderson thought about his path to pro basketball, Ball was one of his role models. Ball left high school after his sophomore year to play professionally in Lithuania.In his rookie year, Ball was very confident, noted Henderson, who joined the Ignite after his junior year of high school.Henderson was part of Ball’s team for the Rising Stars Challenge, and thrilled for an opportunity to play with him. Conversely, Ball appreciated Henderson’s interest in his path.“My whole journey I felt like it was going to help the younger generation, which I feel like it’s doing,” Ball said. “So just having kids do what they want, I feel like it’s great.”“I was nervous before the game before I even got out there, but when I got out there it was kind of relieving,” Beauchamp said.Brian Sevald/NBAE, via Getty ImagesBut restrictions remain on players as they attempt to enter the N.B.A. Henderson, for example, will not be eligible for the draft until 2023.“If I had the opportunity and that chance, I would definitely love to play in the N.B.A. next year,” Henderson said.Henderson added that he had found the environment with the Ignite helpful given the mentorship opportunities and the chance to play against N.B.A. talent.Beauchamp was a little nervous backstage on Friday before he was introduced as a participant in the Rising Stars Challenge to a bigger audience than he had ever played for.But the butterflies dissipated by the time he arrived for introductions.His appearance was an honor normally reserved for players in their first or second N.B.A. seasons, not those, like Beauchamp, preparing for the draft. Between his accomplished teammates and the N.B.A. veterans he saw sitting courtside, he looked around and thought about what he wanted for his future.“I feel like it motivates me to want to be here,” Beauchamp said. “Again and again and again.” More

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      N.F.L. Steps Out of the Basement for 2021 Draft

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      Rebounding from the 2020 version that saw Commissioner Roger Goodell announcing picks from his basement, the league announced plans for an in-person event in Cleveland.Commissioner Roger Goodell eschewed bro hugs and a podium during the N.F.L. draft last April, when he was forced to announce teams’ picks from his wood-paneled basement as the league conducted the event virtually while the coronavirus raged.For part of the night, when New England Patriots Coach Bill Belichick briefly left his setup at a dining table, his pet dog, Nike, seemed to be orchestrating the franchise’s moves. TV cameras captured the husky sitting near its owner’s computer.Arizona Cardinals Coach Kliff Kingsbury drafted from his luxurious, white modern home, and Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones sent in his choice from below deck on his yacht. Scenes of both men went viral because of their backdrops, and a record 15.6 million people watched the first round despite its teleconference feel.The 2020 N.F.L. draft was very different from the glossy production that the league has become used to hosting. Since 2015, the three-day event has grown from a staid broadcast to a multi-location football festival with musical performances. The event last year was supposed to culminate with an extravagant display in Las Vegas, where drafted players would be ushered by boat to a stage floating in the fountain outside the Bellagio Hotel & Casino. That plan was moved to 2022.The N.F.L. announced Monday that the coming draft, slated to take place from April 29 to May 1, will be a bridge between the league’s recent extremes. Goodell will once again announce selections from a stage, this time in Cleveland, and team personnel will once again be allowed to work from so-called war rooms, as long as they follow local health guidelines. ESPN, ABC and the NFL Network will televise the event.This version of the annual spectacle will marry the ceremony of the league’s recent drafts with the socially distanced production elements from last season. Some rookies will still participate virtually from their homes, while mask and distancing requirements will be in place for those on site in Cleveland. The N.F.L. did not immediately respond to a request for comment about how many prospects will be in Cleveland, or about whether health protocols will prevent the bear hugs between draftees and Goodell that have been a hallmark of the event.The draft will be the N.F.L.’s first public event since Super Bowl LV, which took place with a hybrid attendance model in Tampa, Fla. There, 22,000 fans — a relatively large number in the pandemic era but the lowest attendance ever for the event — watched in person, following masks and social-distancing measures, at Raymond James Stadium as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers defeated the Kansas City Chiefs.The prospect of a celebratory championship, or even completing a full season, had been in doubt in March 2020. But despite outbreaks at team facilities and the slew of schedule changes that resulted, the N.F.L. played all 256 regular-season games and a full playoff slate within the confines of the season’s planned start and end dates. From August through the end of the playoffs, 262 players and 463 team personnel, or 0.08 percent, contracted the coronavirus. Those statistics, along with a steady decline of infections and loosened local restrictions across the country, allowed some of the league’s teams to raise permitted attendance levels at games as the season progressed.Goodell will announce picks from an outdoor stage near Lake Erie, and invited fans from all 32 teams will watch from a nearby theater. Those fans must be fully vaccinated, according to a statement released by the league Monday. Entertainers, coordinated by the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, will also perform at the main stage. More

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      Officer in Tamir Rice Shooting Playing on Football Team Sparks Protest

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyProtests Rise After Officer in Tamir Rice Shooting Plays on Football TeamTimothy Loehmann, who was fired from the Cleveland police force after the shooting death of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, has quietly played with a semipro team in Ohio.A photograph of Tamir Rice became part of a memorial at the Cleveland park where he was fatally shot by Timothy Loehmann in 2014.Credit…Ty Wright for The New York TimesFeb. 2, 2021Updated 7:19 p.m. ETWhen the new player appeared on the semipro football team made up of emergency workers, he simply went by Tim or Timmy. He was noticeably bad at football, said Randy Knight, a lineman on the team, who took Tim under his wing and taught him the basics: assuming a three-point stance, “firing off” the line, proper hand placement at the line of scrimmage.They did not interact much off the field, Knight said, but he played alongside Tim, who mostly kept to himself, without incident for more than two seasons.But in early 2019, a fellow semipro football player questioned why Knight was playing for the Cleveland Warriors.“They’re racist,” the player said of the Warriors, according to Knight. “The guy that killed Tamir Rice is on that team.”Tamir was the 12-year-old Black boy fatally shot by a white Cleveland police officer in 2014. Knight searched for information about Tamir’s killer on Google, and up popped images of the man he knew as Timmy — Timothy Loehmann.“I became irate,” said Knight, 32, a former corrections officer who is Black.Loehmann’s involvement with the team became public last week in a report by a local television station. Knight led a protest at the Warriors’ practice facility on Saturday, saying that the team’s management had lied to him by allowing Loehmann, who was fired from the police force in 2017 but not criminally charged in the shooting, to continue to play with the team. Activists and supporters of Tamir’s family have since expressed outrage over the former officer’s presence on the team, not least because it is in the National Public Safety Football League, which was originally started for law enforcement.“I think it’s careless and irresponsible for them to allow him to play,” Samaria Rice, Tamir’s mother, said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “His career is over as a police officer in the state of Ohio as far as I’m concerned. It’s just ridiculous.”The league requires players to be active-duty emergency responders. Bill Sofranko, the coach of the Warriors, said that although Loehmann was fired in 2017, the team allowed him to continue to play while his arbitration appeal was pending and that Loehmann was removed from the team once he lost that appeal — in late 2019, after the most recent season was over. (The league, a 20-team group that began play in 1997, did not play last year because of the coronavirus pandemic.)Sofranko, who is white, said that he had allowed Loehmann to continue to practice with the team and that, contrary to what Knight claimed, he had never hidden the former officer’s identity.Loehmann is still trying to regain his job as a Cleveland police officer — he is currently appealing his firing in state court. His lawyer, Henry Hilow, said it was unfair for people to criticize Loehmann for being on the football team.“Every time he does something now in his life, there’s going to be someone picketing?” Hilow asked. “There’s never been criminal charges against him. Whether people agree or disagree, that’s the reality of the situation.”A grand jury in Cuyahoga County declined in 2015 to charge Loehmann in the shooting of Tamir, and in late December, the Justice Department announced that it was closing its investigation into the case without filing charges.Sofranko, 65, said that Loehmann had joined the team in 2017 the way most players do — he just showed up one day. He did not know about Loehmann’s involvement in the Tamir shooting, Sofranko said, until the former officer told him at breakfast after practice one morning. Learning that, Sofranko said, never made him question whether Loehmann should be on the team.“Why should I have?” Sofranko said.One former player, who is Black and now serves as an assistant coach, said that he was initially uncomfortable when learning that Loehmann had killed Tamir, but that then he talked to the former officer about it.“I got to know Tim personally,” said the former player, who asked to be identified only by his nickname, Lebo. “He was remorseful. He was apologetic.”Sofranko said Knight had never lodged any objection to Loehmann’s presence on the team until about two weeks ago, when Sofranko informed Knight that he was being kicked off the team because he had left the Ohio corrections department and was no longer eligible to play in the league.“He’s using this Tamir Rice, this Black-white thing to support his anger and vengeance,” Sofranko said. “Every Black person on the team supports Tim Loehmann.”Knight forcefully denied that. He said that the coaching staff seemed to hide Loehmann’s full identity — that he was not introduced to the full team the way most other players are.Loehmann was circumspect with him once, Knight said. When Loehmann’s suspension from the police force came up during a conversation, Loehmann said that it was due to a technicality with his résumé and that he would soon have his job back, Knight recalled.Loehmann was indeed fired because he lied on his résumé, but Knight said he felt that he should have been more forthcoming about the Tamir shooting.But as soon as he found out who Loehmann was, Knight said, he reached out to several members of the team’s management, including Sofranko, to complain. Knight provided screenshots of several text messages sent to a team board member in March 2019 in which he expressed concern about Loehmann’s presence on the team.“How in the hell did this guy get on the team?” Knight said he asked the team’s management. “How did we allow this to happen?”Management assured him several times that Loehmann would no longer be on the team, Knight said. But each time Knight showed up to games, Loehmann was there. It all blew up before the championship game in 2019 in Los Angeles.The team paid everyone’s way there, in part with a $20,000 contribution from Dee Haslam, an owner of the Cleveland Browns, according to Sofranko. A Browns spokesman said it was a one-time contribution. The Haslam family was unaware that Loehmann was on the team at the time, he said, and does not plan to make any further donations.The night before the game, Knight said, he argued with several teammates about the fact that Loehmann had made the trip, but he eventually decided to play so as not to let down the team. The Warriors lost to the Los Angeles Grizzlies, 24-0.Knight said he decided to return this year after again receiving assurances that Loehmann would no longer be with the team. But Loehmann was at the practice facility in early January. Before he could object, Knight said, Sofranko told him that he was off the team for being disruptive.“Why is he here?” Knight said he asked Sofranko, referring to Loehmann. “So you all mad at me because I spoke out?”Knight returned to practice two weeks later, this time as a protester. The police were called to escort the protesters out of the practice facility.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More