Rumors

Barry ranks among the nation’s top age-group players and earned the Triple Crown at the U.S. Open in Naples, Fla., in April. He won the men’s 80-plus singles title, the men’s 80-plus doubles title with partner Fred Shuey and the mixed doubles 80-plus title with Susan Mathews. This week, Barry is looking to add to his medal collection by competing in multiple events at the Huntsman Senior World Games in St. George, Utah. The 80-plus mixed doubles finals take place Friday, and the singles finals are set for Saturday.

New York Times

NBA on ESPN: Some NBA legends spotted at the US Open 🎾🏀 ⭐ Tracy McGrady ⭐ Jalen Rose ⭐ Juwan Howard ⭐ Dwyane Wade pic.x.com/9ofmpgo1uv

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Mazzulla admits that, aside from the last hour of his day when he allows himself to watch a show, there is nothing he experiences for pure entertainment. As his team was sipping champagne and watching the Sox comeback, Mazzulla was taking mental notes. He did the same thing during a recent trip with his wife, Camai, to the US Open, when he charted unforced errors and how often players communicated with coaches. He even did it during a Broadway show when he paid attention to how actors regulated their breathing between talking and singing. He took his family to Paris for the Olympics and took in different events, some of which will make their way into Celtics practices as well.

Boston Sports Journal

What are some funny or wild travel stories with the Lakers? Austin Reaves: The craziest one to me was when we were in Portland, and it was 20 or 30 minutes before we were leaving to go to the game, and the fire alarm started to go off. Fire alarms occasionally go off. They come over the intercom, and they turn them off quickly, but these kept going off. I was like, I didn’t want to be stuck in a burning building, so I got down the stairs and walked out. Everybody else in the building was going out, too. We went out the front, and our bus was leaving from the back from where our meal room was at the time. I think they finally turned the alarm off, but the security for the hotel wouldn’t let me go back there. It’s like how I was talking about before how I fit in with the regular crowd. As an NBA player, how do you travel privately during the offseason when booking hotels and flights? Austin Reaves: For me, it’s not that hard because I kind of look like an average person. I can get around pretty well, especially if I’m wearing a hat or a hoodie. I don’t have to go too incognito, but it’s getting more difficult. Flying doesn’t bother me. With hotels, I’ve traveled spontaneously and gotten regular rooms. I came out to LA for the US Open on a last-minute kind of thing with my mom and my girlfriend, and we just got a place at the Renaissance by the hotel. It was great. For me, it’s not that difficult.

HoopsHype

Clutch Points: Novak Djokovic rocking a Kobe Bryant 'Mamba Forever' tee shirt after winning the US Open Championship💜💛 pic.twitter.com/hEQuqp2hDU

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Clutch Points: Jimmy Butler at the US Open 😂 pic.twitter.com/DlzXYvIdKC

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Clutch Points: Bucks star Khris Middleton pulled up to watch Carlos Alcaraz take on Alexander Zverev in the US Open quarterfinal 🎾🏀 pic.twitter.com/zscdHslK6e

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Clutch Points: Jimmy Butler pulled up to the US Open to watch Carlos Alcaraz 🔥🎾 (via @JimmyButler / IG) pic.twitter.com/2IrIKq7dUm

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NBA star Jimmy Butler took a swing at another sport Wednesday night, dressing just like a member of the ball crew at the U.S. Open to perform those duties and picking up a racket to play with Frances Tiafoe, Carlos Alcaraz and Sebastián Yatra at a charity event that raised $320,000 for humanitarian relief in Ukraine.

Seattle Times

With his return to the court now presumably less than one month away, LA Clippers star Kawhi Leonard is taking a brief vacation from his offseason training. Spotted at New York Fashion Week, Leonard is enjoying some time on the East Coast for fashion and the US Open. Not long after he was spotted attending a fashion show, Leonard was seen at the US Open taking in some tennis action.

Sports Illustrated

Arash Markazi: Kobe Bryant became a mentor for Naomi Osaka when she was dealing with some adversity in 2019. She wore a Kobe Lakers jersey after every match on her way to winning the 2020 US Open. Here she is channeling her Mamba Mentality after beating Serena Williams at the Australian Open. pic.twitter.com/Wvg4zBZOtj

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The first round of the draft averaged 2.65 million — ESPN’s top NBA audience in the month of November since 2018 — and ranked second for the night in adults 18-49 and 18-34 behind “The Masked Singer” on FOX. The steep decline and multi-year low for the NBA Draft is in keeping with the broader trend facing the sports media industry. The NBA Finals, World Series, Stanley Cup Final, final rounds of the Masters and U.S. Open — and more — have hit historic lows since the wave of cancellations and postponements in March.

Sports Media Watch

Like the playoffs as a whole, the steep drop for the Finals is in line with the industry-wide trend. Even after losing half of its year-ago audience, the Finals held up better than the Stanley Cup Final (-61%) or the final round of golf’s U.S. Open (-56%), which were similarly shifted from June to late summer.

Sports Media Watch

Bill Walton: I really like watching this guy play. I’d love to play with him, I’d love to play against him, I’d love to play basketball. I haven’t been able to play basketball in 34 years now. But you know I can watch. I just love brilliant performers. Whether it’s Tadej Pogačar winning the Tour de France. Whether it’s those two guys from Austria and Germany in the U.S. Open Finals. I love greatness and I love effort and I love talent. And we are lucky to see a lot of it right now. Hershey Felder, the great performance artist. The live nature of athletic competition is just, where you don’t know what’s gonna happen. That’s what drives us as fans, but it also drives the performers. And I salute these guys. I admire these guys, what they’re doing, what they have done, and my anticipation of what’s gonna be next. The real challenge is to continually get better all the time, and Nikola is so versatile, so smart, so imaginative in his life. There’s a golden road ahead, and people like me who have unlimited devotion to brilliance and greatness, we look forward to that journey.

GQ.com