Hip Hop News

One of the biggest video game franchises in the world is NBA 2K and every single year, the game gets a brand new iteration that represents the current NBA season. With each passing year, the game receives some graphical updates all while new features are added to appease gamers who want to justify spending $60 on the same game every year. While 2K has received criticism in the past, “NBA 2K22” is looking to right the wrongs from last year, and it seems like some interesting modes could be introduced.

As always, there will be a career mode where you can create your own player and have them rise up the ranks from high school to college all the way to the pros. Once you get drafted by an NBA team, you can lead your squad to victory and maybe even win some championships. In “NBA 2K22,” however, there is going to be an added component to the career mode.

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According to Screen Rant, the game is set to have side careers that your character can participate in if they so choose. One of those paths is to pursue a career in hip-hop. Over the years, various basketball players have made music, including the likes of Damian Lillard, Andre Drummond, Lonzo Ball, and Marvin Bagley, just to name a few. With that being said, this mode could prove to be a unique addition to the game.

“NBA 2K22” is set to drop in just a couple of months from now, and below, you can find all of the various covers which include Dirk Nowitzki, Kevin Durant, Luka Doncic, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and even Candace Parker.

Also, check out our long-form piece on the history of NBA rappers, right here.

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After winning a championship with the Toronto Raptors in 2019, Kawhi Leonard quickly became the hottest commodity in the entire NBA. He was pursued by numerous teams in free agency and in the end, he had his choice between the Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Clippers, and Raptors. Eventually, Kawhi decided to go home to Los Angeles and play for the Clippers, who went out and got Paul George to complement Kawhi’s skill set.

While the Clippers have been a good regular-season team, Kawhi and PG have yet to lead the team to the NBA Finals, despite being title favorites over the last two seasons. Now, Kawhi has a player option for next season and it is expected that he will decline the option so that he can get paid more, all while testing free agency again.

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Many felt like this was simply a formality and that Leonard would be back with the Clippers no matter what. According to Marc Stein, this might not be the case as sources are saying that there are no guarantees when it comes to Leonard’s status. Teams like the Miami Heat, New York Knicks, and Dallas Mavericks are preparing themselves for this reality, which is yet another indicator that Leonard might be serious about moving teams.

This would certainly be a drastic move, and for now, fans aren’t buying it. As you can see in the tweet below, NBA fans believe it would be weak for Kawhi to leave Los Angeles and that as it stands, the Clippers give him the best shot at winning the title.

Let us know what you think Kawhi should do, in the comments below.

Iggy Azalea has reached the peak of her frustration with social media trolls. In what was supposed to be a simple, yet endearing post on the Gram about her son, has instead, became a target for online haters to express their negative opinions about Onyx’s outfit and Azalea’s parenting, respectively.

Soon after venting her frustrations on social media, Iggy announced, “I’ve decided I won’t be posting about onyx or sharing images online anymore. Y’all not about to be out here playing with my baby on my watch, nope!” 

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Iggy Azalea’s now deleted Instagram post included a picture of the one-year old son Onyx she shares with Playboi Carti, dressed in a dinosaur costume with the caption “His outfit of choice today.” The scathing comments in response to his ‘fit then ensued, with users on Twitter clowning the young child’s outfit, questioning the “Kream” rapper’s parenting skills, and asking on the whereabouts of Playboi Carti, Azalea’s former love interest. 

Iggy Azalea fired back, including some roasts of her own, and after giving it a day to mull over, it seems she’s taken Safaree’s advice.

Check out the tweets that led Iggy to remove her son’s likeness from social media below.

Joe Rogan’s vendetta against Saturday Night Live continued this week when he spoke with short-lived SNL contributor Shane Gillis. After making comments about the overly-woke atmosphere around the show a few months ago, the host of the Joe Rogan Podcast took an alternative angle to attack the show, this time calling it “a den of thieves.” Rogan was referring to the show’s writers and comedians habit of stealing material and jokes, which was corroborated by Gillis who worked on the show for only a four-day period.

“You hear Jim Breuer’s account of the climate in that place and it’s horrific,” Rogan starts, referencing his own interview with Breuer, an SNL cast member in the 90s. “They’re all stealing from writers, they’re stealing from performers. If you’re a writer and you submit your packages, the higher-up writers will steal your shit, according to Breuer,” Rogan said. The host continued to describe the process by which the show steals material: “If you submit a package, they own that package, even if they don’t hire you. So if you have some great premises, they decide they’re just going to take your premises and not hire you, they own all those bits.”

Gillis corroborated the accusations and echoed Breuer’s claims that cast members would take content from each other or those who would send in ideas. Gillis was fired from SNL 2019 after working there for just four days after a video surfaced of the comedian using racial slurs. 

There has been no response from the show, and there probably won’t be. Check out the full episode with Gillis and Rogan below, or stream the clip in particular about SNL.

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Even though new albums don’t always get a proper physical release, music is still one of the most long-lasting forms of media. Where interviews or videos on YouTube may disappear, the albums, EPs, and singles that artists leave behind tend to stand the test of time. Roddy Ricch may agree with that sentiment because on Kanye West’s imminent tenth studio album Donda, the Please Excuse Me for Being Antisocial artist took a moment to officially squash any lingering differences between the two Grammy award-winning rappers.

For those unfamiliar with the tension between Roddy Ricch and Ye, the former artist found himself in a befuddled state after stumbling across the video that Kanye West posted to Twitter that featured him urinating on one of his Grammy trophies.

The video reportedly irritated Roddy to the point that the typically anti-social media artist ranted about West’s actions on Instagram.

“If I get nominated for six Grammys, and a n***a I look to have twenty-five of these muthaf*ckas, and I come in here and I want to get nominated for six this year,” Roddy can be heard saying in the clip. “I feel that’s a good number. And this year, the n***a just piss on that sh*t. How you think that made the world look at my accomplishment? That I worked for. I did all this sh*t! And you pissing on sh*t. That sh*t be lame.”

Roddy Ricch’s criticism eventually went viral, and months later, he hit Big Boy’s Neighborhood for an interview and discussed the situation further. 

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When speaking to Big Boy, Roddy explained that he had initially just reacted off of pure emotion, and he clarified that there was no bad blood between him and the Jesus Is King artist. 

“I feel like what I was saying, I needed to gather my thoughts more and say it how I wanted to say it. What I was saying was I grew up looking to a Kanye or Jay as like, if I do this, I wanna have twenty [Grammys] because that’s what they did,” the 22-year-old artist remarked. “When I seen [Kanye] pissing on a Grammy, it kinda rubbed me wrong ’cause I was like, damn n***a, now that I’m getting nominated, I feel like everybody’s sh*tting on the accolades….In that moment, that’s more so what I was thinking. No disrespect to Kanye because he’s a legend. He’s the guy. I pulled up on him, we chopped it up so it ain’t no disrespect to him.”

Although he didn’t talk in further detail about what pulling up on Kanye was like, it turns out that the two creative forces eventually teamed up for one of the songs on DONDA. A snippet from the listening event in Atlanta has surfaced that previews Roddy’s contribution to the album, and during the clip, you can hear Roddy recounting that aforementioned moment on wax.

In the snippet, Roddy airs out his grievances with Ye once and for all, rapping, “They said I was mad at the Grammys, but I’m looking at my Grammy right now/Pulled up on Ye and said they don’t understand me, I just want my dog to pipe down.“

The audio quality of Roddy Ricch’s feature isn’t the best, but seeing that we’re still awaiting the official release of DONDA, it will have to do for the time being. Check it out below.