Hip Hop News

The late Laker legend, Kobe Bryant, was honored at the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, Saturday, having been inducted as a member of the Class of 2020. In his place, his wife, Vanessa Bryant spoke during the ceremony.

“I do know that he would thank everyone that helped him get here,” Vanessa said. “Including the people that doubted him, and the people that worked against him, and told him he couldn’t obtain his goals. He would thank all of them for motivating him to be here. After all, he proved you wrong.”

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Michael Jordan stood by her side as she continued to congratulate her late husband.

“Congratulations, baby,” Vanessa continued. “All of your hard work and sacrifice has paid off. You once told me, ‘If you’re going to bet on someone, bet on yourself.’ I’m glad you bet on yourself, you overachiever. You did it, you’re in the Hall of Fame now. You’re a true champ. You’re not just an MVP, you’re an all-time great. I’m so proud of you. I love you forever and always, Kobe Bean Bryant.”

Bryant, an 18-time All-Star and five-time champion, is universally considered to be one of the greatest basketball players of all time.

Others inducted into the Hall of Fame on Saturday include Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett, Patrick Baumann, Tamika Catchings, Kim Mulkey, Barbara Stevens, Eddie Sutton, and Rudy Tomjanovich.

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Tom MacDonald dropped $100,000 on one of Eminem’s original NFTs, the instrumental for “Stan’s Revenge,” and turned it into his own three-minute track, “Dear Slim.”

“Whether you love me or hate me or think I’m crazy, dropped a hundred grand to get a beat from Shady, I really hope when I bought it he wasn’t angry, but I really had to tell him that he made me,” MacDonald raps on the song.

Eminem partnered with NiftyGateway back in April for Shady Con, an event where the legendary rapper debuted numerous unique NFTs that would be available for purchase.

“I’ve been collecting since I was a kid, everything from comic books to baseball cards to toys, as well as every rap album on cassette I could get my hands on,” Eminem explained in an official statement ahead of the event. “Not much has changed for me as an adult. I’ve attempted to re-create some of those collections from that time in my life, and I know I’m not alone. I wanted to give this drop the same vibe of, ‘Oh, man I gotta get just that one or maybe even the whole set!’ It’s been a lot of fun coming up with ideas from my own collecting passion.”

MacDonald wrote about his decision to purchase the NFT on Twitter, Saturday night.

“’Dear Slim’ was probably the most expensive & creative Thank You in Hip-Hop history. I cant even pretend to give a fuck if you don’t like it…I’m not humble enough to downplay how dope it was…and I’m not too cool to acknowledge the man who inspired me. Suck it.”

As of Saturday, the song has over 2.3 million views on YouTube.

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50 Cent’s series For Life has been canceled at ABC after two seasons, Deadline revealed on Friday, due to low ratings for the network. The show was inspired by the story of Isaac Wright Jr.

Series star Nicholas Pinnock says not to blame ABC for its decision and that For Life isn’t a network show. Pinnock explained his stance in a series of posts on Twitter:

I am in no way bitter with ABC for not renewing For Life for a third season. ABC has been nothing but supportive of our show, and has championed it from the start. So I won’t have you bad-mouthing them. I can tell you firsthand how great they have been to me and to our show. Sadly, the live audience numbers didn’t reflect and equal the social media attention,” he continued. “The catch-up numbers were really good, but that doesn’t fit the model of a network show.

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Sony Pictures TV is expected to shop the program to other networks in an attempt to keep the series alive.

“If we do manage to secure another home for [For Life] … I can promise you we will continue to make a show that is beyond worthy of your time and engagement,” Pinnock added.

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Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid gave a shout-out to his former general manager, Sam Hinkie, after the team clinched the number one seed in the Eastern Conference standings, Friday.

“Trust the Process… Sam Hinkie knew,” Emiid said, echoing Hinkie’s iconic motto.

Rich Hofmann of The Athletic reports that 76ers president Daryl Morey told Emiid to reference the quote.

“Being the top seed helps a lot from home-court advantage. Definitely helps a lot as we’ve been dominant at home. We barely lose here… So it means a lot to have the No. 1 seed,” Embiid added.

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Hinkie served as the 76ers GM from 2013-16 and was a fierce supporter of advanced statistics. He was often accused of “tanking” to receive better draft picks.

Head coach Doc Rivers, who joined Philadelphia at the start of the season, described the accomplishment as “part of what you can get on the way to what you want.” 

“It’s an accomplishment. I don’t want to downplay it, but I told our guys to enjoy, I don’t want to call it a moment, I told them to enjoy the second, because it’s not what we want, but it’s part of what you can get on the way to what you want,” Rivers said after the game.

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Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid gave a shout-out to his former general manager, Sam Hinkie, after the team clinched the number one seed in the Eastern Conference standings, Friday.

“Trust the Process… Sam Hinkie knew,” Emiid said, echoing Hinkie’s iconic motto.

Rich Hofmann of The Athletic reports that 76ers president Daryl Morey told Emiid to reference the quote.

“Being the top seed helps a lot from home-court advantage. Definitely helps a lot as we’ve been dominant at home. We barely lose here… So it means a lot to have the No. 1 seed,” Embiid added.

Tim Nwachukwu / Getty Images

Hinkie served as the 76ers GM from 2013-16 and was a fierce supporter of advanced statistics. He was often accused of “tanking” to receive better draft picks.

Head coach Doc Rivers, who joined Philadelphia at the start of the season, described the accomplishment as “part of what you can get on the way to what you want.” 

“It’s an accomplishment. I don’t want to downplay it, but I told our guys to enjoy, I don’t want to call it a moment, I told them to enjoy the second, because it’s not what we want, but it’s part of what you can get on the way to what you want,” Rivers said after the game.

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Following a delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic, The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame welcomed the Class of 2020, Saturday. The inductees included Tim Duncan, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, and more. Garnett praised Duncan and the late Bryant during his speech at the induction ceremony.

“I wanted to say, Timmy, thank you, man,” Garnett said. “Congratulations to you and Kob, seriously. There was nothing [more] epic than when we battled, I looked forward to all the battles, seriously. And I thank you for taking you to another level, you and Rasheed [Wallace]. I appreciate you. It’s an honor to go in the Hall with you, bro, you, and Kob. Congratulations Vanessa, I love y’all.”

“My only regret in Minnesota was that I wasn’t able to bring them a championship,” Garnett added.

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Garnett is widely considered one of the greatest power-forwards of all time. He won the NBA’s Most Valuable Player award in 2004 and help win the Celtics an NBA Championship in 2008. Garnett was selected to 15 All-Star teams throughout his 21-season career.

Others included in the class are Patrick Baumann, Tamika Catchings, Kim Mulkey, Barbara Stevens, Eddie Sutton, and Rudy Tomjanovich.

Check out Garnett’s speech below.

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Chance the Rapper says that he is working on a “hood” reboot of Home Alone. The Coloring Book rapper discussed the film project with Jimmy Fallon on the latest episode of The Tonight Show.

“It’s a Chicago film, and since I was younger I was like, ‘What if there was a hood Home Alone—or Hood Alone if you will,” he told Fallon. “Just a little more realistic story about people trying to kick at the doors at the wrong house. And hilarity ensues, I can’t give you too many details.”

“It’s up for grabs if you want to get in on this project,” Chance added, offering a role to Fallon.

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A Home Alone reboot won’t be the first time Chance will have worked in film. In addition to having provided his voice acting skills in The Lion King, he is also releasing a concert film, Magnificent Coloring World, later this year, which will be shown in AMC theaters.

“Basically, it’s four years old. It was a film that I shot right after I won the Grammys in 2017,” he told Fallon. “I came back to Chicago right after finishing up this tour, getting ready to go on another one, I just had this idea that I wanted to do this concert but specifically for film and it’d be shot like a movie and eventually put it out in theatres.”

“It came together in like three weeks a bunch of years back,” he said, “but I didn’t really know a lot about film at all or how to edit or anything. So about three weeks ago, I sent out for the film and brought it to the studio house and worked tirelessly on it with about 20 people and shot some new stuff.” 

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