SAN FRANCISCO — Jimmy Butler had 21 points, five rebounds and five assists, Stephen Curry added 19 points and eight assists, and the Golden State Warriors beat the Clippers 98-79 on Tuesday night.

Curry shot 7 for 15 a night after four Warriors players scored 20 or more points to beat Memphis — but it marked just the sixth time in Curry’s 17 seasons he wasn’t one of them.

Butler and Moses Moody each hit three-pointers late in the third quarter as the Warriors used a 10-2 burst over the final 2:07 to go ahead 78-63 starting the fourth.

Brandin Podziemski followed up a 23-point performance against the Grizzlies with 12 points, while Quinten Post had 12 points on four three-pointers and eight rebounds.

James Harden scored all 20 of his points by halftime while Kawhi Leonard added 18 points and five rebounds in a game featuring a 13-point second quarter by Golden State followed by the Clippers’ 14-point third.

Harden’s three with 41 seconds left in the first half gave the Clippers their first lead heading into halftime ahead 49-46 after ending the second quarter on a 24-6 run.

Ivica Zubac contributed 14 points and a season-best 13 rebounds for the cold-shooting Clippers, who went 6 for 33 from long range and 30 of 82 overall (36.6%).

The CLippers had won the last seven in the series and three in a row at Chase Center, where the Warriors improved to 3-0 so far.

Al Horford was back for the Warriors against the tall, physical Clippers team featuring the 7-foot Zubac after sitting out the front end of the back-to-back to manage a left toe injury.

The Clippers began six for 20 and one for eight on threes to fall behind 27-14 on a night they missed Bradley Beal for a second consecutive game because of back soreness.

Legendary rapper Jay-Z came out in defense of Bad Bunny amid controversy over the Puerto Rican recording artist being tapped to perform at the Super Bowl LX halftime show.

Jay-Z’s company Roc Nation co-produces the halftime show for the NFL and reportedly makes the final decision on the headline each year. This year, the selection of Bad Bunny has drawn pushback from fans.

But Jay-Z wasn’t buying the outrage.

“They love him. Don’t let them fool you,” he told TMZ Sports on Monday night.

Jay-Z didn’t go too much further, telling the TMZ reporter that he “ain’t got no scoops for you.”

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell defended the selection of Bad Bunny, despite the Grammy Award winner’s comments about U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) over the last year.

“It’s carefully thought through,” Goodell said of the decision-making process for the halftime show. “I’m not sure we’ve ever selected an artist where we didn’t have some blowback or criticism. It’s pretty hard to do when you have literally hundreds of millions of people that are watching.”

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Bad Bunny, whose birth name is Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, has caught flak from President Donald Trump and his supporters given his public comments about the president and his administration. The 31-year-old expressed fears about ICE, which is why he decided to do a residency in his native Puerto Rico to avoid stops in the United States.

He said last month he didn’t book any U.S. dates on his tour over fears his fans would be detained by ICE agents.

“But there was the issue of, like, f—ing ICE could be outside [my concert]. And it’s something that we were talking about and very concerned about,” he told i-D.

Bad Bunny also recorded and posted video of what he described as local ICE raids to social media in Puerto Rico.

“Look, those motherf——s are in these cars, RAV-4s. They’re here in Pontezuela,” he said in Spanish, mentioning ICE working on the Avenida Pontezuela in Carolina, a city east of Puerto Rico’s capital, San Juan.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell looks on during a press conference at Caesars Superdome on February 03, 2025 in New Orleans, Louisiana ahead of the NFL Super Bowl LIX football game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Kansas City Chiefs. (Michael Owens/Getty Images)

Some NFL fans had an issue not only with those comments, but with his hit songs all being sung in Spanish. But Goodell has no qualms with the show he’s expecting from Bad Bunny.

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“We’re confident it’s going to be a great show,” Goodell said. “He understands the platform that he’s on, and I think it’s going to be exciting and a united moment.”

Fox News’ Scott Thompson contributed to this report.

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For all the times the Toronto Blue Jays walked Shohei Ohtani, they lost Game 3 of the World Series because of the one time they did not walk him.

They learned their lesson, four times over.

Here’s another Babe Ruth comparison: Ruth played in 41 World Series games. He was intentionally walked twice.

On Monday, in one World Series game, Ohtani was intentionally walked four times.

The situation called for it — no, begged for it — in the seventh inning. The Blue Jays led, 5-4, with one out and the bases empty. Ohtani already had batted three times, with two doubles and a home run.

On a night they would eventually use four pinch-runners, they already had removed two of their four most potent bats in George Springer and Bo Bichette. They needed to win in regulation, and they were eight outs away. As Ohtani stepped to the mound, the Jays held a conference on the mound.

There really wasn’t much to discuss. Their pitcher, Seranthony Domínguez, had held right-handers to a .132 batting average and .451 OPS this season — and left-handers to a .277 average and .816 OPS.

Mookie Betts, who bats right-handed, was on deck. Freddie Freeman, who bats left-handed, would have followed Betts, but he did not have three extra-base hits already.

The Blue Jays did not issue the obvious intentional walk to Ohtani.

“We’re trying to pitch around him,” Toronto manager John Schneider said. “You trust Seranthony to make pitches to do that. Sometimes for pitchers it’s hard to do that when you’re kind of trying to throw a ball and didn’t put it where you want to put it.”

To recap: We’re not trying to throw him a strike, but we’re not going to walk him intentionally.

Sure, he might chase a pitch and strike out or make weak contact. But, if you pitch to Ohtani, you might miss your pitch and, if he’s swinging, he might hit a home run.

Domínguez missed, right down the middle. Ohtani’s home run tied the score 5-5.

“After that,” Schneider said, “you just kind of take the bat out of his hands.”

The Blue Jays intentionally walked Ohtani in each of his next four plate appearances, three times with the bases empty and once with a runner on third base.

Shohei Ohtani looks at home plate umpire Mark Wegner as he is intentionally walked in the 13th inning of Game 3 of the World Series against the Blue Jays on Monday.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

Too late. The Blue Jays and their increasingly patchwork lineup played another 11 innings, without scoring. The Dodgers won in 18 innings, 6-5, and they can close within one victory of the World Series championship on Tuesday.

In all, Ohtani reached base nine times, setting a postseason record. He became the first player in postseason history with multiple home runs, doubles and walks in the same game. And not since Frank Isbell of the 1906 Chicago White Sox had a player put up four extra-base hits in a World Series game.

Ruth had Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig batting behind him, but the two guys batting behind Ohtani could wind up Hall of Famers too: eight-time All-Star Mookie Betts and nine-time All-Star Freddie Freeman, each a former most valuable player.

“There’s certain times where I feel like, you feel like, you feel better about someone else beating you,” Schneider said. “If that someone else is Mookie Betts or Freddie Freeman, it still stings.”

Freeman hit the walk-off home run. Schneider said he would continue to walk Ohtani.

He has no choice. Balls fly in warm weather at Dodger Stadium. The marine layer knocked down several potential home runs Monday, but a heat advisory has been issued for Southern California on Tuesday and Wednesday, with the game-time temperature predicted at 87 degrees Tuesday and potentially a little warmer Wednesday.

“I get it,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “He’s the best player on the planet, and he was on the heels of a huge offensive night, and John smelled that and wasn’t going to let Shohei beat him at all, obviously, and even when nobody’s on base and putting him on to make the other guys beat him.”

Highlights from the Dodgers’ 6-5 win in 18 innings over the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 3 of the World Series at Dodger Stadium.

Technically, one of the other guys beat the Blue Jays on Monday. But Freeman would not have had the opportunity to beat them in the 18th inning had the Blue Jays won in nine innings, which they would have had Ohtani not hit that home run in the seventh.

Only after that did the walk-a-thon commence.

“When you’re that hot and you’re hitting balls right-center, left-center like Shohei was tonight, you just knew he was feeling good. So that’s the right move,” Freeman said. “You don’t want Shohei to beat you, and you let other guys try and beat you after his first four at-bats. It took a lot longer, but we finally did it.”

The Angels adopted that strategy in the 2002 World Series. They walked Barry Bonds 13 times in the seven-game series, including three intentional walks in the first five innings of Game 4.

Is Ohtani in line for the full Bonds treatment?

“I think it’s all relative,” said Roberts, a teammate of Bonds with the San Francisco Giants.

“Barry’s the greatest hitter I’ve ever seen, but in this day and age there’s just him or maybe (Aaron) Judge. We’re just fortunate we have Mookie and Freddie behind him. But you just don’t see that type of behavior from opposing managers, and that’s just the ultimate sign of respect.”

Benito Santiago, a five-time All-Star, batted behind Bonds in 2002. No disrespect intended, but Betts and Freeman are more complete offensive threats.

Monday marked the 23rd anniversary of the Angels’ lone World Series championship, won in some measure because they did not let Bonds beat them. The Blue Jays have decided they won’t let Ohtani beat them, but that decision might have come too late.