Sports

How the House v. NCAA settlement could reshape college sports: What you need to know

Published

7 months ago

May 23, 2024

How the House v. NCAA settlement could reshape college sports: What you need to know

Big 12 presidents and chancellors voted to approve proposals of what is expected to be a multi-billion dollar settlement in the House v. NCAA class-action lawsuit Tuesday, a source briefed on the decision confirmed to The Athletic. Their approval is another step toward a resolution in the landmark case likely to reshape the college sports business model.

The Big 12 is the first of the suit’s defendants to vote on the settlement terms, with the remaining power conferences and NCAA Board of Governors also expected to do so this week. It’s expected the settlement will cost them nearly $3 billion in damages and allow power-conference athletes to finally share in annual revenues.

House v. NCAA seeks back pay for Division I college athletes who were barred from earning name, image and likeness (NIL) compensation prior to the NCAA changing its policy in summer 2021, while also pursuing a cut of future broadcast revenues for athletes at power-conference schools.

As college sports face a reckoning on multiple fronts, and with the prospect of the NCAA owing as much as $20 billion in damages were it to lose the House case at trial, settlement efforts intensified in recent weeks.

In addition to more than $2.7 billion in NIL back-pay damages, a settlement would include a system in which roughly $20 million a year can be distributed directly from a power-conference school to its athletes, multiple people briefed on the negotiations confirmed to The Athletic.

All indications are that the last vestiges of amateurism in college sports are coming to an end.

“I expect the athletes who are generating the most money would get the greatest economic return,” said Jeffrey Kessler, one of the lead lawyers representing the plaintiffs. “That’s the economic competitive market we live in.”

A House settlement would be the next legal domino in what has been a busy stretch of forced change for the NCAA, including the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upholding the NCAA v. Alston decision in 2021 and agreeing that the NCAA’s cap on education-related expenses was an antitrust violation. State legislatures helped usher in the NIL era weeks later. Lawsuits filed by multiple state attorneys general have since forced the NCAA to halt enforcement of NIL regulations and allow multi-time transfers immediate eligibility.

Over the past three years, these lawsuits and policy changes have created (and exposed) cracks in the foundation of the collegiate model.

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“The most important part about the settlement — and let’s face it, there’s still a lot of work to be done there — is it creates some clarity and some visibility on a whole bunch of issues that have sort of been roiling everybody for a while,” NCAA president Charlie Baker said last week. “The other thing it does is create predictability and stability for schools. It creates a tremendous opportunity for student-athletes.”

So what does this mean for fans of college sports? Most immediately, it simply means that the power-conference programs you follow and root for, which bring in millions of dollars in revenue annually from television contracts and ticket sales, can start paying athletes with that money — a significant budgetary adjustment, but not so functionally different from how school-affiliated NIL collectives have started paying players.

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Yet in the broader scope, this settlement will further widen the gap between high-major revenue sports — particularly power-conference football — and the rest of college athletics. It’s another step toward a future in which the biggest programs stratify or fully separate from the rest of the NCAA into some version of super conferences or a super league. To that end, there’s also been some organized, internal pushback within the NCAA from smaller Division I conferences that believe they will be forced to shoulder a disproportionate amount of the damages in the proposed settlement.

Plenty of hurdles remain beyond the House case as well, including whether athletes will ultimately unionize and/or be deemed employees, or if the NCAA can secure antitrust exemptions from Congress. Regardless, big changes are on the horizon, and in a way the NCAA has long fought.

Here’s more on what’s at stake in House v. NCAA, and what could come next.

Potential settlement details

The NCAA is backed into a corner.

House v. NCAA was filed in June 2020 with Grant House, a former Arizona State swimmer, and Sedona Prince, a former Oregon and current TCU women’s basketball player, as the two named plaintiffs. In November, U.S. District Court Judge Claudia Wilken, who has a track record of ruling against the NCAA in similar cases (O’Bannon, Alston), granted class-action certification for the damages portion of the House case, expanding it to any Division I athlete dating back to 2016 (in accordance with a four-year statute of limitations).

This exponentially elevated the potential cost — and impact — of the case, which is currently scheduled to go to trial in January 2025.

U.S. antitrust laws grant plaintiffs three times the damages they are awarded — known as “treble damages” — meaning if the NCAA lost at trial, it would automatically be on the hook for triple the damage amount ordered by the judge. According to documents circulated among power conference presidents and administrators and obtained by Yahoo Sports, that final class-action figure could be as high as $20 billion, and enough to force the NCAA to file for bankruptcy.

A loss at trial would also strike down any existing constraints on NIL.

“So essentially, if we win, there would be a complete free market in NIL, including from broadcast payments,” said Kessler.

The combination of triple damages, which would likely have to be paid out immediately, and the NIL floodgates fully opening would be a death rattle for the NCAA, and why a settlement is seen as the surest path to the organization’s survival, at least in the short term.

Through a spokesperson, the NCAA declined to comment.

Certain details of the settlement, though not finalized, have been reported by multiple outlets and confirmed to The Athletic. The nearly $3 billion in back-pay damages would be paid out over 10 years, and power-conference programs could opt into the annual $20 million revenue-sharing allocation likely starting with the 2025-26 season.

This would coincide with a change in roster limits that would eliminate existing caps on scholarships, such as a baseball team’s 11.7 scholarships that get divvied up among 30-plus players. If the baseball roster limit was set at 25, for example, schools would have 25-player teams and could fully fund up to 25 scholarships. This impacts football as well, where teams currently have 85 allotted scholarships but can carry up to 115 total players on the roster. There’s fear among coaches that the new roster limit could eliminate walk-ons.

“Our game is not the pro game,” said Wake Forest coach Dave Clawson, a member of the American Football Coaches Association board. “We get players that need to be taught and coached when they come out of high school. …(In the NFL), they have a practice squad, they have access to players and other teams. Once we start practice, our roster is set for the year, and they have to be students.”

ACC commissioner Jim Phillips said those roster determinations would be “local decisions” for each university, with better-resourced schools likely to do more than others within the Power 4 leagues. Roster limits are expected to be part of Thursday’s vote by the conferences, and multiple administrators told The Athletic that they expect specific scholarship figures to be decided collectively by the Power 4 conferences in the coming months.

What the NCAA could avoid with a settlement

The compromises of a possible House settlement are obvious, but so are the benefits. The NCAA doesn’t risk the immediately payable treble damages at trial and can negotiate terms on a revenue-sharing model while maintaining a similar operating structure.

College athletes receive scholarships and other benefits, but the anticipated rate of revenue sharing wouldn’t be nearly as high as their counterparts in the pros. The roughly $20 million annual amount represents 22 percent of the average Power 4 school’s annual revenue. Revenue sharing in the major American professional sports is usually around 50 percent for the players.

A settlement would also address another major NCAA issue by simultaneously resolving other high-profile antitrust cases, including Hubbard v. NCAA and Carter v. NCAA; plaintiffs in both cases are also represented by Steve Berman and Kessler.

Hubbard is similar to House in the sense that it is seeking retroactive damages for education-related Alston payments; Carter argues that rules prohibiting college athletes from receiving “pay for play” violate antitrust law. A House settlement would resolve each of them.

One other antitrust case factors in: Fontenot v. NCAA, a separate, class-action suit filed in Colorado that is seeking similar claims and damages as Carter. A motion to transfer the case to the same Northern District of California court as the other antitrust suits has been requested, ostensibly to have it resolved by a settlement in the House case. A hearing on the transfer is also set for Thursday.

Resolving all four antitrust cases — House, Hubbard, Carter and Fontenot — is a crucial aspect of the settlement for the NCAA, according to people briefed on the negotiations.

“In the current world we live in, planning is very hard to do,” Baker said. “If we can land this thing … I think it creates a lot of stability and clarity for schools. And it makes it possible for all of us to start thinking about what the next act will look like as it rolls out instead of feeling like you’re waiting for the next shoe to drop.”

How it would work

Assuming the NCAA and power conferences sign off on terms this week, there would still be a number of steps to complete a settlement, including official filing, an approval from Judge Wilken and a 90-day period for review and any objections.

If approved, the power-conference revenue sharing will be optional, and there are no specifications on how the money will be distributed, as long as it stays within the capped allotment.

It’s expected that most if not all power-conference programs will opt in to some degree of revenue sharing in order to remain competitive. But even for a number of the schools at that level, it could be a gradual financial process that requires cuts elsewhere.

“As it currently stands, I don’t know many schools that will be able to pay even remotely close to ($20 million) without eliminating some portion of what they currently spend,” said Iowa State athletic director Jamie Pollard.

For back-pay damages, the NCAA would use its reserves to cover $1.1 billion, and the remaining approximately $1.6 billion would come from withheld revenue distributions, chiefly via the NCAA men’s basketball tournament credits. Of that $1.6 billion, nearly 60 percent is expected to come from leagues outside the Power 4 conferences (including the Group of 5), according to people familiar with the settlement proposal.

The 22 smaller, non-FBS conferences (colloquially referred to as the CCA22) were not initially briefed on the settlement talks until earlier this month, multiple administrators said, once the financial structure of payouts had already been formulated.

One Division I commissioner estimated that non-FBS conferences would be on the hook for $2.5 million per year to help cover the NCAA’s costs of the settlement. Two sources in different CCA22 leagues said that equates to roughly 25 percent of the annual revenue those schools receive from the NCAA. That level of reduction could lead to cutting sports and athlete resources, despite a lawsuit that was clearly aimed at power-conference schools with the most lucrative media deals.

“The burden that’s being pushed to us is not following any sort of logic as it relates to the court order,” one non-Power 4 source said.

However, the damages payment model that is being voted on is a slightly tweaked version of the original breakdown put forth by the NCAA, a college administrator briefed on the proposal told The Athletic. That’s despite the non-FBS leagues submitting a formal request to the NCAA’s Board of Governors and Division I Board of Directors on Monday, according to sources briefed on the proposal, asking to either delay a final decision on the financial breakdown or adjust it to an equivalent rate of revenue reductions for each conference. The latter would have made the power conferences responsible for roughly 60 percent of the damages.

The Board of Directors and Board of Governors (the NCAA’s highest governing body) are also scheduled to vote on settlement details this week, including authorizing the NCAA to use its financial reserves.

Another area to be addressed is how the terms of a settlement apply to the new classes of athletes each year. Berman mentioned a potential solution.

“Every year, when an NCAA athlete reports in to start the year, they could be given a copy of the class notice and the settlement, and given an opportunity to object within a few months receiving that notice,” said Berman.

Jim Cavale, the founder of the players organization Athletes.org, questions the forward-looking part of the settlement, saying it lacked athlete input. His organization includes about 1,500 power-conference athletes and recently signed up the entire UAB football team.

“How involved are the current athletes?” he said. “On top of that, how involved if at all are future athletes on these terms? The answer is not at all. The results of a (collective bargaining agreement), the terms of the athlete experience and even these caps are not really the responsibility of these plaintiffs’ lawyers in a class-action lawsuit.”

Some industry sources believe there could be less incentive or motivation for players to unionize once they’re getting a piece of the pie. Cavale disagrees.

“Should it be approved, if we got 500 of our 3,000 athletes to object, the way it’s written, you’re going to have 500 different hearings,” he said.

Other unknowns

Plenty more questions remain.

• How will Title IX apply to revenue-sharing distributions? Will proportional payments need to be made to male and female athletes in order to remain compliant — meaning an athletic department can’t spend all or most of its revenue-sharing dollars on football or other men’s sports — or would schools argue that proportional scholarship opportunities satisfy Title IX? This is not something that can be stipulated by the settlement and could be challenged in court. Multiple administrators at Power 4 schools told The Athletic they believe the total dollar figure needs to be equal between male and female athletes, but that their understanding is that each school can determine how to allot the money between its athletes and sports.

• How would this impact potential unionizing and collective bargaining ventures?. Unionizing efforts by the Dartmouth men’s basketball team and national advocacy organizations such as Cavale’s Athletes.Org and the College Football Players Association have yet to gain widespread support, a challenge within something as wide-ranging and transient as college sports. But the topic could receive renewed attention in the wake of a settlement, along with the ongoing discussion of whether college athletes should be deemed employees, which is at the heart of both the Johnson v. NCAA suit and a National Labor Relations Board complaint against USC, the Pac-12 and the NCAA.

In any event, settling House and resolving the other prominent antitrust lawsuits will not fully shield the NCAA from future legal battles, which is why Baker and the organization will continue to pursue Congressional antitrust exemptions.

“(A settlement) creates a framework that makes it possible to then have a different kind of conversation with Congress,” said Baker. “So, in many ways, I’m hopeful.”

• What about NIL collectives? A settlement wouldn’t fully address the role of these third-party organizations and the culture of pay for play, though Yahoo Sports reported that the informational documents it obtained mentioned “economic incentives” for athletic departments to bring collectives in-house.

• How will the financial adjustments trickle down? Will schools decide to cut athlete benefits, administrative positions or entire sports? Will this finally stem the tide of ballooning, seven-figure annual coaching salaries, bloated staffs and multi-million-dollar buyouts? Wholesale changes to the structure of collegiate athletics and the NCAA’s governance remain likely years away, but that doesn’t mean reverberations won’t be felt sooner in other areas.

“It could be the sports you sponsor,” Pollard said. “It could be what you do for the sports you sponsor. It could be the number of staff you have in football. It could be the number of players you have on a football team. Everything’s going to be on the table.”

—The Athletic’s Chris Vannini and Scott Dochterman contributed reporting.

(Photo Illustration: Pavlo Gonchar / SOPA Images / LightRocket via Getty Images)

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Sports

Most interesting NBA awards: An unknown Rookie of the Year? Wide-open Most Improved race?

Published

40 minutes ago

December 25, 2024

Press Room

Most interesting NBA awards: An unknown Rookie of the Year? Wide-open Most Improved race?

All your favorite characters are competing for the same NBA award once again.

Nikola Jokić is the MVP favorite. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander follows him up. Two-time winner Giannis Antetokounmpo is on their tails, as are Jayson Tatum and Luka Dončić. Those five made up First Team All-NBA last season. Now, they make up the quintet atop the 2024-25 MVP race.

Christmas isn’t just Santa’s day. It’s also the marker of when NBA talk reaches the public sphere, which means it’s time to discuss the battles for the league’s most prestigious awards.

For MVP, the fight isn’t so bloody. Jokić is the obvious No. 1 today. He’s three-tenths of an assist away from averaging a triple-double; the advanced metrics (which have always painted him as a higher being) are greater than ever; and the shooting splits are out of a video game. On top of it all, he’s nailing a league-leading 51 percent of his 3-pointers.

If the season ended today, a fourth Jokić MVP would be on the way. Of course, there are still more than four months to go.

It’s difficult to infuse a team’s record into any reasonable candidate’s argument right now. Jokić’s Denver Nuggets provide the perfect example.

Denver is 16-11, fifth in the Western Conference. It is only two back of second place in the loss column. Yet, it’s only two up of ninth place in the loss column.

One bad week, and the Nuggets are in the bottom half of the Play-In Tournament, which would bump Jokić down a slot or two. It’s difficult to dub someone MVP if his team isn’t in the playoffs, even if Jokić somehow breaks mathematics as we know them and starts shooting 107 percent from the field.

Gilgeous-Alexander could become the favorite to win his first MVP in that case. His Oklahoma City Thunder are atop the Western Conference, and he’s the leading reason. Or maybe the Milwaukee Bucks go on a run, which inspires a third trophy for Antetokounmpo. Neither Tatum nor Dončić is out of the race, either.

As of today, my ballot would include those five. Let’s go with:

Nikola Jokić
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
Giannis Antetokounmpo
Jayson Tatum
Luka Dončić

But the MVP race is not done — nor are others.

The NBA is littered with interesting awards races so far this season. Here are four more of them:

Who finishes second and third in Defensive Player of the Year?

Just look at how the Philadelphia 76ers ended the first quarter Monday night.

All they wanted to do was get up a shot, any shot, before the buzzer sounded. Their only strategy was to pray. That was not enough.

Kyle Lowry rose for a fadeaway jumper with seemingly no one around him, but the San Antonio Spurs employ one man whose arms appear twice the width of the court. That man swatted Lowry, then trailed Caleb Martin, who recovered the loose ball, and knocked Martin’s shot out of bounds at the buzzer.

We don’t need to call any award race over yet, especially because players must participate in at least 65 games to be eligible for most of them, but there is an obvious leader in Defensive Player of the Year. If Victor Wembanyama is on the court, you don’t score on the Spurs. He has 18 blocks over his past two games alone. He’s pacing to become the first player to average four rejections a game since Dikembe Mutombo in 1995-96 — and keep in mind, it was far easier to block shots then, considering how many more were inside the 3-point arc. The Spurs defense is more than 10 points per 100 possessions better when Wembanyama is on the court.

He is the world’s greatest defender right now. But who could follow him on the ballot?

Could there be an all-French top two? Rudy Gobert, the four-time winner of this award, has still helped the Minnesota Timberwolves to sixth in points allowed per possession, despite holes elsewhere on the roster. Opponents stop attacking the paint whenever Gobert is around. His team allows 8.3 percent fewer shots at the rim when he’s on the court, the largest differential for any player in the NBA, according to Cleaning the Glass. Almost all of those layups turn into midrange jumpers, not 3s.

Could it be Bam Adebayo, who has a similar effect on the Miami Heat’s opponent shot profile? Could Jaren Jackson Jr. contend for a second Defensive Player of the Year? Could Evan Mobley re-enter the conversation he was in a couple of years ago, when he finished second? The Cleveland Cavaliers own the best record in the league, and opponents are shooting 9.3 percentage points worse at the rim when Mobley is on the court, by far the largest differential in the NBA.

Could a perimeter player vault to the spot behind Wembanyama? Defensive Player of the Year is usually reserved for big men, but Dyson Daniels might have something to say about that. Daniels is getting steals on 4.4 percent of his possessions, the highest steal rate for any player since Tony Allen in 2010-11. He has 72 more deflections than De’Aaron Fox, who is second in the league. For reference, that’s the same difference as the one between Fox and 147th place. Daniels isn’t just a gambler. He’s a pest on the ball. Dribblers can’t jolt past him. As long as he keeps performing like this, he’s a lock for All-Defense, but he has two main knocks against him.

First, a perimeter player can’t affect team defense like a big man can. And second (which may just be further proof of the previous point), the Hawks are actually better defensively with Daniels off the court. And that’s not just because Daniels plays many of his minutes alongside the defensively challenged Trae Young. When Daniels is on the court and Young is off, the Hawks defense is a sieve.

If not Daniels, does OG Anunoby, an off-ball maestro who can cut off an entire side of the court, have a case to slide onto the ballot? How about Amen Thompson, who comes off the bench in Houston but still inspires fury among opposing starters like few others? The Rockets may be the NBA’s most-physical team defending the perimeter. No one there is better in that aspect than Thompson.

Ballot, as of today:
1. Victor Wembanyama
2. Dyson Daniels
3. Evan Mobley

What is a most improved player?

Franz Wagner was the obvious choice here, but an oblique injury will likely make him ineligible to win. And because of that, debating who is the most improved will say more about the debaters than it will about the candidates.

Is a vast improvement in shot-making the way to determine the victor? If so, the LA Clippers’ Norman Powell is the current favorite, but it’s still early enough and Powell’s scoring numbers (24.1 points per game and 47 percent 3-point shooting on 8.1 attempts a night) are so through the roof that there must be some regression on the way — though it’s not like Powell is putting up empty numbers. The Clippers are winning more than anyone could have expected, and their offense is more than 10 points per 100 possessions better with Powell on the court, according to Cleaning the Glass.

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Payton Pritchard has a case. He’s nearly doubled his 3-point volume, is sinking a higher percentage than ever, is the planet’s sneakiest offensive rebounder and has gone from cutesie, full-court-shot specialist to Sixth Man of the Year leader.

De’Andre Hunter is another player who’s hitting jumpers like never before, though he’s developed in other ways, too. He’s getting to the line more than ever. Hunter used to avoid contact. Now he finishes through it, a big sticking point for Hawks head coach Quin Snyder.

Yet, there are other types of improvement to deliberate.

Another Hawk, Jalen Johnson, should be on the list. Atlanta has handed more opportunities to Johnson this season, who is a better facilitator than ever. He’s never created his own shot this much and has never set up teammates like this. The Hawks offense is not just the Young show anymore. And Johnson is putting up the counting stats we normally associate with winners of this award: 19.4 points, 10.1 rebounds and 5.6 assists. He might be an All-Star this season.

RJ Barrett’s passing is worth a mention. Barrett has gone from looking for his shot first, second and third to learning how to change speeds in pick-and-rolls. He loves flinging cross-court zingers to shooters while leading the break. He had never posted a double-digit assist game coming into this season. He’s already done it five times in 2024-25. His assist rate right now is twice his career average.

Some other players who could sneak onto the list include Cade Cunningham (who is running an offense better than ever and should be an All-Star), Daniels (because of the defensive leap), Mobley (who is handling the ball more than ever in Cleveland) and Nikola Vučević (whose percentages put prime Dirk Nowitzki to shame and must be bound to come down but for now force his entry onto this list).

Ballot, as of today:
1. Jalen Johnson
2. Norman Powell
3. RJ Barrett

Who lands the final spot on the Rookie of the Year ballot?

As with M.I.P., one player had first place virtually locked up, and then that player (in this case, the 76ers’ Jared McCain) got hurt. Now, the race for Rookie of the Year has all the vibes of the one from 2017, when second-round pick Malcolm Brogdon won.

This season’s Brogdon is the Grizzlies’ Jaylen Wells, a fellow second-rounder who is starting for a top-three team in the West and has been highly efficient in the process. The Pelicans’ Yves Missi is doing his best to make something of a lost season in New Orleans. Tune into the Pels each month and Missi, a ferocious finisher and top-flight athlete, is doing something new a bit better.

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As with M.I.P., your third-place choice might say more about you than it does about the candidates.

The Spurs’ Stephon Castle has started for a winning team and is already a feisty defender, but the shooting isn’t up to snuff yet. The Grizzlies’ Zach Edey has missed some time and isn’t playing loads of minutes but is a scoring machine already. The Hawks’ Zaccharie Risacher cannot make a shot but is one of a few long defenders Atlanta has lining its wings. The Trail Blazers’ Donovan Clingan isn’t playing much but would own the NBA’s second-highest block rate (behind only Wembanyama) if he qualified for the league leaders. The Lakers’ Dalton Knecht isn’t connecting lately but has started occasionally for a winning team and is liable to catch fire at any point.

The candidates are underwhelming. But you have to choose three.

Ballot, as of today:
1. Jaylen Wells
2. Yves Missi
3. Stephon Castle

The Coach of the Year race

There isn’t a coach with a more difficult job this season than the Spurs’ Mitch Johnson, who had to take over a young team that hasn’t finished above .500 in six years after Gregg Popovich suffered a stroke. Yet, as the Spurs await Popovich’s return, they are 15-14. Just about every player is performing at his capabilities.

And yet, it doesn’t matter when it comes to awards.

Toss Johnson’s résumé into the same bin that held Luke Walton’s in 2016, when the Golden State Warriors went 39-4 after Walton took over temporarily for head coach Steve Kerr, who could not patrol the sidelines during that time because of a back injury. Johnson is not officially the head coach of the Spurs and thus is not eligible for Coach of the Year.

But even without him, there are too many qualified candidates to choose from. At least six coaches could justify first-place votes.

Kenny Atkinson took over a team that underwhelmed a season ago and has helped it to the best record in the NBA. The Cavs are 26-4.

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Jamahl Mosley’s Magic have suffered injury after injury. Paolo Banchero, the team’s sole All-Star, has played five games all season. Now, both Wagners (Franz and Moe) are out. Yet, Orlando’s identity is distinct. Battle the Magic and, win or lose, you will leave the arena with a sore back, neck, shoulder, knee — you name it. Most importantly, they’re winning: 19-12, fourth in the East.

Taylor Jenkins has transformed the 20-10 Grizzlies. If you think NBA teams all play the same style nowadays, check out Memphis. Jenkins and assistant Noah LaRoche have implemented an offense based around quirky cutting, stuff few others around the league are running. The Grizzlies use an extended rotation and don’t run their guys for many minutes. No one averages more than 28. It’s working. Memphis is a contender.

After Paul George left in free agency and without Kawhi Leonard even playing a game yet, the Clippers should not be this good, sitting at 17-13 as they await the return of Leonard. They guard like maniacs. Such is the beauty of employing Ty Lue, who has somehow never won this award.

Ime Udoka has the most typical case. The Rockets are the NBA’s surprise team. Their identity could not have adjusted more from its one before Udoka arrived in town. Houston tosses hound after hound at its opponents. It plays as hard as any team in the league. It’s disciplined. No one wants to face the Rockets, who are young, yet are second in the league in points allowed per possession.

Let’s throw reigning Coach of the Year Mark Daigneault into the mix, too. The Thunder are in the process of running away with the West despite a significant injury to rising star Chet Holmgren.

Voters could justify including the Heat’s Erik Spoelstra whenever they want. The New York Knicks’ Tom Thibodeau helped a renovated, offense-first roster to a 19-10 record. Michael Malone is navigating injuries aplenty and the loss of Kentavious Caldwell-Pope out West.

This is unquestionably the most gut-wrenching ballot to fill out right now.

Ballot, as of today:
1. Kenny Atkinson
2. Ime Udoka
3. Jamahl Mosley

(Top photo of Jaylen Wells: Justin Ford / Getty Images)

Sports

Netflix under pressure with Christmas Day NFL slate after Tyson-Paul streaming debacle

Published

1 hour ago

December 25, 2024

Press Room

Netflix under pressure with Christmas Day NFL slate after Tyson-Paul streaming debacle

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The NFL is giving fans a present on Christmas, with two high-profile matchups between AFC contenders with a lot of playoff implications.

The Kansas City Chiefs and Pittsburgh Steelers play at 1 p.m. ET, and the Baltimore Ravens and Houston Texans play at 4:30 p.m. ET, with both games streaming exclusively on Netflix.

After many had streaming issues during the Jake Paul-Mike Tyson fight in November, Netflix is under a lot of pressure to ensure their viewers don’t have any issues watching the games.

Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes is introduced prior to a game against the Houston Texans at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium. (Denny Medley-Imagn Images)

One Netflix subscriber even filed a lawsuit against Netflix for “breach of contract” because of constant glitches during the fight, per TMZ.

This will be the first time an NFL game has been streamed exclusively on Netflix, and no matter how the viewing experience is for fans on Wednesday, it won’t be the last game they see on the streaming service.

The NFL and Netflix announced in May that they agreed to a three-year deal where the streaming service will broadcast at least one Christmas Day game over the life of the deal.

Brandon Riegg, Netflix’s vice president of nonfiction series and sports, said the company learned from what went wrong in the Tyson-Paul fight.

“The sheer tonnage of people that came to watch was incredible. And for all the testing that the engineering team had done ahead of that, and I think they’re the best in the business, the only way to test something of that magnitude is to have something of that magnitude,” Riegg said.

PATRICK MAHOMES PLAYS THROUGH ANKLE SPRAIN TO LEAD CHIEFS TO VICTORY VS. TEXANS

Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Russell Wilson takes the field against the Cleveland Browns at Acrisure Stadium. (Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images)

“We never want to have technical issues or a disappointing experience for our members. There was a subset of people that were watching that struggled with that and we acknowledge that. The good news is they stress-tested the system to such a degree that there’s a lot of these fixes and improvements that they realized that they could make, and they’re applying all that stuff.”

Netflix’s first test will be a showdown between the Chiefs (14-1) and Steelers (10-5).

The Chiefs have already secured their ninth consecutive AFC West title and are now playing for the No. 1 seed in the AFC, which would grant them the all-important bye week.

If the Chiefs were to win on Wednesday, they would have the No. 1 seed locked up before Week 18, giving head coach Andy Reid a chance to rest his starters during the final week of the regular season.

The Chiefs are coming off a 27-19 win over the Texans on Saturday, where quarterback Patrick Mahomes played well. The star quarterback threw for 260 yards and a touchdown, while rushing for 33 yards and a touchdown despite playing through an ankle sprain.

RAVENS’ LAMAR JACKSON EAGER TO WATCH BEYONCÉ HALFTIME SHOW: ‘SORRY FELLAS’

Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver George Pickens breaks through the Bengals defense for a touchdown reception at Paycor Stadium in Cincinnati on Dec. 1, 2024. (IMAGN)

The Steelers, on the other hand, are coming off a tough 34-17 loss against their arch-rival Ravens on Saturday.

It looked like the Steelers were going to have a chance to come back after safety Minkah Fitzpatrick intercepted Lamar Jackson down 24-17 in the fourth quarter.

However, Ravens’ cornerback Marlon Humphrey thwarted any chance of a Steelers’ comeback with a Pick Six off Russell Wilson on the ensuing drive, putting the Ravens up 31-17 and effectively sealing the win.

The Steelers’ defense had a tough time handling running back Derrick Henry, who ran the ball 24 times for 162 yards in the win for Baltimore.

For the Steelers, their game against the Chiefs is crucial to winning the AFC North. Pittsburgh has already clinched a playoff spot, but their loss on Saturday was a big blow to their chances of winning the division, as the Ravens are also 10-5.

TEXANS COACH REVEALS EXTENT OF TANK DELL’S HORRIFIC INJURY

Baltimore Ravens cornerback Marlon Humphrey returns an interception for a touchdown against the Pittsburgh Steelers at M&T Bank Stadium. (Tommy Gilligan-Imagn Images)

Some good news for the Steelers is that wide receiver George Pickens has a “real chance” to play against the Chiefs, coach Mike Tomlin said on Sunday.

Pickens has missed the last three games, and he’s been sorely missed. In the three games without Pickens, the Steelers are averaging just 248.3 yards per game, almost 77 yards less than their season average of 324.9.

As big a blow as the loss was for the Steelers on Saturday, the Ravens win over Pittsburgh was just as big a boost for them.

The Ravens played well on Saturday, outgaining the Steelers 418-315 in terms of yards, with 220 of those yards coming on the ground.

Jackson threw three touchdowns in the win, and will have a chance to make his MVP case with the whole world watching on Wednesday.

The Ravens quarterback is having another fantastic year, as Jackson and Bills’ quarterback Josh Allen are considered the two favorites for the award.

TEXANS ADD PRO BOWL WIDE RECEIVER DIONTAE JOHNSON AFTER DEVASTATING INJURY TO TANK DELL

Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson throws against the Pittsburgh Steelers at M&T Bank Stadium. (Tommy Gilligan-Imagn Images)

A win for the Ravens on Christmas would go a long way in their race against the Steelers for the AFC North crown.

The Ravens (10-5) are taking on the Texans (9-6) in the second part of the NFL’s Christmas doubleheader on Netflix.

They are taking on a Texans team that just lost to the Chiefs. In addition to the loss, the Texans also lost second-year wide receiver Tank Dell for the season after he suffered a gruesome leg injury while catching a touchdown in the loss.

The Texans also lost wide receiver Stefon Diggs for the season after the star receiver tore his ACL, leaving what was once a strong wide receiving corps now thin.

A win over the Ravens on Christmas for the Texans would not only clinch them a playoff spot, but also the AFC South title and a home playoff game.

Houston Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud scrambles against Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Drue Tranquill at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium. (Jay Biggerstaff-Imagn Images)

The Texans-Ravens matchup will also come with a special halftime performance by Beyoncé.

All four of the teams playing on Wednesday are playing their third game in 11 days.

With so many playoff implications, and a big halftime performance, Netflix will be under a lot of pressure from NFL fans and the “BeyHive” to make sure things go off without a hitch.

Fox News’ Jackson Thompson and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Sports

Kentucky Derby winner Mystik Dan headlines Santa Anita opening day on Thursday

Published

2 hours ago

December 25, 2024

Press Room

Kentucky Derby winner Mystik Dan headlines Santa Anita opening day on Thursday

Santa Anita Park is opening its 90th season Thursday filled with the kind of cautious optimism that is common in most sports. Make no mistake, this is a big — some might say make-or-break — year for the storied Arcadia track that many consider the most beautiful horse racing facility in the United States.

The track is fighting for its future, struggling to get a foothold in a national racing landscape that is supported by supplemental gaming income. But not in California, at least not now.

This opening day has something the track hasn’t had in a while — the reigning Kentucky Derby champion. running . You have to go back to 1997 when Derby winner Silver Charm ran in the Malibu Stakes after winning the first two legs of the Triple Crown before finishing second in the Belmont. The difference? He was based at Santa Anita.

No doubt about it, Mystik Dan, winner of this year’s Derby, is the centerpiece for what is possibly the best day of racing during the almost six-month season. He’ll be going in the seven-furlong Grade 1 Malibu Stakes, one of six graded stakes on the 11-race card.

Getting Mystik Dan and trainer Kenny McPeek to commit to the race was a lot easier then actually getting the horse to Santa Anita.

Among racing’s many problems is that there are no dedicated air shipping companies that make moving horses around the country easy. Racing uses FedEx — yes that FedEx — which suspends horse shipping in early December so it can more easily move holiday packages.

“The logistics were complicated,” McPeek said. “The last and only plane was going out of Florida on Dec. 9 and we are based in New Orleans. We would have had to ship him to Miami and then Miami to L.A. We didn’t want to go that early and we weren’t committed to the race yet.

“I needed to get a gate workout out of him and needed to make sure he was good and in a routine.”

All of that worked out just fine, and Mystik Dan was headed to California with Santa Anita picking up the shipping costs.

Those who travel during the holidays are used to long trips, but only the hardiest would try a 1,900-mile van ride. Yet that’s how it worked out.

Assistant trainer Dermot Magner and Greg Morehead, director of operations for McPeek, took turns doing the driving for the first two days with a stopover at Zia Park in Hobbs, N.M.

“He got a good night’s rest and then vanned the rest of the way the next day,” McPeek said, making sure to thank officials at Zia Park for their hospitality. “He’s a good traveler. It was easy. He had plenty of room to lay down if he wanted. He could eat, we had buckets and tubs [of food] in there. There was plenty of space. It was uneventful.”

Mystik Dan settled into Barn 54 at Santa Anita last Wednesday and on Sunday the colt did a three-furlong speed workout to ready him for the race. Barn 54 also is occupied by trainer Karen Headley. Her father, the late Bruce Headley, and McPeek were longtime friends and Headley’s barn is where McPeek would stable his horses when running in California.

The Malibu Stakes is an odd choice for the Kentucky Derby winner because of the low purse amount of $300,000, the minimum required for a Grade 1 race.

McPeek is looking at the long game.

“It’s the last Grade 1, 3-year-old race of the year,” McPeek said. “I think as a stallion prospect, a lot of people who breed want to see the horse be a fast sprinter. We’re pretty confident he has that kind of talent. He broke his maiden gong 5½ [furlongs] and he’s perfectly capable of sprinting. It takes a very good horse to do this. I think it’s a good opportunity to prove that he can.”

Mystik Dan hasn’t raced since the Belmont Stakes, the third Triple Crown races in five weeks. He won the Derby in a blanket finish by a nose then came back two weeks later to finish second behind Seize the Grey in the Preakness. Mystik Dan then finished eighth in the Belmont.

“He campaigned pretty steady for almost a year,” McPeek said. “Coming out of the Belmont, Brian [Hernandez Jr., jockey] didn’t think he liked Saratoga’s surface. So, we only had the Travers [at Saratoga] and Pennsylvania Derby to point to. So, I thought let’s give him a break and let him fill out. We’ll regroup and point him to later in the year.”

Mystik Dan has had nine timed workouts since returning to the track.

“I fully expect him to win,” McPeek said. “Absolutely he’s ready to run. He’s had a nice series of breezes. He’s been on a steady routine. He hasn’t missed a step. The hardest part of this trip was getting him there.”

Jockey Brian Hernandez Jr. gets a high-five from trainer Kenny McPeek while aboard Mystik Dan in the Kentucky Derby Winner’s Circle.

(Jeff Roberson / Associated Press)

Crazy as it sounds, Mystik Dan is not the most celebrated 3-year-old in McPeek’s barn. He also has Thorpedo Anna, a filly who won six of seven races this year including the Kentucky Oaks and Breeders’ Cup Distaff. She is a lock to win the Eclipse Award for best 3-year-old filly and certainly has the résumé to win horse of the year.

Mystik Dan, if he wins the Malibu, is likely to make the final three for the Eclipse for 3-year-old male, although Fierceness is the favorite.

There is another Eclipse candidate in the McPeek barn and that is the trainer. The favorite for the award is Chad Brown, who has put up impressive numbers. But McPeek did something that hasn’t been done since 1952, winning the Kentucky Oaks for fillies and the Kentucky Derby on consecutive days.

“It would be a pleasant surprise,” McPeek said. “I certainly don’t have Chad Brown’s depth of talent and quality. What I’m most proud of is we don’t have million-dollar yearlings floating around all the time. We’ve been doing it with working-class horses. Thorpedo Anna was 40 grand and Mystik Dan was a homebred that I actually did the mating on.

“I do a lot of picking my own yearlings and I’m really proud we’ve been able to compete at the highest level.”

Bill Finley, a respected columnist for the Thoroughbred Daily News, even made the case for McPeek to win the Eclipse for top trainer. (The Times does not vote in the Eclipse Awards.)

“While he’ll never equal Brown’s numbers, McPeek had a year that was truly special, one that captivated the sport and reminded us there is more to this than raw numbers,” Finley wrote. “McPeek made every right move, many of which were ‘good for the game.’”

In a sport that retires its stars instead of running them, McPeek is very much looking forward to Mystik Dan’s 4-year-old campaign. The first possibility for Mystik Dan, providing everything works out well in the Malibu, is the Pegasus World Cup at Gulfstream, at $3 million the second-richest race in the U.S. behind only the Breeders’ Cup. But that’s chump change, if such a thing can be said of seven-figure purses, compared to the $20-million Saudi Cup and $12-million Dubai World Cup.

“We’re going to consider the Pegasus and the Middle East,” McPeek said. “We’ll let him tell us. He’s not run against older horses yet. We’ll wait and see.”

Mystik Dan’s racing career will end before McPeek’s training career. In fact, McPeek, 62, has a timetable.

“I’ve said all along, I’ll do this until I’m 70 or 72,” he said. “Maybe 10 more years. It’ll be 50 years of training if I do it until I’m 72.”

As for his bucket list before retirement, it’s extensive, with a strong international flavor.

“I’d like to win the Breeders’ Cup Classic, the Dubai World Cup, the Saudi Cup, the Arc de Triomphe, the English (Epsom) Derby and the English Oaks,” he said with a chuckle.

But if he had to pick one?

“I really do want to win the English Derby. I’ll do that before I retire.”

For now, he’ll be happy with a win Thursday.