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How the Lakers use Japanese slideshow presentations to build chemistry

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How the Lakers use Japanese slideshow presentations to build chemistry

JJ Redick was already preaching one type of Japanese philosophy, harping to his team about the concept of “kaizen” to improve each day. Off the court, the head coach found inspiration in another Japanese phrase.

Lakers players and coaches have used PechaKucha presentations to facilitate team bonding this season. The slideshows, which come from the Japanese word for chitchat, could be a secret to the team’s hot start as the Lakers (7-2) have won five consecutive games entering a five-game road that starts Saturday in Atlanta at 5 p.m. PST against the Hawks.

The Lakers have pieced together one of the NBA’s most efficient offenses despite injuries keeping LeBron James, Austin Reaves and Luka Doncic in and out of the lineup, relying on a strong team bond that’s developed quickly through an even faster form of communication.

PechaKucha presentations are traditionally 20 slides, each with a photo. The speaker has 20 seconds to explain each slide for a total presentation time of 6 minutes and 40 seconds.

The Lakers’ version consists of five slides: where you’re from; favorite basketball memory; person, event or thing that has impacted your life; your non-basketball happy place; and dealer’s choice.

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“A lot of times most of the interactions you’ll have with your teammates is on the basketball court,” forward Jake LaRavia said. “So it’s good to just kind of either learn some stuff about them outside of basketball, like hobbies and stuff like that, where they come from. And that just helps you kind of understand who the person is a little bit better.”

Assistant coach Scott Brooks started his presentation with a photo of a walnut, symbolizing the walnut farm he worked on during the weekends to help his family make ends meet. LaRavia showed a photo of his driveway as the origin of his basketball journey. Doncic spoke about how his daughter Gabriela changed his life.

One coach and one player present, and then they each nominate the next coach or player to go. With about half of the players and coaches left, Redick said he’s already noticing the holdouts actively planning their presentations before their nominations.

“We’re just constantly encouraging and empowering our guys to get connected,” Redick said. “I believe if you’re connected off the floor, you’re connected on the floor. You need buy-in to that. I’m not trying to take credit for my staff here. It’s the guys on the team, they’re bought into that.”

Doncic, for one, isn’t sold. He deadpanned that he doesn’t think the exercise helps.

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Just the fact that Doncic made the joke meant it’s working.

Settled after last season’s jarring trade, the 26-year-old’s personality has started to emerge among his teammates. He is a sarcastic jokester who expresses love for his teammates by threading passes to them through pinhole-sized gaps in the defense and then trash talking them right soon after.

Lakers coach JJ Redick, with injured forward LeBron James next to him, questions a call along with guard Marcus Smart during the game against the Spurs on Wednesday.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

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Doncic’s smiling antics, whether he’s trying to sit on Austin Reaves’ lap on the sideline or swishing halfcourt shots in a contest with Reaves, Maxi Kleber and staff members, show just how connected the superstar feels to the team.

“Honestly, the feeling is I’m enjoying, very much, playing with these guys,” Doncic said. “AR [Reaves] can’t play. We’re still missing LeBron. So this team has a big potential. But everybody who steps on court, gives maximum, man, everybody. So it’s very enjoyable to play.”

Reaves is present on the road trip but will miss a third consecutive game Saturday. The Lakers ruled him out after practice Friday as his right groin injury progressed to a strain after previously being categorized simply as soreness.

James did not make the trip to Atlanta. He progressed to on-court basketball activities this week after missing four weeks because of a sciatica on his right side. He was playing one-on-one with coaches, Redick said. A stint with the South Bay Lakers is on the table, but no decision has been made.

The NBA’s all-time leading scorer hasn’t played a single minute for the Lakers yet. Reaves, averaging 31.1 points and 9.3 assists, has missed the last two wins, and Doncic has played in only half of the games. But the Lakers are still fifth in the NBA in offensive rating.

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“It shows how professional we are,” guard Marcus Smart said of the team’s chemistry despite constantly changing personnel. “I think a lot of people, especially who aren’t in the brotherhood, they forget that you build a relationship with guys, and then one guy or a couple guys, you get traded and you got to rebuild another one. You don’t understand how tough that is, how much of a toll that takes.”

Just as Smart spoke, Doncic appeared behind the group of reporters, clapping loudly. Then Doncic made sure to put on the record that he would beat Smart at a team-building competition that night. Both smiled as they walked away.

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Tiger Woods pleads not guilty, demands trial with jury after DUI arrest following rollover crash

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Tiger Woods pleads not guilty, demands trial with jury after DUI arrest following rollover crash

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Tiger Woods has entered a plea of not guilty and has waived his arraignment, demanding a trial with a jury.

Woods was arrested in Florida with prescription opioids found in his pocket after being involved in a rollover crash this past Friday, according to court documents.

The 15-time major winner was arrested on charges of driving under the influence with property damage and refusal to submit to a blood alcohol level (BAL) test after law enforcement said his vehicle collided with another while driving impaired.

This is a breaking news story. Check back for updates.

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Lamar Odom’s past is a ‘cesspool of trauma,’ he says: ‘I don’t know what made me relevant now’

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Lamar Odom’s past is a ‘cesspool of trauma,’ he says: ‘I don’t know what made me relevant now’

After his October 2015 overdose at a Nevada brothel, Lamar Odom says, he had “12 strokes and six heart attacks. All my doctors say, like, I’m a walking miracle.”

Now, more than a decade later, the Love Ranch brothel has been demolished, but Odom is still around.

The former Laker and onetime husband of Khloé Kardashian is telling his story for “The Death and Life of Lamar Odom,” the newest episode of Netflix’s documentary series “Untold,” along with Kardashian, former coach Phil Jackson and others who were around during his Oct. 13, 2015, health emergency. The episode premiered Tuesday.

“You know what’s funny?” the 46-year-old former player told Sports Illustrated in an interview published Monday. “I haven’t even watched it yet. You know why? Because I lived it.”

Odom, who just got out of another month of rehab in February, insists that the 2015 episode was not a mere overdose but a “hit,” an attempt on his life.

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“Right when I signed the divorce papers, I was like, ‘I’m gonna get it in.’ The Bunny Ranch I used to always see on TV, but I don’t have any coke to take,” he says in the documentary. “ … It’s crazy when you think about [how] one decision, so big or so minor, could be so pivotal to you and to people that you really love.”

The late Dennis Hof, owner of the Bunny Ranch, where HBO’s “Cathouse: The Series” was shot, owned other Nevada brothels. Odom set off that October for Hof’s Love Ranch in Crystal, about 80 miles outside of Las Vegas.

“It was pretty rare that a celebrity — certainly anybody above the D-list — would be actively trying to come out to one of the brothels,” former Love Ranch manager Richard Hunter says in the “Untold” episode. “This was kind of a myth. This was something Dennis perpetuated.”

But, Hunter said, “Lamar Odom actually began contacting several of the girls from the Love Ranch on Instagram. … Being a professional athlete, there’s a lot of easier ways to do this than to drive an hour outside of the city into the desert, walk into a brothel, such as it was, and want to live there for a few days.

“As the days progressed, I remember that him or one of his handlers … actually contacted the brothel and wanted a car to pick him up. So it definitely became real when he gave us the address of where he was at.” The driver called the Love Ranch and let them know his passenger really was Odom. They put him in a house behind the brothel, Hunter said, where they put folks who were “spending enough money.”

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Odom told USA Today in an interview published Monday that what transpired at the Love Ranch — which was demolished in November 2024, after Hof’s 2018 death — “was like a hit. Obviously they missed. I don’t know if they want to finish the job.”

Hit or not, Odom infamously wound up overdosing on alcohol and various drugs including over-the-counter erectile-dysfunction supplements. He says no cocaine was involved.

Kardashian explains in the episode that her divorce from Odom came as a result of an ultimatum she was told to deliver during a planned intervention: a three-month rehab stint or a split. Odom surprised them, she said, when he said that all he wanted was his passport — and the divorce.

“I was like, looking around like, ‘Wait. Wait. I — I don’t want the divorce,’” she said. “‘You guys [who assembled for the intervention] told me I have to say this.’”

Odom and Kardashian had signed their papers before the OD, but a judge hadn’t yet signed off on the dissolution, which allowed her to keep him insured and, as his wife and next of kin, to make decisions regarding his health. Kobe Bryant, Odom’s Lakers teammate and Kardashian’s close friend, flew to Nevada to help her decide whether to proceed with surgery to fix Odom’s lung that had collapsed. She said yes, even though there was only “like a 10% chance” that it would work and that he would survive the procedure.

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Odom made it through, recovering at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Bryant died in a helicopter crash less than five years later.

After the OD, Kardashian never left the hospital. She put their divorce — finalized in 2016 — on hold. When Odom awakened from his coma, he couldn’t control his bowels and needed six hours a day of dialysis, according to the documentary. “So you can understand the humility … I’ve won two championships. I’m Lamar Odom. I can’t walk, can’t talk. And they come in to check my diaper.”

He was 35 at the time. The next summer, he was removed from a flight at LAX before takeoff while drunk and vomiting, having been seen earlier slamming beer and whiskey in the Delta Airlines lounge.

So what would Odom tell his younger self, if he could, after suffering a dozen strokes and six heart attacks after that visit to the Love Ranch?

“Stay away from your weakness. And my weakness, obviously, was drugs because I’m a drug addict,” he told SI. “It could have been passed down to me from my father. But I’m not blaming anybody. Makes no sense to blame anybody. On or off the court, you have to work with what you’ve got. And I had an incredible stat line in terms of skills and how to play the game.

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“And just work on being the best player that you can be. Anybody who offers you that s—, drugs, whether it be coke, pot, alcohol, they probably ain’t your friend. And to choose my friends wisely, because they could affect you on or off the court.”

Odom also wasn’t sure why Netflix had tapped him at this moment, but hopes that by telling his story he might help other people who are trying to get out of addiction.

“I was telling my girlfriend on the way here, it’s like swimming in a cesspool of trauma,” he told USA Today, mentioning a partner who has not been identified. “And I’m trying to get out of it, but the story reels me back into that pool every time. But I just know I’m bigger than the situation, and I hope to help a lot of people by giving my testimony. Not just with the story, but just in life, that we can all overcome addiction.”

That and, well, “Netflix had a good paycheck, bro,” he told SI with a laugh. “No, but it’s a time and place for everything. I don’t know what made me relevant now.”

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Shedeur Sanders ditches rookie number as Browns announce change heading into 2026 season

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Shedeur Sanders ditches rookie number as Browns announce change heading into 2026 season

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Shedeur Sanders is making a jersey change heading into his sophomore NFL season, and he’s going back to his Colorado roots. 

Sanders, who wore No. 12 during his rookie season, will wear No. 2 next year for the Cleveland Browns. 

As the Browns made it official on social media, Sanders did so as well, writing “#2” on X to coincide with his squad. 

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Shedeur Sanders of the Cleveland Browns stands for the national anthem prior to a NFL preseason 2025 game against the Carolina Panthers at Bank of America Stadium on August 8, 2025 in Charlotte, North Carolina. (Photo by Logan Bowles/Getty Images) (Logan Bowles/Getty Images)

The move comes after wide receiver DeAndre Carter, who wore the number for Cleveland last season, is no longer on the roster. Now that he has a year under his belt, Sanders can make the change. 

And he does so with his old college number, as Sanders wore No. 2 at Jackson State University before transferring to Colorado, as his father, Deion Sanders, took the head coach role with the Buffaloes. 

SHEDEUR SANDERS’ WILD 2025 BEGAN WITH DRAFT FALL, BUT IT’S ENDING WITH HOPE AFTER TUMULTUOUS TURNS

While he was wearing No. 12 last season, Sanders started the year in a depth role, as veteran Joe Flacco was Kevin Stefanski’s starting quarterback. But, when Flacco was traded to the Cincinnati Bengals following Joe Burrow’s injury, Dillon Gabriel, who was drafted two rounds before Sanders in a shocking NFL Draft for the Buffaloes product, took over the role. 

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He would be Gabriel’s backup, but after the latter’s struggles and injury, it was Sanders’ time to step up. 

Cleveland Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders reacts on the sideline during the first half of an NFL football game against the San Francisco 49ers, Sunday, Nov. 30, 2025, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)

Sanders won his first-ever start against the Las Vegas Raiders and went 3-4 across seven starts as he remained the starter for the remainder of the season. Since then, Stefanski was fired; head coach Todd Monken was hired, and the veteran coach who served as John Harbaugh’s offensive coordinator with the Baltimore Ravens echoed what the Browns said heading into 2026 — there will be an open quarterback competition. 

Monken told NFL Network at the NFL owners meeting in Phoenix on Monday that the Browns haven’t “gotten that far yet” in terms of naming Sanders their starter heading into the team’s offseason program. 

Deshaun Watson, who has had a turbulent Browns tenure, is back in the fold, while Gabriel is back healthy heading into 2026. 

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Sanders surely understands he’ll have to prove himself again with a new coaching staff in the building, as that’s ultimately the nature of the NFL except for a rare group of certified starters. 

Cleveland Browns’ Shedeur Sanders (12) and Teven Jenkins (74) celebrate a touchdown in the first half of an NFL football game against the Tennessee Titans in Cleveland on Dec. 7, 2025.  (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)

But Sanders has a Pro Bowl under his belt already despite the small sample size on the NFL gridiron. He’s looking to build off the momentum of last season, but it’ll be a fresh start with a new number.  

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