Members of the media are taken on a tour during the transformation taking place inside Vivint Arena before the start of the NBA basketball All-Star weekend Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2023, in Salt Lake City. More than 60 players are making their way to Salt Lake City for All-Star weekend, some of them for the first time, one of them for the 19th time. And while some events will tout the league's future, many will be celebrating the past.(AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)
NBA All Star Gam3 '23 - TNT/TBS
Picked by Reporter Lawrence Banton
It's the midpoint of the NBA season and that means it's time for the league's best to gather for their annual exhibition game. Weeks ago LeBron James and Giannis Antetokounmpo were named team captains. The league switched its approach to the game this year and have upped the stakes. Teams will be selected less than an hour before competition commences. It should be noted that Team LeBron is 5-0 in the All-Star Game and has not lost since the league made the format switch in 2018. The big game tips off on Sunday at 8:30 pm. Other events like the celebrity game and three-point contest begin today and run through the weekend.
Star Trek: Picard: Season 3 - Paramount+
Picked by Digital Editor Mike Nam
The saga of the iconic Starfleet admiral concludes in the third season of Picard, which is streaming now. The final season draws together the original cast members of Star Trek: The Next Generation, prompting folks online to quip that it's essentially the eighth season of THAT show. In any case, join Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Marina Sirtis, Michael Dorn, LeVar Burton, Gates McFadden, and Brent Spiner for one last trek across the stars with the beloved classic cast.
Love and Monsters - Amazon Prime Video
Picked by Reporter Alex Vuocolo
This Amazon Prime Video original — released early in the pandemic to little fanfare — is about a post-apocalyptic world in which gigantic, carnivorous monsters reign over the surface and humans live in underground bunkers. The plot begins when a young survivor decides to leave the safety of the bunker and travel miles across a dangerous landscape to reunite with his girlfriend from before the world ended. The cast is strong; the CGI imaginative and convincing; and the pace pleasantly brisk. So if you're looking for something to hold you over before the next The Last of Us episode, Love and Monsters hits many of the same notes.
Throwback Picks
Shrek 1 & 2 - Prime Video
Picked By Growth Associate Keara O’Driscoll
This series is one of the few "children's" movies that truly can be enjoyed by all ages. Both choices are great to throw on in the background for the kids in your life, and you won’t find yourself banging your head against the wall to the tune of We Don’t Talk About Bruno.
The Freshman - HBO Max
Picked by Senior News Editor Dina Ross
Marlon Brando knocks off Marlon Brando playing The Godfather in this 1990 comedy, which also stars a young Matthew Broderick playing a bright-eyed film student who gets a rough-and-tumble welcome to New York City. Broke and alone, Clark (Broderick) is offered a job that is too good to be true that leads him on a wild ride involving the mafia, an eye-roll-inducing academic advisor, and a pesky komodo dragon. If you haven't seen it in a while, or ever, it's worth an easy watch.
Podcast Pick
Let’s Make a Rom-Com - CBC Podcasts
Selected by Newsletter Impresario Graison Dangor
Perhaps you’ve heard about BuzzFeed’s new AI quiz that generates the plot of a romantic comedy. (Mine is called Life's a Fire, starring Henry Golding and Christina Aguilera as love interests, set in Winnipeg. Agents: Get in touch anytime.) The CBC’s approach to making a rom-com is much more fun: Have three podcast hosts try to create a script that’s actually good. To get help over the eight-episode series, the trio turn to screenwriters who have worked on iconic rom-coms like Legally Blonde and 10 Things I Hate About You. Their approach worked in the podcast’s first season: The New Yorker called Let’s Make a Sci-Fi one of 2022’s best shows.
Former NFL QB Lester Ricard Jr. joins Cheddar Bets to discuss playing--and beating--the same team three times in a season ahead of the NFC Championship Game.
Sponsored by BetMGM
Brian Bennett, College Basketball Senior Editor of The Athletic, joins Cheddar Bets to share his methods for forecasting long-term success for college basketball's top programs.
Sponsored by BetMGM
Super Group, the company behind leading global online sports betting and gaming businesses Betway and Spin, has landed on Wall Street. The company went public via SPAC with Sports Entertainment Acquisition Corp., and now lists on the NYSE under the ticker symbol 'SGHC.' This debut comes as the U.S. sports betting market continues to heat up with more and more states legalizing the practice. Eric Grubman, chairman of Super Group, joined Cheddar to discuss.
Olivia Harlan Dekker and Sean Green provide their insight and top picks after studying the early lines for Super Bowl LIV, while Chris Spagnuolo breaks down betting trends from this NFL season using data and analytics. Sponsored by BetMGM.
Eight months after the National Football League announced $1 million in research into cannabinoids, the NFL-NFLPA Joint Pain Management Committee has awarded the funding to two teams of medical researchers at the University of California San Diego and the University of Regina. The NFL says the studies will investigate the effects of cannabinoids on pain management and neuroprotection from concussion in elite football players, respectively. Cheddar correspondent Chloe Ailello spoke with Jeff Miller, the executive vice president of communications, public affairs, and policy for the NFL, about the studies, as well as the recent lawsuit filed against the NFL by former Miami Dolphins head coach Brian Flores. "Maybe we can learn things from other alternative pain approaches that are going to benefit our player population and then sports medicine as a whole," Miller said.
Former Dolphins coach Brian Flores filed a lawsuit against the NFL over racial discrimination, exposing a long-running problem the NFL has had with diversity in its top coaching and management positions. Eric Mitchell, the president and CEO of public relations and communications company LifeFlip Media, joined Cheddar News to delve into the scandal rocking the pro football world just before the Super Bowl. "There is a problem. If you look at who owns teams in the NFL, it's right, it's a good old boys club, it's a bunch of old white guys," he said. "So, it's exposing something that's been around for ages and now that we're sitting in 2022 has come up."
This April, Madison Square Garden will be hosting the first-ever women's boxing match to headline at the arena in its 140 years of history in boxing. Undisputed lightweight champion, Katie Taylor, and seven-division champion, Amanda Serrano, will go head-to-head for a career-high guaranteed seven-figure purse for both of them. The pair joined Cheddar News to talk about the upcoming "fight of their lives." "I mean, this is the first step I believe," said Serrano. "Unheard of, two women headlining the Garden, we get in the biggest paydays of our career, I hope it continues to break down barriers."
A year after announcing plans for a name change, Washington, DC's NFL team has settled on Commanders. The update comes after receiving years of criticism for the previous nickname deemed highly offensive by Native American groups and communities.
