Against the Golden State Warriors, Joel Embiid switched his jersey number to No. 24 to honor fallen NBA legend, Kobe Bryant.
Since the devastating death of Kobe Bryant in a fatal helicopter crash that also claimed the lives of his daughter Gianna and seven others, players across the league have been paying tribute to the “Mamba.”
On the court, teams have been taking eight and 24-second violations as an ode to Bryant’s two jersey numbers he wore in his career. On Tuesday, in their first game action since Bryant’s passing, the Golden State Warriors traveled to his hometown of Philadelphia for a contest with the 76ers.
Joel Embiid suited up in Bryant’s No. 24 jersey against the Warriors. The No. 24 is retired from 76ers Hall of Famer, Bobby Jones, yet Embiid received permission to wear the jersey against Golden State.
"He was one of my favorite players. I think it’s certainly appropriate that Joel wore the number."
When Joel Embiid made the call, Hall of Famer Bobby Jones was more than happy to help honor Kobe Bryant.
Golden State won’t have the chance to honor Bryant in San Francisco until February 8, as they are currently riding a five-game road trip. When Golden State does return to the Bay Area, they will host Bryant’s former team, the Los Angeles Lakers at Chase Center.
Promoter Sampson Lewkowicz always knew that Jeison Rosario was going to knock out Julian Williams, even if no on else shared that opinion.
A few weeks ago, at a meeting to discuss the upcoming junior middleweight title fight between champion Julian Williams and unsung challenger Jeison Rosario, Sampson Lewkowicz, Rosario’s promoter, put down a bold prediction.
“I told them (the people in the meeting) this isn’t going past six [rounds]. Rosario will stop [Williams],” Lewkowicz told Boxing Junkie. “Everyone looked at me like I was stupid.”
Williams, naturally, was heavily favored to win. How heavy? One sports book made him a 33-1 favorite, a reflection no doubt of the dominating fashion in which Williams defeated Jarrett Hurd last year to win his titles. Plus, contender Nathaniel Gallimore had knocked out Rosario in 2017; Williams easily outpointed Gallimore when they fought in 2018. No matter, for Lewkowicz, it was Rosario by early knockout.
“‘Oh, you’re joking,’ they said,” Lewkowiczrecalled. “No! It’s not a joke. I’m telling you this guy ‘Banana’ Rosario will knock [Williams] out.”
And that’s exactly what happened. On Saturday night, in Williams’ hometown of Philadelphia, the relatively unknown Dominican stopped the incumbent in the fifth round to capture two belts. After a strong opening round for Williams, Rosario went to work in Round 2, connecting on some hard shots to the body and head, one of which opened up a cut over Williams’ left eye. In Round 5, Rosario landed a left hook that badly shook up Williams. Rosario added the finishing touches with a booming uppercut followed by a right and clean-up left hook before referee Benjy Esteves jumped in to stop the fight.
“The power of Rosario [made me confident],” Lewkowicz said. “Every fight he went to the other fighter’s backyard and it was too much pressure and he would make a mistake.”
Lewkowicz paused, then quipped, “I don’t know why everyone was shocked.”
Lewkowicz wasn’t being facetious. The 69-year-old Uruguayan-American, after all, made his name as one of the sport’s preeminent scouts. When it comes to snatching up promising boxers from around the globe, no one had a better track record or sharper set of eyes than Lewkowicz. The more obscure the boxer, the better. His resume includes discovering the likes of Manny Pacquiao and Sergio Martinez. Lewkowicz’s other current titleholder is super middleweight David Benavidez.
“One way or another I’ve had 32 champion,” Lewkowicz said. “When I used to be with ‘Maravilla’ Martinez, one guy told me, ‘You’re like a roach. It doesn’t matter what poison they give you, you always come back with someone else.”
Count Rosario as Lewkowicz’s latest diamond in the rough.
“I believe I should have gotten some respect when I say my guy would knock [Williams] out,” Lewkowicz said.
So then, what’s next? Well, says Lewkowicz, it’s up to Williams. A rematch clause is in place, but Williams must pull the trigger. Lewkowicz doesn’t advise rushing back into the ring, however, certainly not against Rosario.
“If you want the rematch, we will (honor) it, but I don’t recommend it,” Lewkowicz said. “I believe (Williams) needs to recoup himself, fight a [tune up] and come back and get the rematch. But it’s up to him.
“But I strongly do not recommend it. I watched the fight again and Rosario is too strong. I promise that whatever is the decision, the result will be the same.”
If nothing else, Lewkowicz is confident that his charge won’t let the sudden fame get to his head. After the win on Saturday night, the team made sure to celebrate – with water.
“This kid,” Lewkowicz said, “is a real clean-cut kid.”
Jeison Rosario stopped Julian Williams in the fifth round to win two junior middleweight titles Saturday in Philadelphia.
Julian Williams is getting to know the highs and lows in boxing all too intimately.
Williams turned in the performance of his career last May, stopping then-unbeaten Jarrett Hurd to win two of the four major junior middleweight titles and put a knockout loss to Jermall Charlo far behind him. On Saturday at Liacouras Center in Philadelphia, he was rudely reminded of that crushing setback.
Jeison Rosario, a strapping but little-known contender from the Dominican Republic, stunned everyone watching by cutting, hurting and then brutally knocking out Williams at 1:37 of the fifth round to become a 154-pound world champion.
Rosario, a 24-year-old first-time titleholder, wept as the belts were placed on his shoulders after the fight.
“I gotta keep crying because I’m so emotional in this moment right now,” he said through a translator. “When I lost my last fight I said I’d never lose again until I won the championship of the world and that’s what happened tonight.
“I came prepared. So I knew before the fight I was going to win it.”
Not too many others did.
Rosario (20-1-1, 14 KOs) was 7-0-1 against solid opposition since he was stopped by Nathaniel Gallimore in 2017 but he didn’t seem to be a realistic threat to Williams, who was coming off a sensational victory and had climbed onto some pound-for-pound lists.
The first round seemed to support that line of thinking, as Williams, an excellent technician, outboxed Rosario fairly easily.
Then, in the second round, a jab from Rosario opened a cut on Williams’ left eye lid and everything changed. Suddenly, Williams was somewhat tentative because of the cut and, it seemed, Rosario was emboldened. We had a fight.
Williams pawed at the blood dripping into his eye occasionally but remained competitive for the next few give-and-take rounds, as the outcome of the fight was still in doubt. And then, in an instant, it wasn’t. In Round 5, Rosario landed a hard right that stunned Williams and then followed with an overwhelming onslaught of power punches.
Williams was able to remain on his feet until, while attempting to hold Rosario, he fell to the canvas. He was able to get up slowly but his eyes were glassy and his legs were shaky. He was in big trouble.
Rosario picked up where he left off by landing a vicious right uppercut, followed by a left hook that prompted referee Benjy Esteves to jump between the fighters and stop the fight. Esteves looked Williams in the eye and the now-former champion nodded, his way of saying that the referee made the right move.
Just like that, a fighter whose impressive performance in his previous fight seemed to portend a long reign at the top was cut down by a fighter with whom few were familiar. Such is boxing.
“I wasn’t surprised,” he said immediately afterward. “I kept telling everybody this was a real fight. … I have to accept it. [The cut] blurred my vision a little bit but that wasn’t the reason why. He was just a better fighter tonight.”
Where does Williams go from here?
He was knocked out by Charlo in five rounds in 2016 only to battle back into contention and upset Hurd. And now, as a result of another fifth-round knockout, he would appear to be where he was after the Charlo fight.
Not so fast, though. One thing is different.
“We have a rematch clause,” he said. “We’ll see him again real soon.”
Julian Williams stunned the boxing world by upsetting Jarrett Hurd to win a major title. Now he’s setting his sights on even bigger things.
Junior middleweight titleholder Julian Williams isn’t content to win a major belt or two. He’s thinking bigger – much bigger. He wants to become the No. 1 fighter pound for pound in the world.
“J-Rock” took his biggest step in that direction when he stunned the boxing world by taking then-unbeaten Jarrett Hurd’s title on May 11 of last year. He defends for the first time against Jeison Rosario on Saturday at Liacouras Center in his hometown of Philadelphia on Fox.
And then, assuming things go well, it’s on to bigger challenges required to attain greatness.
“I’m not satisfied with just being the best super welterweight in the world,” he told PremierBoxingChampions.com. “Why sell myself short when I have the drive and the ability to be the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world? . . . I’d be leaving millions of dollars on the table.”
Jeison Rosario (right) will likely learn that Julian Williams is no joke Saturday in Philadelphia. Stephanie Trapp / TGP Promotions
That concept would’ve been unthinkable late in the evening on Dec. 10, 2016, the date then-154-pound titleholder Jermall Charlo put Williams down three times and stopped him in five rounds in his first title shot.
The perception of Williams changed instantaneously, from a complete fighter with a bright future to just another contender with a suspect chin. Williams only became more determined.
The typically tough product of a tough town went back to the gym immediately and fought again six months later, a seventh-round TKO of Joshua Conley that served as the first step back toward the top.
“I think people change like day and night,” he told PBC. “It’s been said boxers are loved conditionally: That they win, they look good and they look dominant. You can’t shortchange anyone in boxing, because you’ll be considered exposed, or not that good, or all those other terms they come up with.
“It’s what have you done for me lately. Nobody cares about the (New England) Patriots now. They’re only the greatest team in (NFL) history but nobody cares because they’re not in the playoffs.”
Williams (27-1-1, 16 KOs) fought his way back into title contention. He easily outpointed durable Ishe Smith in November 2017. He defeated Nathanial Galimore by a majority decision the following April, although most observers thought he won clearly.
And he stopped Francisco Javier Castro in two rounds in December 2018 to earn a shot at Hurd’s junior middleweight title on May 11 of last year in Fairfax, Virginia.
Hurd at that time was seen as a physical phenomenon. The 154-pound champion made weight on the scale but seemed to have the strength of a light heavyweight, which allowed him to swallow up almost all of his opponents. If any champion at that time was unbeatable, it seemed, it was him.
Williams knew better. He knew he was the better boxer, the better all-around fighter. And he proved it.
The challenger outboxed, outworked and outthought the champion – even putting him down once – and was more than durable enough to handle anything Hurd threw at him. The result was a stunning unanimous-decision victory and one the most-impressive performances in recent years.
Williams was elated but not surprised. Neither was his longtime trainer, Stephen “Breadman” Edwards.
“Even though I was confident he was going to win, to accomplish it physically is different,” Edwards told PBC. “It was like a monkey was off our back. It was joy, relief, happiness, and your pride kicks in, the competitive spirit, to shut everybody up. I’ve had very few feelings like that in my life.”
Williams also knows better than to take Rosario (19-1-1, 13 KOs) for granted.
The Miami-based Dominican is unbeaten in eight fights (7-0-1) since Gallimore stopped him in six rounds in 2017. Gallimore was his best opponent, meaning he’s never faced anyone like Williams.
However, Rosario is a solid fighter. And he might’ve learned something by watching Williams defeat Hurd.
“You can never underestimate what a man has been through, how hungry he is, how hard he’s been training,” Williams said. “I know I inspired a lot of people with that performance [against Hurd], and that made people believe they can do the unthinkable.”
For Hopkins, it was an ignominious ending to an otherwise illustrious career. That it happened all the way out in Inglewood, California seemed to underscore the cruelty of the event. At the time, Hart was in the gym training so he didn’t get to watch the fight unfold live, but he recalls getting a phone call.
“It hurt the little boy in me because Bernard meant a lot to me,” Hard said. “Not only was I so hurt, my city was hurt as well. We all felt like Hopkins should have gone out better than that.
“And that’s the reason this fight is occurring. It’s not secret that I’m the best light heavyweight out of all these jokers.”
Hart (26-2, 21 KOs) gets his chance to exact revenge for his mentor and idol when he faces Smith (24-3, 20 KOs) in a light heavyweight tilt Saturday at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey on ESPN. It’s business as usual, yes, but also a bit personal. Well, a lot personal.
“As a little boy we all got our inspirations,” Hart said. “I don’t know who that was for you, but I’m saying, as a little boy, you’re inspired by wrestlers, Hulk Hogan, you know what I’m saying. Kids say I want to be like Deion Sanders. The kids say they want to be like Andre the Giant. They say they want to be like Bruce Lee.
“The little boy, what’s the inspiration that inspired you to become whatever you became and to be the best at it? That’s what people don’t understand. Bernard Hopkins inspired me to be what I am today and to be the best at it.”
Last month, Hopkins was elected to the International Boxing Hall of Fame, along with Juan Manuel Marquez and Shane Mosley. To Hart, though, Hopkins long surpassed Hall of Fame status.
“He’s an icon,” Hart said. “Not just for this sport of boxing but for life, period. Showing people that you can be knocked down and can get back up and coming from where he came from, the penitentiary and doing those negative things and changing his life around. Being a Hall of Famer is cool, but being an icon surpasses all of that.”
Hart is chasing similarly lofty goals himself. After two close losses at super middleweight against then 168-pound titleholder Gilberto Ramirez, Hart moved up to light heavyweight this year, winning a decision against veteran Sullivan Barrera in June. A win over Smith would get him one step closer to another title shot.
He promises not to suffer the same fate as Hopkins.
“I will not go out the ring,” he said. “I will fight at the highest level that I can perform at ever.”
Julian Williams is excited to make his first title defense in front of his hometown fans in Philadelphia.
Julian Williams overcame a knockout loss to Jermall Charlo in 2016 to realize his dream of becoming a world champion in May. And he did it by outpointing a junior middleweight who was unbeaten and on the rise, Jarrett Hurd.
Now comes the hard part – hanging onto his two belts.
Williams (27-1-1, 16 KOs) will make his first defense against tough Miami-based Dominican Jeison Rosario (19-1-1, 13 KOs) on Jan. 18 at Liacouras Center in Philadelphia, Williams’ hometown. The fight will be televised on Fox and Fox Deportes.
“It took a lot for us to get the title,” Williams said. “We had some bumps in the road. But me and my team, we just kept battling and fighting through. We finally got our breakthrough fight and got the titles, and we wanted to bring the titles right back to Philadelphia.
“It’s amazing to have this opportunity to come back home and perform in front of my home crowd.”
Of course, Rosario doesn’t enter the fight with a reputation similar to that of Hurd but he’s on his own comeback run. He was stopped by Nathaniel Gallimore in April 2017 but is 7-0-1 against solid opposition since then.
Williams has respect for him.
“Rosario is a really good fighter and I’m not just saying that,” Williams said. “They’ve been matching him tough and he’s been coming through fights he wasn’t supposed to win. I’m expecting a really tough fight and for him to be in shape.
“He’s got 36 minutes to change his life forever. I was in his exact same position very recently. It would be extremely arrogant for me to think I can’t lose.”
Williams will be fighting in his hometown for the third time but the first time since 2011 and the first time as a world titleholder. He can’t wait to bring his belts into the ring.
“I haven’t actually thought about fight night and what it will feel like,” he said. “I can only imagine it will be amazing seeing the people who have watched me fight since I was a teenager. I’m pretty sure as it gets closer to the fight, I’ll start thinking about it and it will give me an extra push in camp.”
From there the impeachment case will go to the Senate, where the Republican majority will most likely vote to acquit. On and on we go.
HOWEVER, there have still been rallies around the country in support of impeachment, including one this week in Philadelphia. There, we saw signs for what has become a rallying cry for the Philadelphia left: “Only Gritty is above the law.”
Gritty, the Flyers mascots, has become an instant folk hero in the city of Philadelphia, and somehow also become a symbol of the anti-fascist movement? (Read the Daily Beast story, because I can’t summarize how this all happened.)
This isn’t exactly a new thing. “Only Gritty is above the law” has been a rallying cry for a while now, with t-shirts being printed already, and the sign showing up at more than a few protests over the last few months.
Fayaadh Gillard has been charged with fatally shooting his twin, Suhail. The brothers played HS football in Philadelphia.
A tragic story out of Philadelphia as a brother has been charged with fatally shooting his twin to death Sunday. The twins played for Mastery Charter School.
The shooting took place when the twins’ father was showing them how to use a gun, Philly.com reported.
High school students, some wearing blue and white football jerseys, gathered around Fayaadh Gillard at Penn’s Landing, literally holding him up so he did not collapse to the ground.
Before breaking into sobs, Fayaadh, 18, led the group of students and faculty from Mastery Charter School Lenfest Campus in chanting “Long live Su, long live Su, long live Su.” Then they released blue balloons into the cloudy sky above the bank of the Delaware River.
The vigil Wednesday afternoon, which drew close to 100 members of the senior class and their teachers, was for Suhail Gillard, Fayaadh’s twin brother, whom police say he shot to death Sunday in an Overbrook apartment.
Fayaadh was charged with murder, possession of an instrument of crime, unsworn falsification to authorities, and obstructing justice. He was granted bail of $125,000, and was released after paying 10% of that amount.
The Mastery football coach told Philly.com Suhail excelled as a running back. A three-time All-Public League running back for the Pumas, Suhail Gillard had committed to attend West Virginia State University in the fall fall.
“No one at the age of 18 should lose their life. That’s too young. There are things he had yet to experience the pleasure of — being a young man and college athlete. There’s really no words,” John Davidson said.
It’s with grieving hearts that we inform you of the untimely passing of our beloved brother, Suhail Gillard. He was the most respected and hardest worker Mastery ever had the honor and privilege to put a jersey on. Rest well #Agent4🥀 4ever. pic.twitter.com/GYsAxZ3PHH
This is the second tragic around high school football in the Delaware Valley in recent months. A 10-year-old died after shooting broke out at a Camden-Pleasantville playoff game in November.
