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After teasing Magic Mike fans last month, HBO Max has finally whipped out the full trailer for Finding Magic Mike, a new reality competition series from executive producers Channing Tatum and Steven Soderbergh. While the original Magic Mike and director will remain behind the scenes, Adam Rodriguez, who starred in the first film and its sequel Magic Mike: XXL, will be handling hosting duties. Joining him will be guests Whitney Cummings, Nicole Scherzinger, and Nikki Glaser (who is getting used to working with muscle bound dudes thanks to her stint on FBoy Island).

In the new trailer for Finding Magic Mike, the contestants put it all out there not just from the waist down, but emotionally and physically as well. The dance routines are no joke — despite the presence of the top female comedians — and the trailer makes it clear that not landing a move just right can have dangerous results. Channing Tatum (who will soon appear in Magic Mike’s Last Dance) made it look easy on the big screen, but these fellas are about to find out that having a tight six-pack isn’t even half the battle.

Here’s the official logline:

Ten regular guys who have “lost their magic” are put through the paces of a Magic Mike Live bootcamp, baring their souls – and more – as they learn to perform sexy and daring dance routines with one being crowned the real Magic Mike. The winner will pocket a cash prize.

Finding Magic Mike will work its abs all over HBO Max on December 16.

Neil Olshey‘s tenure as the general manager and president of basketball operations for the Portland Trail Blazers has come to an end. The team announced on Friday afternoon that the previously-announced independent investigation into “concerns and complaints around our workplace environment at the practice facility” had come to an end, and because of its findings, Olshey had been immediately terminated.

The team stressed that it would not discuss the findings of the investigation “out of respect for those who candidly participated,” and announced that director of player personnel Joe Cronin will take the reins as general manager in the interim as the franchise works to find a permanent replacement. Jake Fischer of Bleacher Report indicated that a pair of former NBA players who have made the transition to working in front offices are among those who will be considered for the role.

A bombshell report by Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports indicated that the franchise was going to authorize an investigation due to “10 years of mistreatment leading to mental and physical stress” by Olshey, which led to a toxic work environment under his watch. After starting his front office career with the Los Angeles Clippers, Olshey joined the Portland Trail Blazers as the franchise’s general manger ahead of the 2012 NBA season.

In June this year, Polo G earned his first-ever no. 1 album with Hall Of Fame, his third studio album featuring appearances from The Kid Laroi, Lil Wayne, Roddy Ricch, Young Thug, and more. Today, a little under six months later, he’s followed up with the deluxe edition, Hall Of Fame 2.0, looking to extend the shelf life of his hit album through the end of the year.

To mark the release, he’s also dropped the Ryan Lynch-directed video for “Young N Dumb,” one of the 14 new tracks that appear on the deluxe edition. In the video, Polo and his crew visit fallen friends at the cemetery and share an introspective walk on the beach.

Along with “Young N Dumb,” the new version of the album also includes the Michael Jackson-sampling “Bad Man (Smooth Criminal)” and the NLE Choppa-featuring “Jumpin.” The new tracks also include appearances from Lil Baby, Lil Tjay, Moneybagg Yo, and YungLiV, marking reunions for Polo with both Lil Baby, with whom he released “3 Headed Goat” last year alongside Lil Durk, and Lil Tjay, who appeared on Polo’s breakout 2019 single “Pop Out.”

Watch Polo G’s “Young N Dumb” video above.

Hall Of Fame 2.0 is out now via Columbia Records. You can stream it here.

Over the past few months, Joyner Lucas has greatly expanded his collaboration pool and the results largely speak for themselves. Beginning in April this year, the formerly iconoclastic Joyner began working with some of hip-hop’s hottest names including Lil Baby (“Ramen & OJ“), Rick Ross (“Legend“), Lil Tjay (“Dreams Unfold“), J. Cole (“Your Heart“), and Ty Dolla Sign (“Late To The Party“). Today, he continues that streak by tapping Chicago’s Lil Durk for the boastful “Rambo.”

On “Rambo,” Durk and Joyner keep things simple, employing the obvious metaphor of comparing the titular film character’s prowess with firearms to their own rap skills — although it could be argued that Durk is talking about the actual weaponry he has amassed over the years, considering his usual content. “I got the sniper on top of the roof,” Joyner brags on the hook. “You’ll never hear when I shoot.”

Joyner’s stylistic reinvention over the past two years has seen him tap into both his creativity and his sense of humor. While his personality may come off brusque and self-serious, by releasing videos like the visually impressive “Will” and the tongue-in-cheek “Zim Zimma,” he’s humanized himself a lot and made himself more endearing than his beefs with Logic and Lil Nas X suggested.

Listen to Joyner Lucas’ “Rambo” featuring Lil Durk above.

The Rundown is a weekly column that highlights some of the biggest, weirdest, and most notable events of the week in entertainment. The number of items could vary, as could the subject matter. It will not always make a ton of sense. Some items might not even be about entertainment, to be honest, or from this week. The important thing is that it’s Friday, and we are here to have some fun.

ITEM NUMBER ONE — Joe and John, my sweet boys

We are living inside a powerful moment for awkward gentlemen whose names begin with the letter J. Right now, on television and/or online if that’s your preference, you can watch new episodes of both Joe Pera Talks With You and How to With John Wilson every week. This is… it’s kind of wonderful. I recommend both shows as strongly as I can recommend any shows. Sometimes I like to watch an action movie like a John Wick or a Fast Five and zip right into one of these episodes just for the whiplash effect of it all. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s back up.

I’ve written about Joe Pera before, sometimes in this column, sometimes a lot. I love his show a lot. It runs on Adult Swim on Sunday night in back-to-back little 10-12 minute episodes, and the first two seasons are on HBO Max. It’s almost impossible to explain, like most good shows. Pera plays a high school choir teacher named Joe who lives in Michigan and speaks directly to the camera sometimes. He’s a sweet man. Each episode takes on a single topic — examples include “Joe Pera Reads You The Church Announcements” and “Joe Pera Talks With You About Beans” — but eventually reveals itself to be about much more. There’s always a twist. Sometimes it’s charming, sometimes it’s absurd. Sometimes he just cooks pierogies for his drunk girlfriend.

It’s one of those five percent shows, where the jokes and style and general vibes of the show will land with about five percent of the general population, but that five percent will love it deeply. The most recent episode was about Joe flying a drone around Michigan and it was honestly kind of profound and beautiful. It’s a good show.

Speaking of good shows that are kind of profound and beautiful, How to With John Wilson is back for a second season on HBO. This is terrific news. The first season was… also kind of hard to explain. Wilson sets up each episode as a guide to teach the viewers how to do various things — examples include “How to Make Small Talk” and “How to Cook the Perfect Risotto” — but, again, reveal themselves to be about much more. Like, the entire human experience. It’s a lot. I adore it.

Wilson has been making the rounds for interviews to promote the new season, which premiered last week. He spoke to our Jason Tabrys in an interview I will link to here and encourage you to click on because it’s good. He also spoke to Alan Siegel at The Ringer, which I will blockquote now to highlight two important facts. First:

This season, journalist and bestselling author Susan Orlean and absurdist comedian Conner O’Malley joined Wilson, Michael Koman, and Alice Gregory in the writers’ room. Both brought their own sensibilities to the show. It was Orlean who came up with the idea that formed the basis of the upcoming episode “How to Throw Out Your Batteries.”

It is cool/wild that Susan Orlean is a writer on this show. It makes sense because Susan Orlean rules, which I would say about anyone who has written articles about both teen surf girls and absurdist horse-based Twitter accounts, but still, just cool. Also cool: Conner O’Malley being involved. Which brings me to my second blockquote.

Their first meeting, however, didn’t go well. “I really pissed him off,” Wilson says. “I had a hand buzzer with me, during a very annoying phase of my life. I hand-buzzed his friend, and his friend got really upset. This was years ago. Conner didn’t want to talk to me.” But they eventually reconciled, he adds, and “I ended up approaching him to write on the show. He was super into it.”

And now here’s the best part: I get to bring it all full-circle. Conner O’Malley is also a writer/actor in Joe Pera Talks With You. And he’s in a bunch of sketches from I Think You Should Leave. It’s really cool that these three shows — all different and weird and funny and a little groundbreaking — have this one unifying figure. He’s like the Forrest Gump of strange little comedies your friends who are too online tell you to watch. (Hi.) He was also in the Samberg-Milioti comedy Palm Springs, which a) is great/weird, b) is on Hulu, c) features him doing whatever this is.

The lessons here are as follows:

• Please watch the shows/movies I have mentioned here
• All of them
• In any order you want

I do recommend watching Joe Pera Talks With You at bedtime, though. That show is a peaceful delight. This was a nice little chat.

ITEM NUMBER TWO — Speaking of strange little things I enjoy…

It appears we have found ourselves in yet another situation where two things can be true at once. This time those things are:

• I still have a massive case of Game of Thrones fatigue after everything that went down in the last season, which ended about two and half years ago, which somehow feels both too long ago to be right and too recent to be right
• I am wildly excited about one of the proposed spin-offs that HBO is tinkering with, titled Dunk and Egg and based on a series of novellas that I have not and will not read

These two things appear at odds. And they would be at odds, had there not been an announcement this week that the potential series will be written by Stephen Conrad, creator of both my beloved Patriot and Ultra City Smiths. Variety had the announcement, the highlight of which I will paste into this box riiiiiiight now.

Steve Conrad has been tapped to serve as writer and executive producer on the potential series under his Elephant Pictures banner. As Variety exclusively reported in January 2021, the one-hour show would be based on the series of fantasy novellas by George R. R. Martin, which follow the adventures of Ser Duncan the Tall (Dunk) and a young Aegon V Targaryen (Egg) 90 years prior to the events of “A Song of Ice and Fire.”

This is awesome. Not so much that there’s more Game of Thrones stuff coming because, again, the fatigue. But the thing where Conrad is getting to take this swing. The two shows I mentioned earlier, Patriot and Ultra City Smiths, were legitimately unlike anything I’ve seen on television, in a really cool way. Funny and heartfelt, dry and absurd, one of them (Patriot) about a depressed spy and folk singer running around doing missions for a character played by Kurtwood Smith who loves breakfast and cocaine equally and a lot, the other (Ultra City Smiths) a stop-motion musical about a detective investigating the death of a wealthy local businessman. They’re so weird. I love them a lot. Please go watch them and come over and then we can watch them again together and talk about them.

So, yes, I am now in on the Game of Thrones spinoff. This one, at least. Because they did a good thing and I want to support that, and also because I like good things and Steve Conrad has a track record of making good things I like. I mean, the man created a puppet called The King of the Night who was voiced by John C. Reilly and would only answer a detective’s questions if that detective defeated him in a dance fight.

It’s good. I like it. I still don’t care too much about the Thronesiness of it all, but I don’t think I cared about stop-motion murder mystery musicals too much before Ultra City Smiths. I’m willing to keep an open mind here.

ITEM NUMBER THREE — What if the third Magic Mike is just my sweet glistening boys traveling the world and thrilling various gas station employees with impromptu striptease performances?

Well, guess what: There’s a third Magic Mike movie on the way. Channing Tatum announced it on Twitter and then everyone else caught up and got the rest of the facts out as fast as they could. Facts, for example, like these at Entertainment Weekly:

Provocatively titled Magic Mike’s Last Dance, the new screenplay is apparently written by Reid Carolin (who wrote both of the previous films) and will be directed by Soderbergh, who helmed the first entry in the series but took a step back for Magic Mike XXL. Soderbergh shot and edited the sequel but it was ultimately directed by his longtime collaborator Gregory Jacobs. Jacobs returns for the third film but as a producer alongside Carolin, Nick Wechsler, and Peter Kiernan.

The Magic Mike movies are so good. They are so, so good. And the coolest thing is that they’re good in such different ways. The first one was kind of like if Rocky had been a stripper from Florida instead of a boxer from Philly. Like, a real, serious piece of cinema. The second was an absolute blast, a road trip movie about a squad of oiled-up dancers traveling to a big convention and learning and growing on the way. If the first movie was like Rocky, which I just said it was and will not take back here or ever, then the second was like Rocky IV, but fun on purpose.

It also contained this scene…

… which resulted in easily a Top Ten Hardest I’ve Ever Laughed In A Theater moment. I was howling. I laughed again just now watching it while putting this together. I might stop typing this sentence and watch it again. And I did. It’s a beautiful piece of filmmaking.

And now they’re all getting together for one last job… er, dance. I hope, for reasons that can be but do not have to be explained, they rob a casino this time. Or a museum. Or the home of a Tampa billionaire who wronged them. Just thrusting between lasers in a well-guarded room, redirecting the beams by letting them bounce off their glistening torsos. The people need and deserve it.

ITEM NUMBER FOUR — Rest in peace to Brandy the Pig

Good news and bad news, everyone. The good news is that Pig, starring Nicolas Cage as a truffle hunter who “returns to Portland to find the person who stole his beloved pig,” is still a real movie that is still getting good reviews and you can watch it anytime you like on Hulu or your VOD streaming outlet of voice. What a world, you know?

The bad news, however, and it pains me to say this, is that Brandy, the real pig who played the pig in Pig, apparently passed away last year and no one bothered to tell us (me) until someone went and interviewed director Michael Sarnoski about it.

We couldn’t afford a trained acting pig so we just had to go to farms and find a pig that had a nice personality and looked nice. Brandy just looked very sweet and she was mostly sweet, although she was a pig and you know, did not love being on set sometimes and got a little moody about it. There was something very adorable and special about her. I’d never quite seen a pig that looked like that. They’re just an adorable breed. She was a huge challenge to work with but also one of those things where when it worked, it was just really fun to see emotion coming across from this pig. It was a great joy and a great difficulty.

I just heard that she died.

She did. She got a jaw infection, actually, at the beginning of COVID, and the sad thing is because of COVID all of the vets weren’t taking, like, new clients, so they couldn’t treat her. So she passed away, which was really sad. But she actually was pregnant while we were shooting Pig, so she does have some piglets still running around today.

What a freaking emotional rollercoaster this section turned out to be. I’m sorry for doing this to you on a Friday. I’ll try not to do it again. No promises, though.

ITEM NUMBER FIVE — I might just go ahead and make “Talk Your Shit, Ridley Scott” a recurring section

So, here’s what’s happening: Ridley Scott, the legendary director who has made everything from Alien to Gladiator to The Martian, made House of Gucci. I haven’t seen it yet but everyone who has says it’s… a lot. Just over-the-top and wild and fun, with huge performances galore and some liberties taken and Lady Gaga and Adam Driver doing truly powerful nose-related acting. I have no issue with any of this.

I am not, however, as far as I know, a member of the Gucci family. They do have an issue with it. A bunch of them. They put out a whole statement and everything. Here, look:

“The production of the film did not bother to consult the heirs before describing Aldo Gucci — president of the company for 30 years [played by Al Pacino in the film] — and the members of the Gucci family as thugs, ignorant and insensitive to the world around them,” the statement said.

It added that the pic attributes “a tone and an attitude to the protagonists of the well-known events that never belonged to them.”

“This is extremely painful from a human point of view and an insult to the legacy on which the brand is built today,” it noted.

Which was great news for me because, as we’ve discussed before, Ridley Scott rules and has no qualms about responding to things like this in the press, loudly and colorfully, as is one’s right when one has made both Alien and Gladiator. And he did respond. And it did not disappoint me even a little, even with my sky-high expectations. Please, read this. All the way to the end.

“The people that were writing from the family to us at the onset were alarmingly insulting, saying that Al Pacino did not represent physically Aldo Gucci in any shape or form,” Scott says. “And yet, frankly, how could they be better represented than by Al Pacino? Excuse me! You probably have the best actors in the world, you should be so f*cking lucky.”

I cannot express just how happy this makes me. I don’t think I know enough words. It’s a problem because communicating with words is quite literally my job but, I mean, look at this. The man made a movie about the Gucci family and the Gucci family got mad about it and he said, basically, “YOU SHOULD BE THANKING ME YOU UNGRATEFUL SLOBS!” To the Guccis! He said it! And now they’re probably going to respond, too. And I’ll read that response and be excited about it. It’s a perfect feud because I don’t know either party personally and they’re all millionaires and everyone will be fine even though they’ll convince themselves the world is ending.

Make a movie about this next. Cast The Rock as Ridley Scott and Vin Diesel as all of the members of the Gucci family, Nutty Professor-style. And let Ridley Scott direct it. Screw it. Let’s do it all.

READER MAIL

If you have questions about television, movies, food, local news, weather, or whatever you want, shoot them to me on Twitter or at brian.grubb@uproxx.com (put “RUNDOWN” in the subject line). I am the first writer to ever answer reader mail in a column. Do not look up this last part.

From Brandon:

This is going to sound weird but I’m curious about your screencap system. From following you on Twitter and reading you at Uproxx for years now, I know you have a lot. Do you have them sorted into folders by show? By topic? By reaction? How does one go about cataloguing hundreds of images of Mike from Breaking Bad and GIFs from Zoo? I just want to know how the sausage is made, I guess.

Oh, Brandon. Oh, buddy. It is adorable that you think I have anything resembling this kind of system. I suuuuuper do not. Everything gets saved as a string of letters and words I think I might remember and then it gets plopped onto my Desktop and then I search for it later when I’m hoping to find it. Like, all my Succession screencaps start with “succ” and then a character name, except for this one, which is named “Roman Fart.”

Is this helpful or useful in any way? No. Do I laugh every time I open it because I immediately think about a person whose name is Roman Fart? Of course. Was I able to pull up this image in seconds because I knew exactly how to find it? Well, yes.

You know how sometimes there’s a character in a movie or television show whose office is a mess of piles everywhere, tumbling over and spread over any surface flat enough to balance them, and whenever someone asks them about a specific piece of paper they’re like, “Ah, yes, one second. I think I just saw it over by the window”? That’s me with files on my computer. I’m that guy. It’s a miracle anything ever gets done around here. Especially with all the extra wasted time giggling about Roman Fart.

AND NOW, THE NEWS

To Europe!

It is called the “wine train,” and every weekend it rumbles out of the port of Tilbury, east of London, on a 100-mile journey to a depot in central England. It looks pretty much like any other freight train, but it carries an unusual cargo: Almost 650,000 bottles of wine.

STEAL THE WINE

SOMEONE

SOMEONE STEAL THE WINE FROM THE WINE TRAIN

WINE TRAIN ROBBERY

WINE HEIST

ANYONE

PLEASE

This 32-car, 1,600-foot-long traveling wine rack is the latest, and one of the more creative, answers to the supply shortages that have bedeviled Britain and caused the government to fret about disruptions to the Christmas holiday.

CHRISTMAS WINE HEIST

THEY CAN WEAR LITTLE SANTA HATS

A CREW OF SANTAS

STEALING THE WINE

FROM THE WINE TRAIN

BROSNAN

STATHAM

HATS

The wine train has been running from this busy port for a month or so, reducing the reliance on truck drivers, who have been in short supply in Britain, and ensuring that Britons will at least have a decent stock of alcohol during the holiday.

KELSEY GRAMMER IN MONEY PLANE 2: WINE TRAIN

GIMME

WRITE IT

HURRY

GIMME

Freightliner suggested that the weekly deliveries on the wine train — whose cargo takes several hours to load — had not yet satisfied the demand during the holiday season.

“We are looking to increase the frequency of this service to daily,” the company said.

DAILY WINE TRAIN

MOTHER GOD

PEOPLE

SOMEONE

ROB THE TRAIN

FOR ME

FOR CHRISTMAS

WINE HEIST

Two weeks ago, Terra Field — the Netflix employee who tweeted against Dave Chappelle’s trans jokes in The Closer and was subsequently suspended for attending a meeting, to which she wasn’t invited — announced her resignation from the streamer. At the time, Field’s attorney announced that she had “resolved” any “differences with Netflix” and, therefore, had withdrawn a National Labor Board Relations charge. While Chappelle continues to tell trans jokes on tour, Field has been reflecting upon what has happened, months after Chappelle has declared himself to be “Team TERF” (adopting a trans-exclusionary radical feminist stance).

While Chappelle is just fine and not “cancelled” by any stretch (and his high school alma mater will still name a theater after him), Field has called upon him to put his money where his mouth isn’t to help make things right. “Since it is #GivingTuesday, I’d again like to suggest folks donate to my fundraiser for @EquitasHealth which does great work for trans people in the state of Ohio,” Field tweeted. “Also, what a great day it would be for @DaveChappelle to make a sizable donation to them!”

Notably, this tweet happened days ago, and Chappelle hasn’t bitten yet. Field spoke with The Daily Beast to explain why she called upon Dave to donate to a health provider that serves the Ohio trans community:

“[N]ot only am I raising money for Equitas Health,” Field told The Daily Beast, “but you know, I’ve publicly called on Dave Chappelle to make a sizable donation in his name to Equitas Health. Since he cares so much about trans people and cares so much about Ohio and he’s such an ally to trans people, it just seems like it would make sense for him to make a donation. It’s a natural match.”

Clearly, there’s some hefty sarcasm there, but yep, it’s Dave Chappelle’s move now.

(Via The Daily Beast)

Hunter Biden, son of President Joe Biden, has been a regular target of Tucker Carlson and his fellow Fox News cronies in the months leading up to—and since—the 2020 presidential election. Back in December, Carlson talked about Hunter and his family’s “sleazy international business deals that undercut America’s core interests.” Which seemed strange, as just two month prior to that—just days ahead of the 2020 presidential election—Carlson said it was time for the media to lay off Hunter Biden. There were some mixed messages, to be sure, but if pro-Trump lawyer Lin Wood is to be believed, Carlson and Hunter Biden have a friendly history.

As Mediaite reports, Wood shared a screen shot to his Telegram channel on Wednesday of what is supposedly a private conversation between Biden the Younger and the Fox News sh*t disturber, who he claims have a “buddy-buddy” relationship. From the text of the conversation—if it is indeed to be believed—it appears as if Hunter, who earned his BA from Georgetown University, wrote a letter of recommendation to the school for Carlson’s son Buckley.

Carlson starts the correspondence on November 12, 2014 with: “Hunter! I can’t thank you enough for writing that letter to Georgetown on Buckley’s behalf. So nice of you. I know it’ll help. Hope you’re great and we can all get dinner soon.”

Biden replies: “Hey buddy — I need Buckley’s CV if you have one handy. Thanks[.]”

To which Carlson says: “Of course. Getting on a plane now but I’ll ask Susie to send it right away. Thanks again. It’s really nice of you to do this.”

Recommendation letters? Friendly dinners? Surely this isn’t the same Tucker Carlson who had people cheering when, while shopping in a Montana fishing store, he was confronted by a total stranger who told him he was “the worst human being known to man.” As the correspondence has not been verified, that’s a question that has not yet been answered. But it might explain that 180 Carlson made just ahead of the 2020 election in telling people to back off Hunter Biden.

While Mediaite notes that the timeline would match up for when Buckley would have been applying to colleges, ultimately, he ended up at the University of Virginia.

(Via Mediaite)

In a story that sounds like an episode of The Righteous Gemstones (although, sadly, no one had a pickle in their mouth despite what sounds like some misbehavin’), a plumber discovered a secret stash full of cash and checks hidden in a restroom wall at Joel Osteen‘s megachurch. Back in 2014, thousands of dollars were stolen from a safe in Osteen’s Lakewood Church in Houston, and the money was never found despite the offer of a cash reward. However, that all changed when a plumber was called in early November of this year to fix a toilet.

As reported by local news station, KRPC Channel 2, the plumber called into a morning radio show where he walked host George Lindsey through the insane discovery:

“There was a loose toilet in the wall, and we removed the tile,” the caller said. “We went to go remove the toilet, and I moved some insulation away and about 500 envelopes fell out of the wall, and I was like ‘Oh wow!’”

The caller said the envelopes were full of cash and checks.

“I went ahead and contacted the maintenance supervisor that was there, and I turned it all in,” he added.

While talking to KRPC Channel 2 about the plumber’s discovery, Lindsey wanted to know what the heck happened to the thief. “I mean they stole the money, but they didn’t get it out of the wall. Did they have an accident, you know what I mean? It’s like, why did they never go back? If it’s that money, why did they never go back?”

More importantly, the radio host feels the plumber should get the $25,000 reward that was offered. However, Crime Stoppers of Houston feels differently. When contacted by KRPC, Crime Stoppers said that the reward was “only for information leading to a suspect’s arrest” and “the statute of limitations has expired.” Ouch.

Maybe Osteen will step in and make this right, but then again, generosity hasn’t been his strong suit as evidenced by his church infamously refusing to offer shelter during 2017’s Hurricane Harvey.

(Via KRPC Channel 2)

Brent Faiyaz continues his mission to turn R&B into the most toxic genre with “Mercedes.” On the cool new single, Faiyaz tries to explain to a potential paramour the danger in pursuing him, claiming, “My block too hot to have a lady” because “If they can’t get to me, they’ll try my baby.” Okay, Batman.

Faiyaz has slowly but surely become a fixture of New Music Friday over the past 12 months, after being included on singles from the likes of Tyler The Creator (“Gravity“), Sonder (“Nobody But You” featuring Jorja Smith), Drake (“Wasting Time“), and Baby Keem (“Lost Souls” from the deluxe version of The Melodic Blue). On the solo tip, Brent also countered the perception of his toxicity with the prideful “Show You Off.”

As he grows in popularity, though, fans have gotten more and more anxious for the follow-up to his 2017 debut album Sonder Son. While his 2020 EP F*ck The World did a fine job of tiding some fans over as they waited, his buzz has only grown, leading to an equivalent increase in fan messages needling him to release a full project. With 2022 right around the corner, they’ll likely have to wait until next year… but that wait won’t be so long.

Listen to Brent Faiyaz’s “Mercedes” above.

Thanksgiving is a time for family and fellowship, but it is also a time to consume copious amounts of football. That happened in 2021 and, in this space, things went very well in the NFL to the tune of a 5-0 performance. That isn’t sustainable by any means, but it certainly helps the bottom line, and Week 13 looms with another interesting card on the docket.

Before we roll into a five-pack of selections, let’s glance at how things have gone this season.

• Last Week: 5-0
• 2021 Season: 35-24-1

Come get these winners.

Los Angeles Chargers (+3) over Cincinnati Bengals

We enjoy the Chargers on the road, as a general rule. This line is also inflated after two blowout wins for the Bengals, and Justin Herbert is coming off a brutal game by his standards. Los Angeles may not win outright, but getting the field goal pushes this over the top.

New York Giants (+4) over Miami Dolphins

The Dolphins are on a four-game winning streak. They are certainly playing better, but three of those victories came against the Texans, Jets and Panthers. There is a lot of attention paid to Miami’s uptick and, while the Giants are not a ton of fun to side with, New York can keep this tight with their defense. The line is also higher than it should be because of the worries about Daniel Jones and his neck. To put it bluntly, the line shouldn’t move more than a point between Jones and Mike Glennon.

Pittsburgh Steelers (+4.5) over Baltimore Ravens

This is gross. I’m fairly low on the Steelers, fading them with success last week, but this is their season. Pittsburgh’s defense is getting healthier, and the Steelers know the Ravens well. Mike Tomlin is also stellar as an underdog and this line shouldn’t be more than three.

Denver Broncos (+10) over Kansas City Chiefs

We don’t lean too heavily on trends in this column, but there are a few in play here. First, the Chiefs are 12-18 against the spread in the last 30 games, including playoffs, and that includes a 5-11 mark in home games. Second, Teddy Bridgewater’s ATS record as an underdog is the stuff of legend in NFL circles. Third, this is a lot of points for a Broncos defense that remains stout. Kansas City is likely going to win the game, but the full ten points should be enough.

Buffalo Bills (-2.5) over New England Patriots

The Patriots are playing great. There is no doubt about that. They’ve won six in a row and the last several victories came in blowout fashion. That explains the number, at least to some degree, but I still believe Buffalo is the better team. Yes, Bills All-Pro cornerback Tre’Davious White is injured, and that hurts Buffalo’s defense, but this isn’t the spot in which that should bite the Bills. New England’s defense is real, but this is a number that is too appealing to pass on right now.