Coverage: TNT
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Capacity: 20,917
Justin Van Duyne, Ray Acosta, JB DeRosa
Manchester City will appeal UEFA's decision to ban the club for two seasons from European competition -- including the Champions League -- after the governing body found them guilty of breaching financial fair play rules.
UEFA announced on Friday that the reigning Premier League champions will be excluded from the Champions League for the 2020-21 and 2021-22 campaigns and have also been fined €30 million ($33 million) for "overstating its sponsorship revenue in its accounts" and failing "to cooperate in the investigation," according to findings by the UEFA Adjudicatory Chamber.
In response, City said they were "disappointed but not surprised" by the ruling and gave notice of their intention to lodge an appeal at the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
Sources have told ESPN that City believe UEFA's process has been flawed and that they remain confident they will be cleared of any wrongdoing once their appeal is heard by an independent body. Sources have told ESPN that, until then, the club will go about their business "as usual."
Meanwhile, a source told ESPN's Rodrigo Faez that Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola is worried how the ban could affect his players but that he will remain at the club "as long as he is happy."
A UEFA statement issued on Friday night partly read: "The Adjudicatory Chamber, having considered all the evidence, has found that Manchester City Football Club committed serious breaches of the UEFA Club Licensing and Financial Fair Play Regulations by overstating its sponsorship revenue in its accounts and in the break-even information submitted to UEFA between 2012 and 2016.
"The Adjudicatory Chamber has also found that in breach of the regulations the Club failed to cooperate in the investigation of this case by the [chamber's Club Financial Control Body].
"The Adjudicatory Chamber has imposed disciplinary measures on Manchester City Football Club directing that it shall be excluded from participation in UEFA club competitions in the next two seasons [ie. the 2020/21 and 2021/22 seasons] and pay a fine of €30 million."
Julien Laurens explains how Manchester City's UEFA ban will be perceived by other big clubs around Europe.
City, who face Real Madrid in the last-16 of this season's competition, issued their own statement shortly afterward to declare their anger at how the case has been handled by Europe's governing body.
"Manchester City is disappointed but not surprised by today's announcement by the UEFA Adjudicatory Chamber," the team statement said. "The club has always anticipated the ultimate need to seek out an independent body and process to impartially consider the comprehensive body of irrefutable evidence in support of its position.
"In December 2018, the UEFA Chief Investigator publicly previewed the outcome and sanction he intended to be delivered to Manchester City, before any investigation had even begun. The subsequent flawed and consistently leaked UEFA process he oversaw has meant that there was little doubt in the result that he would deliver.
"The club has formally complained to the UEFA Disciplinary body, a complaint which was validated by a CAS ruling.
"Simply put, this is a case initiated by UEFA, prosecuted by UEFA and judged by UEFA. With this prejudicial process now over, the club will pursue an impartial judgment as quickly as possible and will therefore, in the first instance, commence proceedings with the Court of Arbitration for Sport at the earliest opportunity."
The Premier League did not issue a statement on Friday but La Liga president Javier Tebas tweeted that: "UEFA is finally taking decisive measures. There needs to be fair play rules and punishing financial doping is essential for the future of football...Better late than never."
CHICAGO -- It might be early in the NBA All-Star Weekend festivities, which feature events with famous musicians, chefs, Instagram stars and actors, but one person has already left top draft pick Zion Williamson starstruck: former President Barack Obama. Williamson said his meeting with Obama was one of his top life experiences.
"This could be No. 1," the New Orleans Pelicans forward said. "I don't want to say it is No. 1 right now because the draft might be 1, but this is definitely top two."
Obama showed up for an NBA Cares event in between Rising Stars practices on Friday morning. NBA players from the USA and World teams put on red T-shirts and assisted young students from local schools in filling 500 backpacks with colored pencils, markers, notebooks and other school supplies for under-resourced students and teachers.
Players like RJ Barrett and Luka Doncic stood and stuffed the backpacks while taking teasing jabs from the children about who could dunk on whom. Roughly 15 minutes into the event, Obama showed up. Most of the players and children had no idea he would be attending.
Slowly, Obama weaved his way around the room and introduced himself to every player, student, volunteer and coach. After Obama dapped up Charlotte's Miles Bridges, Bridges turned toward reporters and admitted that he had intended to ask for a photo but was too nervous. The students said they felt the same.
"I can't believe I just met him; I almost cried," one student exclaimed.
Eventually, Obama nestled in between Williamson and Trae Young and chatted with the two young players for 20 minutes while helping them add markers to the backpacks.
"It was crazy being able to stand next to him, talk to him," Young said. "He basically knew everything about my season, my game. I was definitely asking him a lot of questions. He was just like a regular person -- that's what was crazy. You see all these things on TV and you don't even realize. He was just talking to me like a regular person."
It was the first time both Williamson and Young had met Obama. Young said Obama told him that with him at point guard, the Atlanta Hawks would eventually turn things around and have a winning season.
"It is special when you meet someone that is an icon like that," Young said.
Williamson was stunned when Obama started rattling off his recent stats in Pelicans games. Williamson said that the former president even recalled specific plays from his year playing for Duke.
"He said I played great, and I kind of zoned out after that," Williamson said, still giddy. "That was all I needed to hear, to be honest."
CHICAGO -- The stars among stars were out in 10-degree weather Friday night to celebrate Chicago's first NBA All-Star Weekend in three decades.
And the league didn't miss an opportunity to honor two legendary figures in the process.
Ahead of the NBA All-Star Celebrity Game tipoff, ESPN commentators Stephen A. Smith and Michael Wilbon -- a native of Chicago -- delivered emotional speeches, and 24.2 seconds of silence was held to honor the passing of NBA legend Kobe Bryant and former commissioner David Stern.
"Two men who forever changed the NBA and the great game of basketball globally in ways only legends could," Wilbon said.
"So let's take these next few moments to celebrate and show gratitude for their contributions to this game we all love," Smith added.
"They will forever be missed, but certainly never forgotten," Wilbon said. "Thank you, David and Kobe."
Chants of "Kobe, Kobe, Kobe" then showered the arena as the clock counted down.
Rapper Quavo also wore a white T-shirt representing Bryant's Mamba Sports Academy during pregame warm-ups instead of the traditional team gear.
Wilbon's team went on to win the game, 62-47.
Tributes to Bryant can be found throughout the weekend, including on the back of all media credentials, where photos of Bryant and Stern are stamped.
The All-Star uniforms feature patches displaying nine stars, to represent every victim who died during the helicopter crash that claimed the lives of Bryant and his daughter Gianna on Jan. 26. All members of Team LeBron and Team Giannis will wear No. 2 and No. 24, respectively, during Sunday's All-Star Game for Kobe's and Gianna's jersey numbers.
Bryant was also officially named a finalist for the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame Class of 2020 on Friday in Chicago.
LOS ANGELES -- The Los Angeles Lakers announced Friday that fans seeking to attend the Feb. 24 memorial for Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna at Staples Center must register to purchase tickets and there will be no outside overflow areas.
Top-tier tickets will be priced at $224 each, while others will be two for $224 and some $24.02 each -- combinations of numbers that like the date, 2/24, represent the No. 24 worn by Bryant and the No. 2 worn by Gianna on her girls basketball team.
Proceeds from the ticket sales will benefit the Mamba and Mambacita Sports Foundation, the Lakers said.
Ticket registration was to extend from 11 a.m. Friday through 10 p.m. Monday through the Ticketmaster Verified Fan system. On Tuesday, registered fans will receive emails with nontransferable personal access codes that will allow them to participate in the public sale on Wednesday morning.
In a move apparently intended to prevent a repeat of the massive crowds that flocked to Staples after Bryant's death, the Lakers said the memorial will not be shown on exterior video screens at the arena or the adjacent L.A. Live entertainment area.
Members of the public without tickets to the memorial were advised not to come near the arena or L.A. Live because they will not be able to enter the area, the team said.
The Lakers' statement did not include any details about the memorial.
Staples Center, known as "the house that Kobe built," is where Bryant starred for most of his 20-year career with the Lakers.
Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter and seven others were killed Jan. 26 when the helicopter they were aboard crashed in Calabasas, California, as they were flying to a basketball tournament where Gianna was to play with her team.
Bryant and Gianna were buried Feb. 7 at Pacific View Memorial Park in Corona del Mar, California, near the family home, according to death certificates.
On Monday, several thousand people came to Angel Stadium of Anaheim to mourn three of the victims: Orange Coast College baseball coach John Altobelli, his wife, Keri, and their daughter, Alyssa, who was Gianna's teammate.
Also killed in the crash were Christina Mauser, who helped Bryant coach the girls basketball team; Sarah Chester and her daughter, Payton, another of Gianna's teammates; and pilot Ara Zobayan.
The cause of the crash remains under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
CHICAGO -- The star-studded Class of 2020 for the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame took one step closer to induction as Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett and the late Kobe Bryant were all officially named as finalists on Friday.
They were joined by 10-time WNBA All-Star Tamika Catchings of the Indiana Fever, coach Kim Mulkey of three-time women's NCAA champion Baylor, five-time Division II coach of the year Barbara Stevens of Bentley University, four-time NCAA coach of the year Eddie Sutton and former Houston Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich, who won two NBA titles.
From the moment Garnett, Duncan and Bryant were all eligible to be inducted this year, there was no doubt all three -- each among the greatest ever to play the sport -- would be enshrined on Aug. 29 in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Being a lock as a finalist didn't make the moment any less special for Garnett, who was on hand for the announcement in the same city where he spent his senior year of high school playing at Farragut Academy before being drafted fifth overall by the Minnesota Timberwolves in 1995.
"He'd probably think this is pretty awesome right here," Garnett said with a smile when asked what the 18-year-old version of himself would've said back in 1995 about Friday's announcement. "The Hall of Fame is something you don't really think about. It just happens."
The basketball world still is reeling from sudden and tragic losses.
Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others were killed Jan. 26 when the helicopter they were aboard crashed in Calabasas, California, as they were flying to a basketball tournament where Gianna was to play with her team.
In addition, David Stern, the NBA commissioner during the most successful period in league history, died Jan. 1 as a result of a brain hemorrhage. He was 77.
The combination of Bryant's passing and the enormity of the three names atop the ballot caused the Hall's nominating committee, led by chairman Jerry Colangelo, to change its rules this year by limiting the class to eight nominees to be voted upon and eliminating the direct-elect selections on a one-year trial basis.
One step closer to Springfield. #MambaForever pic.twitter.com/ojR8iHpcwD
— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) February 14, 2020
The goal, Colangelo said, was to avoid the lesser-known honorees being lost amid the interest in the star names headlining this year's event.
"[That's] because of the enormity -- even before Kobe's death -- that we think Kobe and Duncan and Garnett bring to it," Colangelo said. "We've never had a class that strong at the top. And of course with Kobe's death, it added more focus.
"We thought the way of dealing with it was eliminating some direct-elects on a one-year basis. We have that flexibility, fortunately, to do it because some people could get lost in the shuffle, really, in terms of getting their due."
Colangelo also addressed the speculation that, in the wake of Bryant's death, he would be enshrined in the Hall without a vote.
"No, no, no," Colangelo said. "I have no idea where those things started. We have a process and you follow the process. When we met in Dallas after his death, we had to deal with that, and the way we dealt with it was we weren't going to submit a lot of names. We were going to make it a small class.
"We want everyone to get their due. It's important. It's sensitive. We have a job to do between now and the end of August, that it is that kind of a program and production. As sad as it all is, we have to deal with all of that, and life goes on in the world of basketball and the Hall of Fame and we don't want to take away from the people here who are the prospective inductees."
ESPN's Michael Wilbon and Mike Breen were elected into the Hall of Fame as recipients of the Curt Gowdy Media Award. The Hall also added a pair of media awards this season -- the Curt Gowdy Insight Media Award and the Curt Gowdy Transformative Media Award -- and those went to Jim Gray and TNT's "Inside The NBA" program, respectively.
Michael Wilbon receives a phone call saying he won the Curt Gowdy Media Award for Print Journalism.
"It's hard to process," Breen said with a smile. "I just love the game, and to be able to call the games ... to me, that was the lottery. That was hitting the jackpot for the rest of my life.
"To think that you were doing something that you love so much, and then they're going to give you this unbelievable award? I know it's a cliché, but it's overwhelming."
The Hall's Class of 2020 will be announced during the NCAA Final Four in Atlanta on April 4. The Hall's Honors Committee -- made up of Hall of Famers, basketball executives, media members and others -- will vote on the finalists, who must receive 18 of 24 votes to be enshrined.
Coverage: TNT
Capacity: 20,917
Justin Van Duyne, Ray Acosta, JB DeRosa
Win %:81.1
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Luka Doncic makes 46-foot three point jumper
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CLEVELAND -- The Indians are already dealing with adversity before taking the field for their first full-squad workout.
Starter Mike Clevinger could be sidelined two months after undergoing surgery Friday to repair a torn meniscus in his left knee, an injury the right-hander sustained while working out at the team's training complex in Goodyear, Arizona, earlier this week.
"He was doing some drills a couple days ago," manager Terry Francona said before Clevinger had the procedure. "He felt something. We took him to the training room. Then we let him go home to see how he feels. I think our trainers were a little nervous at the outset that this has meniscus written all over it. He was pretty sore so they got him an MRI."
The Indians estimate Clevinger will be able to return to "major league game activity" in six to eight weeks. Cleveland opens the season on March 26 against Detroit.
If there's a bright spot, it's that the injury happened early in camp and not closer to the season's start.
"It's not doomsday," Francona said. "One, we know he's a quick healer. And two, he will be able to keep his arm in condition the entire time. I'd prefer it didn't happen, but he's going to be OK."
Clevinger, 29, went 13-4 last season, and the Indians are counting on him to help fill some of the void after they traded two-time Cy Young winner Corey Kluber to the Texas Rangers this winter.
Clevinger has become a vital part of the team's rotation, winning 38 games over the past three seasons. He made 21 starts in 2019, but missed time early in the year with a strained back muscle. Clevinger had a 2.71 ERA last season.
Clevinger avoided arbitration by signing a $4.1 million contract for this season. He's recently been outspoken about the Houston Astros sign-stealing scandal.
Also, the Indians and outfielder Domingo Santana agreed to a contract that guarantees $1.75 million. The deal includes a $1.5 million salary this year and a $5 million club option for 2021 with a $250,000 buyout, and it could be worth $7.5 million over two years.
He played for Seattle last season, batting .253 with 21 homers and 69 RBIs in 121 games. Santana, 27, missed 24 games in August and September with an injured right elbow.
He'll enter a crowded competition to win one of the open starting spots in Cleveland's outfield. Only center fielder Oscar Mercado seems to have a job locked up.
"It's an offensive bat with right-handed power that isn't easy to find," Francona said of Santana. "Where it ends up fitting, we don't know all of that yet. With [Franmil] Reyes, with [Jordan] Luplow, with Domingo, it's enough of a bat, a pretty potent bat at times. We thought it was worth signing him. We don't know where it all fits together but we'll figure that out."
Santana is excited about the new opportunity.
"This is a great organization. I'm really glad that I'm part of it," he said. "They didn't talk to me about how I would fit here. They really just talked to my agent so I don't know that part yet. I'm just glad I'm here. I'm comfortable with whichever role they put me in. I just want to prepare myself and be healthy."
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- Count Washington Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo among those not impressed or satisfied by the Houston Astros' attempts to apologize for -- and put behind them -- their sign-stealing scandal.
"They cheated. They were found guilty of it. And I haven't heard it yet," Rizzo said Friday after Washington's second formal workout at the spring training complex the team shares with Houston.
"The thing that pains me the most is it puts a black cloud over the sport that I love. And that's not right. The commissioner did an investigation and found that they cheated in 2017 and 2018. Somebody's got to say the words over there: 'cheated.' And that's important to me," Rizzo said. "For the sport to move on, which is what I'm most concerned about, we have to make sure that all the i's are dotted and the t's are crossed on this investigation before we end it."
Rizzo's NL champ Nationals went into last year's World Series prepared to deal with against-the-rules actions by the AL champ Astros before beating them in Game 7 for the title.
"I have no proof of what, if anything, they did in 2019," Rizzo said. "We assumed they were, and we prepared diligently for it."
World Series MVP Stephen Strasburg said the Nationals used new catcher's signals and changed them during games, so if Houston had been trying to steal signs in October, there wouldn't be anything from his past outings that could be relied on.
"Regardless of if there was any funny business going on, we controlled what we could control, we were prepared for it, and we did what was necessary to go out there and make it as even a playing field as possible," Strasburg said.
Rizzo and Strasburg said people from other teams reached out to the Nationals as soon as it was known their opponent in the Fall Classic would be the Astros.
"We got a lot of volunteer phone calls on how to beat them and how to play them," Rizzo said.
Noted Strasburg: "The league is a lot smaller than you think."
Last month, commissioner Rob Manfred punished Houston for using a video feed to view and decode opposing catchers' signs during the 2017 -- when the team won the championship -- and 2018 seasons. Players banged on a trash can to signal to batters what pitch was coming, believing it would improve the chances of getting a hit.
Rizzo made a point of saying the Astros "cheated to win the World Series."
Houston's manager, AJ Hinch, and GM, Jeff Luhnow, were suspended by Manfred for a year and immediately fired by the club.
"I know for a fact that could not and would not happen with the Washington Nationals, because I would not allow it to happen with the Washington Nationals," Rizzo said. "So we certainly take pride in that, the way we conduct our business and our process, and we try and do things the right way for the good of the game in its entirety."
Told of the general nature of Rizzo's comments Friday, Astros pitcher Brad Peacock said: "I don't know how to answer that. All I know is we're moving forward, looking forward to next year. And everybody spoke yesterday about it. And I agree with everything they said."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
MEXICO CITY -- Bartolo Colon is headed to Mexico.
The right-hander, who will turn 47 in May, has signed with the Monclova Acereros of the Mexican Baseball League.
The Acereros, defending champions of the Triple-A circuit, announced the signing of the Dominican right-hander Friday. The team didn't provide details of the contract.
"Bartolo Colon would be an important piece of the pitching staff of the current champions, becoming one of the bigger signings in our baseball history,'' the team said in a press release. "The 'Big Sexy' show would be something the Monclova fans will be able to enjoy."
Colon hasn't pitched in the majors since 2018 with the Texas Rangers.
He became the top winning pitcher born in Latin America, getting his 246th career victory on Aug. 7, 2018, against the Seattle Mariners.
Colon is 247-188 in 565 games -- 552 as a starter -- since his big league debut with Cleveland in 1997. He also was the 2005 AL Cy Young Award winner while with the Angels.
TAMPA, Fla. -- Gerrit Cole ambled into the clubhouse at the New York Yankees' facility for the first time the other day, glancing at the placards at the tops of the lockers to find his name and his spot. The Cucuzza brothers, Rob and Lou, make the decisions about who sits where, and Cole got the locker formerly occupied by Aroldis Chapman, who, because of his seniority among the pitchers, was moved to the coveted and spacious spot CC Sabathia had for years.
Cole has a pretty good locker, right underneath the clubhouse television, very handy for March Madness days, and as it turns out, he resides right next to a former teammate from his Pirates days, J.A. Happ. When Happ walked over, Cole greeted him happily, extending his forearm after noticing they both had the same modest watches.
In Pittsburgh, Happ and Cole were catch partners, sharing the daily ritual of tossing a baseball, and they are reunited in this. As Cole joked happily, he's relieved he won't be the guy left out.
While Cole's former Houston teammates are stuck in apology prison on the other side of the state, doomed to serve an indefinite sentence of penance, Cole is here, seemingly like a college student excited in his first days experiencing a new place, investing in a new set of friends.
Gerrit Cole throws his second bullpen of the spring as a member of the New York Yankees. Video by Marly Rivera
Context is important: Cole was not part of the 2017 Astros team that, according to the commissioner's report released in January, beat the Yankees in the American League Championship Series while engaged in systematic sign stealing. He did pitch for the Astros in 2018, when the sign stealing continued, and in 2019, when the Astros again beat the Yankees in the ALCS. When Yankees manager Aaron Boone was asked Thursday about whether a bridge needed to be constructed for Cole with his new teammates, he initially misunderstood the question, because, as he clarified, the bridge is already there. Cole has been embraced already.
He joins the Yankees to be, in theory, the $324 million finishing piece to a team capable of being the first New York team to win a World Series since 2009. The Yankees have a dominant bullpen and their lineup led the league in runs last year, but Cole appeared to be the difference between Houston and the Yankees in the playoffs. The ace, the No. 1 starter. Now Cole is theirs, wearing No. 45. As far as the right-hander is concerned, the burden of expectations -- the Steinbrenner Doctrine of World Series or bust -- is anything but onerous.
"I love it," he said. "From a player's perspective, it doesn't get much more simple than that.
"I've been champing at the bit," he continued. "I'm thrilled for this new adventure."
He threw his first bullpen session for the Yankees on Wednesday, 25 pitches, and when it was over, after the finishing tap of the glove with catcher Gary Sanchez, Cole stood and talked with Yankees staffers, Boone and new pitching coach Matt Blake and a small horde of others. Five minutes passed. Ten minutes. Twenty minutes.
Cole was cheerily animated, talking about his philosophy of working in to left-handed hitters and away from right-handed hitters and the setup of the catcher, among other topics. He loves to talk, he said, and for a baseball junkie, this was baseball mainlining. With other responsibilities calling them away, Boone and others drifted off, the crowd dissipating around the celebrity newcomer who clearly enjoyed the face time with everyone.
At the outset of the first team meeting Thursday morning, Boone spoke with Yankees pitchers and catchers about bringing a positive energy into the clubhouse, about contributing to the work environment, and for Cole, this resonated.
There haven't been any vibes that other Yankees expect Cole to bare his soul about the Astros' cheating scandal. As a pitcher, he wouldn't have had direct involvement anyway, and in his news conference after his workout Thursday, he indicated that he didn't really know anything. If teammates approach him with questions, he said, he'd answer as honestly as possible, but there is no sense here that any veteran Yankee will demand anything of him. He came here to pitch, to lead.
Meanwhile, his former Houston teammates appear destined to lead the majors in road attendance in 2020, but not for reasons any of them might've envisioned when they hoisted the 2017 championship trophy.
Before Cole walked out of the building here Thursday, he sat in a pair of jeans, a T-shirt and running shoes, and chatted with Lou Cucuzza, one of the clubhouse godfathers, buoyantly showing Cucuzza something on his phone.
The Cucuzza brothers haven't laid out the locker assignments in Yankee Stadium yet, so it's unclear whether Cole will inherit Sabathia's old locker or some other spot down pitchers row, maybe closer to where Happ is. But it's already evident that whatever spot Cole is given, he will be exactly where he wants to be, as part of the Yankees.
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