Boardroom CEO Rich Kleiman on sports media rights shake-up, Kevin Durant trade and Game Plan Summit
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
13 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Why you're probably better off just avoiding Rashee Rice in your fantasy football drafts this season
The 'will he, won't he' nature of Rashee Rice's potential and inevitable suspension saga took another turn Thursday morning. ESPN's Adam Schefter reported that Rice's disciplinary hearing with the NFL will take place on Tuesday, Sept 30 in New York, which means his suspension would only begin sometime after that date. When Rice entered into a plea bargain stemming from the 2024 multi-car crash in Dallas back in July, fantasy gamers assumed the NFL's disciplinary process would begin soon and Rice would serve his suspension — estimated anywhere from four to eight games — at the start of the season. That's now completely out the window, as he'll be eligible to play in the first four games of the 2025 NFL season. Those matchups include a Week 1 Brazil game with the Chargers, a Super Bowl rematch with the Eagles in Kansas City, a trip to New York vs. the Giants and a home game against the Ravens. [Join or create a Yahoo Fantasy Football league for the 2025 NFL season] Beyond the fact that this has been a super laborious and drawn-out disciplinary process for someone who deserves immense scrutiny for what he did, this is straight-up bad for fantasy drafters considering Rice. I firmly believe fantasy content creators have gotten too over-focused on 'the weeks that matter' toward the end of the season rather than hammering how important it is to win in September, as I outline in my Draft Day Blueprint mega-article. However, it's objectively true that the easiest time to fill in the gap around a suspended or injured player is earlier in the season. There are no bye weeks to consider, you haven't sustained injuries yet and the most appealing waiver-wire heroes are often made apparent in the first few weeks of the year. Essentially, you have your whole lineup at your disposal to fill in the gaps. That will no longer be the case if Rice serves his four-to-eight-game suspension anywhere between Weeks 5 and 18. Not that the Chiefs have a Week 10 bye that can't count toward a suspension and there's no guarantee the league hands out punishment right after the September 30 hearing before their Week 5 kickoff against the Jaguars on October 6. We've seen this before. Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott was suspended six games during the 2017 NFL season over accusations of domestic violence. Elliott was originally suspended for the first six weeks of the season but after appeals and court litigation pushed it off, he ended up serving the suspension from Weeks 10 to 15. The process for both situations is an apples-to-apples comparison but the point is the same: You're in the Wild West of projecting when the player will miss time. Yahoo drafters were taking Rashee Rice at an ADP of 61st overall. That seemed more than fair enough of a risk/reward proposition for a player who has been ultra-productive in a terrific offensive ecosystem. Since he entered the league in 2023, Rice has been targeted on 27.4% of his routes, sixth-most among wide receivers who have run 300-plus routes, and ranks seventh in first downs per route run. I do have my concerns about Rice holding up to that level of production long-term, given that he doesn't have the complete WR1 skill set as a man-coverage-beating or downfield receiver that every other name in the top 10 of those two metrics brings to the table. The YAC-based zone-beaters who struggle to beat man coverage can be susceptible to environmental changes more than traditional WR1s. Just look back to JuJu Smith-Schuster's rise and fall for an example of this; I think they're incredibly similar players. However, that's more of a dynasty concern. If Rice is on the field for this Chiefs offense, he's likely ticketed for another year of heavy volume of layup targets as the team's power slot receiver, unless Xavier Worthy takes a massive leap forward. Before Thursday's update, I had Rice ranked 52nd overall and was willing to take the plunge in Round 5 even if he was set to miss the start of the season. Now that the suspension is a complete unknown from a timing perspective, the calculation has to change. I've hammered this over and over again this offseason but the Rounds 5-8 wide receiver draft board is just so appealing. There are even appealing picks all the way into the 110-to-120-overall range. None of those bets are flawless but at least I'm not walking into the season carrying a massive burden of unknown and locking myself into multiple missed games during crucial bye weeks. I won't sink Rice past that 120 overall range or anything like that, but a big dip into the 90s and outside the top-40 wide receivers feels appropriate. There's likely a way to take Rice, start him in the first four weeks and insulate your wide receiver corps with the deep pool of WRs this year to make up for his absent weeks. However, I question if the reward of such a pursuit is as great as the fantasy community may imagine. That's because there is another significant risk factor to Rice's profile that we haven't touched on here yet — and is way too often ignored in the fantasy circles. Rashee Rice is coming off a major injury that ended his 2024 season after less than four games. One of the (slightly galaxy brain) takes in some circles of the fantasy community over the last month — when Rice pled guilty in July — was that missing the first few games of the season may actually be good for Rice. This would allow him to get healthier coming off the significant injury and you wouldn't have to start him in the games he may be working back into form. Instead, you'd just plug him into the lineup when he's close to fully operational after four, six or however many games he missed. I'm not sure if that ever made sense but either way, that's out the window now. You're now getting Rice for those first four games when he may indeed be working back from that injury. And just because he's been practicing, you've seen some nice-looking clips of him and the team is saying he looks good, does not mean you are guaranteed anything close to 100% Rice when the real games begin. Drafters made this exact same mistake with Tank Dell last season for all the same reasons listed. Despite participating fully in the offseason, Dell was not productive to start the year, averaging 32.3 yards per game, 9.7 yards per catch and scoring just once in the first seven weeks of last season. It took no time at all when turning on the film in September to see that, while there was a wide receiver out there wearing No. 3 for the Houston Texans playing a normal snap count, that guy didn't play anything like the Tank Dell we saw cut through secondaries as a rookie before going on IR with a lower body injury. Dell eventually returned closer to form as the year wound down, but this still provides a cautionary tale when discussing Rice's projections early in 2025. We act like these guys are names on a spreadsheet, or players in Madden. They're not. Just because they're out there on the field doesn't mean they are capable of performing at their normal level when working back from something significant. Sometimes, it's the year after the year following the injury. Rice's 'ramp up back to normal in-game performance' phase could be in the first four weeks when he's eligible to play and is then whisked away from your lineup the moment he's turning the corner. That's not to mention how coming back from an injury like this may, at best, temporarily sap some of his explosiveness early in the season, which is troubling for a wideout who doesn't win down the field with nuance or separation, but rather as a hammerhead with speed and power in the open field. Maybe all of that worry is for naught and he's fantastic in the first four weeks of the season. That's within the range of outcomes. However, the risk is present and I don't see any of that discussed in the analysis of him from a fantasy standpoint, nor is it at all baked into either his current ADP or even where he was going in best-ball drafts prior to the July plea bargain. Rashee Rice is one of the riskiest propositions on the board in fantasy football drafts this year. It would be one thing if it were a simple four-game suspension to start the year. It's not. It's an unknown length of absence that will come in the middle of the season for a player working back from a significant injury, a player who inhabits a somewhat fragile role as a YAC-based zone-beater for an offense that desperately needs to find a downfield dimension. What if Xavier Worthy takes off in Year 2 as a vertical threat at the start of the season and only cements himself further while Rice is suspended? Are we absolutely confident that Rice returns to the type of outrageous volume he was getting in Weeks 1 to 3 last year? You have to be certain to wade into the incredibly clouded waters that now define his 2025 season. With how strong the wide receiver board is after Round 5, with a litany of appealing bets — some early in their career and others undervalued veterans — there are just too many ways the Rice selection can go wrong. He's a pretty easy avoid for me inside the top 90 selections and there are too many analysts focused on that per route efficiency for me to imagine he falls farther than that.
USA Today
15 minutes ago
- USA Today
Middleweight GOAT? Dricus Du Plessis says he'd be 'very close' after UFC 319 win
CHICAGO – Dricus Du Plessis believes he's knocking on the door of middleweight GOAT status. In the main event of UFC 319 (ESPN+ pay-per-view) at United Center, Du Plessis (23-2 MMA, 9-0 UFC) puts his 185-pound title on the line against Khamzat Chimaev, who many believe is one of the toughest tests in the UFC, regardless of division. If successful against Chimaev, Du Plessis will tie Chris Weidman with three title defenses, which is third in the division's history behind Israel Adesanya and Anderson Silva. Du Plessis has successfully defended his crown twice, and Weidman recently told MMA Junkie's Mike Bohn that with a third, his name will be in the conversation for greatest ever in his division. "Yeah, in terms of the number of title defenses, sure," Du Plessis told reporters at media day. "I think Chris Weidman is amazing. I'm a massive, massive fan. When you look at the amount of defenses, and you look at a guy like Anderson Silva, for example. I think Anderson Silva is the GOAT, because he's the guy. He's always been a hero of mine. "But you also have to look in terms of era of title defenses – who these guys fought. Did they fight a guy with a part-time job? Did they fight full-time fighters? Was the sport ever as developed as it is right now? But I can't take away from any of those guys. I'm just saying, in today's age of fighting, that amount of defenses is not always possible. Right now, I still have a long way to go before I'm considered as the greatest of all time, and even the greatest middleweight of all time. But after this fight, I am right up there. I'm getting very close to that." Du Plessis is currently on an 11-fight winning streak, with his last setback coming in 2018, two fights before entering the UFC. He tore through the division, winning six, including a second-round stoppage of former champion Robert Whittaker, to earn a title shot against then-champion Sean Strickland. Du Plessis defended the title against Adesanya and Strickland in a rematch. The challenge that lies ahead is an undefeated wrecking ball in Chimaev (14-0 MMA, 8-0 UFC). Oddsmakers see the challenger as the favorite, and Du Plessis understands why. Ultimately, the South African champ views the situation as familiar, because every fight has been tougher than the one before it. With a win over Chimaev, Du Plessis sees himself being one step closer to the GOAT, but also knows he will still have his doubters. "I think he's exactly as good as people think, and I know he's this massive task – and so was every other guy in front of me," Du Plessis said. "At the stage where I fought them, they were these massive tasks. Look at Robert Whittaker. He hasn't lost in over a decade to anybody else than the champion. Then, fighting Strickland, who just beat Adesanya, and beating him, then fighting Adesanya, who – it's Israel Adesanya. One of the best to ever do this sport. Now, it's this guy. And after this guy, there will be another guy where people will say, 'Oh, this is your biggest test to date.' Because that's what happens when you fight the best of the best. "So, yes. This fight is massive. Khamzat is an incredibly good fighter. But what people are going to be saying is the same thing they've said after every one of my fights: 'He did it again. Can you believe it? Dricus did it again. I will not doubt him again.' You know, same ol', same ol'."
Entrepreneur
15 minutes ago
- Entrepreneur
How to Rewrite the Mental Scripts That Limit Your Potential
Even top-performing executives are held back by silent internal scripts — learn how to spot them, rewrite them and lead with renewed clarity and confidence. Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. Executive pressure has never been higher, and neither has the silence. CEOs today are navigating complex, fast-changing markets while projecting absolute certainty. But behind the boardroom polish, many are quietly wrestling with a deeper challenge: the inner belief that they're not enough. I must have all the answers. I'm too technical to lead. I'm not the kind of leader they expect. These thoughts rarely make it into headlines or investor calls, but they shape behavior, stifle confidence and quietly limit growth. The truth is, even the most capable leaders carry these mental scripts. And real leadership transformation begins when they learn to confront and rewrite them. Related: 15 Ways to Drown Out the Destructive Voices in Your Head The hidden cost of invisible scripts During a recent client session, an accomplished CTO admitted to avoiding board presentations. His reason? I'm not the charismatic type. That belief, rooted in an early-career speaking misstep, had become a silent limiter. Despite his deep expertise and required influence on innovation, he let others speak for him when it mattered most. These moments aren't rare. From CEO-peer conversations to our client's executive coaching engagements, I've seen how beliefs forged decades ago can shape behavior for years — until they're challenged. These internal narratives rarely present as loud doubts. More often, they subtly guide behavior, such as declining a stretch role, holding back in meetings and micromanaging instead of delegating. Confidence, then, becomes less about bravado and more about clarity and knowing where your belief system helps you lead and where it holds you back. When mindset becomes the inflection point One of the most impressive executives I worked with, a proven product leader, once confided, I don't present well. Despite leading high-impact initiatives and being trusted across the organization, she consistently declined speaking roles at board meetings. That belief, rooted in one early presentation misstep, had shaped years of behavior. Through coaching, she realized it was a limiting script. We reframed it by focusing on her ability to connect ideas, spark curiosity and distill complex information with clarity. Soon after, she led a product launch presentation that redefined her visibility in the organization. Within six months, she led a new division. Her growth began the moment she challenged the narrative that had quietly shaped her decisions for years. Consider Microsoft under Satya Nadella. When he became CEO in 2014, the company was seen as stagnant and internally competitive. Nadella introduced a growth mindset culture — shifting from "know‑it‑all" to "learn‑it‑all" — by encouraging curiosity, collaboration and openness to failure. That shift in mindset helped fuel Microsoft's rise in cloud, innovation and market leadership. Mindset shifts like this require courage, the kind that doesn't just spot familiar patterns but interrupts them. Executives must slow down enough to question long-held beliefs and consider alternatives that feel unfamiliar but necessary. Related: How Mindset Plays a Role in Your Entrepreneurial Success How limiting beliefs show up in career moments Many otherwise qualified executives self-select out of conversations too early. A 2024 Korn Ferry survey found that 71% of U.S. CEOs experience symptoms of imposter syndrome, a clear reminder that even the most seasoned leaders struggle with self-doubt even after success. While imposter syndrome and limiting beliefs aren't identical, they often overlap. One might sound like: I'm not ready yet. Another: They're going to realize I have no idea what I'm doing. Here's what that can look like in reality: What's the voice in your head saying when you walk into a boardroom? Have you ever dismissed a win because it felt like "luck?" Do you still secretly think someone will find out you're winging it? Have you hit a huge milestone and immediately felt panic, like you were going to blow it? The best leaders treat their careers like strategic assets. They stay open, engage with curiosity and evaluate options based on fit and value, not fear or assumption. And organizations notice. Confidence, rooted in reflection rather than ego, signals coachability, adaptability and readiness to lead. Rewriting the narrative with reflection and repetition Here's the truth: Mental scripts aren't erased overnight. Like grooves in a well-worn trail, they take time to reshape. But there is a process: Name the script. Awareness is the first breakthrough. What belief are you carrying that may no longer serve you? Test its origin. When did you first start believing this? Was it based on one moment, or repeated feedback? Find counterevidence. Reflect on times you succeeded despite this belief and on other limiting beliefs you've overcome in the past. What changed? What support did you have? Reframe with intention. Turn "I'm not strategic" into "I've made strategic decisions — here's what worked." Replace "I can't speak well" with "When I'm passionate, I connect deeply." Reinforce the new belief. Do this through small, visible actions. Speak in a team meeting. Accept the next stretch role. Ask for feedback on your presence — not just your performance. Motivational slogans won't get you there. Rewriting internal scripts requires the same discipline and intentionality as any core leadership strategy. The executives who do this consistently inspire change in themselves and across their teams and organizations. Related: How to Overcome Imposter Syndrome and Tame Your Inner Critic What organizations should look for What signals that a leader is ready to grow? According to Shawn Cole, who helps companies vet and place senior executives, organizations should focus on traits like curiosity, adaptability and openness to feedback. "The ability to self-reflect, ask questions, and seek out coaching are strong indicators that a leader is coachable and ready to move beyond limiting beliefs," he says. Culture plays a major role, too. Coachability often hinges on permission. Leaders grow when they operate in environments that welcome questions and reward feedback. However, culture can either reinforce limiting scripts or help dissolve them. Companies evaluating leadership potential should pay close attention to the following traits: Curiosity: Does the leader ask thoughtful questions, even when answers are uncertain? Resilience: Do they recover and learn after challenges or retreat? Openness: Do they seek coaching and integrate feedback, or deflect and defend? These qualities signal a growth mindset that will outlast technical skills and drive long-term impact. The most powerful leadership growth doesn't start with a new title or strategy. It begins when a leader pauses long enough to question the story they've been telling themselves and dares to write a better one. Sometimes, the real transformation isn't about becoming something new. It's about unbecoming the limitations you no longer need.
