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The Advertiser
2 days ago
- Sport
- The Advertiser
Spain triumph in New York for consecutive SailGP wins
Reigning champions Spain have put in a battling performance on the second day of the sixth round of SailGP, beating New Zealand and France in the final race in New York to clinch consecutive wins as the season reached the halfway point. Coming off their season's first victory in San Francisco in March, Diego Botin's team went five points clear into day two and overcame a slump in race five to make the top three. With shifting winds in the shadows of the Statue of Liberty on Sunday, Spain took control of the showdown on the Hudson River with an impeccable start, arriving three seconds ahead of New Zealand at gate two and three, and held their lead to clinch the victory. Peter Burling's New Zealand, winners in New York last year, lost more distance in the final stages and reached the finish line 43 seconds behind the Spaniards. The win saw Spain move up two places in the championship table on 46 points as they moved above three-times champions Australia, who finished fifth in New York, by one point. "America is a special place for us and it's amazing to win again here," Spanish driver Botin said. But it was not all smooth sailing for Spain on the event's final day. They started off well with a second-placed finish in the day's opening race four, 16 seconds behind Brazil, who won their first-ever fleet race at SailGP since joining the league at the beginning of the season. The Brazilians, who sat fifth after day one, were hopeful of a top-three finish, and were well positioned for just that when they finished fourth in the next race. A tricky race five, meanwhile, did a lot of damage to Spain, who were 11th and dropped from top spot to fourth in the event standings. Botin's crew earned a penalty in the decisive race six but made massive gains and got ahead of Brazil on the second-to-last leg to secure a spot in the event final. Australia held onto their early lead to win the sixth race, grabbing their second victory of the event after they came out on top in the second race on Saturday. France, who sailed very consistently on both days, put in a flawless performance to pick up a win in race five. The season next moves to Europe, first returning to Britain as the fleet races in Portsmouth from July 19-20 before heading to Germany in August for the very first time. Reigning champions Spain have put in a battling performance on the second day of the sixth round of SailGP, beating New Zealand and France in the final race in New York to clinch consecutive wins as the season reached the halfway point. Coming off their season's first victory in San Francisco in March, Diego Botin's team went five points clear into day two and overcame a slump in race five to make the top three. With shifting winds in the shadows of the Statue of Liberty on Sunday, Spain took control of the showdown on the Hudson River with an impeccable start, arriving three seconds ahead of New Zealand at gate two and three, and held their lead to clinch the victory. Peter Burling's New Zealand, winners in New York last year, lost more distance in the final stages and reached the finish line 43 seconds behind the Spaniards. The win saw Spain move up two places in the championship table on 46 points as they moved above three-times champions Australia, who finished fifth in New York, by one point. "America is a special place for us and it's amazing to win again here," Spanish driver Botin said. But it was not all smooth sailing for Spain on the event's final day. They started off well with a second-placed finish in the day's opening race four, 16 seconds behind Brazil, who won their first-ever fleet race at SailGP since joining the league at the beginning of the season. The Brazilians, who sat fifth after day one, were hopeful of a top-three finish, and were well positioned for just that when they finished fourth in the next race. A tricky race five, meanwhile, did a lot of damage to Spain, who were 11th and dropped from top spot to fourth in the event standings. Botin's crew earned a penalty in the decisive race six but made massive gains and got ahead of Brazil on the second-to-last leg to secure a spot in the event final. Australia held onto their early lead to win the sixth race, grabbing their second victory of the event after they came out on top in the second race on Saturday. France, who sailed very consistently on both days, put in a flawless performance to pick up a win in race five. The season next moves to Europe, first returning to Britain as the fleet races in Portsmouth from July 19-20 before heading to Germany in August for the very first time. Reigning champions Spain have put in a battling performance on the second day of the sixth round of SailGP, beating New Zealand and France in the final race in New York to clinch consecutive wins as the season reached the halfway point. Coming off their season's first victory in San Francisco in March, Diego Botin's team went five points clear into day two and overcame a slump in race five to make the top three. With shifting winds in the shadows of the Statue of Liberty on Sunday, Spain took control of the showdown on the Hudson River with an impeccable start, arriving three seconds ahead of New Zealand at gate two and three, and held their lead to clinch the victory. Peter Burling's New Zealand, winners in New York last year, lost more distance in the final stages and reached the finish line 43 seconds behind the Spaniards. The win saw Spain move up two places in the championship table on 46 points as they moved above three-times champions Australia, who finished fifth in New York, by one point. "America is a special place for us and it's amazing to win again here," Spanish driver Botin said. But it was not all smooth sailing for Spain on the event's final day. They started off well with a second-placed finish in the day's opening race four, 16 seconds behind Brazil, who won their first-ever fleet race at SailGP since joining the league at the beginning of the season. The Brazilians, who sat fifth after day one, were hopeful of a top-three finish, and were well positioned for just that when they finished fourth in the next race. A tricky race five, meanwhile, did a lot of damage to Spain, who were 11th and dropped from top spot to fourth in the event standings. Botin's crew earned a penalty in the decisive race six but made massive gains and got ahead of Brazil on the second-to-last leg to secure a spot in the event final. Australia held onto their early lead to win the sixth race, grabbing their second victory of the event after they came out on top in the second race on Saturday. France, who sailed very consistently on both days, put in a flawless performance to pick up a win in race five. The season next moves to Europe, first returning to Britain as the fleet races in Portsmouth from July 19-20 before heading to Germany in August for the very first time. Reigning champions Spain have put in a battling performance on the second day of the sixth round of SailGP, beating New Zealand and France in the final race in New York to clinch consecutive wins as the season reached the halfway point. Coming off their season's first victory in San Francisco in March, Diego Botin's team went five points clear into day two and overcame a slump in race five to make the top three. With shifting winds in the shadows of the Statue of Liberty on Sunday, Spain took control of the showdown on the Hudson River with an impeccable start, arriving three seconds ahead of New Zealand at gate two and three, and held their lead to clinch the victory. Peter Burling's New Zealand, winners in New York last year, lost more distance in the final stages and reached the finish line 43 seconds behind the Spaniards. The win saw Spain move up two places in the championship table on 46 points as they moved above three-times champions Australia, who finished fifth in New York, by one point. "America is a special place for us and it's amazing to win again here," Spanish driver Botin said. But it was not all smooth sailing for Spain on the event's final day. They started off well with a second-placed finish in the day's opening race four, 16 seconds behind Brazil, who won their first-ever fleet race at SailGP since joining the league at the beginning of the season. The Brazilians, who sat fifth after day one, were hopeful of a top-three finish, and were well positioned for just that when they finished fourth in the next race. A tricky race five, meanwhile, did a lot of damage to Spain, who were 11th and dropped from top spot to fourth in the event standings. Botin's crew earned a penalty in the decisive race six but made massive gains and got ahead of Brazil on the second-to-last leg to secure a spot in the event final. Australia held onto their early lead to win the sixth race, grabbing their second victory of the event after they came out on top in the second race on Saturday. France, who sailed very consistently on both days, put in a flawless performance to pick up a win in race five. The season next moves to Europe, first returning to Britain as the fleet races in Portsmouth from July 19-20 before heading to Germany in August for the very first time.
Boston Globe
26-04-2025
- Sport
- Boston Globe
In Season 1, Elias Lindholm and Nikita Zadorov provided the Bruins little return on their investment
As for return on investment, both players fell significantly short of the dollars stuffed in pockets, which is not to say their underperformances were the sole reason the Bruins missed the playoffs for the first time since 2016. Yet they were presented as the fix, the perceived stabilizing forces — Lindholm to drive the offense and Zadorov to bring spine to the backline — and it's now a roster unable to prevent another DNQ next season if the second verse of those two proves to be the same as the first. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up 'In both cases,' noted Sweeney, 'the conditioning, and the way training camp went, I'm not particularly happy with, so we're going to address it.' Advertisement If unclear if that's GM talk for, 'Show up here in shape for September training camp and be prepared to earn your dough.' That's about as blunt with the working help as managers or coaches dare get these days. Bruce Cassidy , during his successful tenure as the Black and Gold coach, was said to be much closer to the bone with his criticism, particularly when conversing face to face with his players. He was, by far, the most refreshingly honest coach in Bruins history when it came to answering media questions about the performance of individual players. Advertisement To that latter point, too much honesty (yep, that's a thing in pro sports) with his players likely played a factor in why Cassidy abruptly was canned three years ago, after initially being told, yep, he was good to go here for 2022-23. Beware the expression 'good to go.' Related : 'ROI for it, yeah, it's got to go up,' said Sweeney, addressing the short-changed return on investment on Lindholm and Zadorov. 'Ultimately, when you integrate those guys in here, you want immediate impact, for certain. But they started to grow into their roles, and understanding how they're going to impact our team going forward, and we need to do a better job surrounding them.' In the case of both hires, their play did improve as the season unfolded, though Lindholm's come-to-the-offense meeting came when the season already was kaput. Sweeney now hopes both return for training camp in better shape and can build on the momentum they eventually established. Zadorov on opening night lined up on the No. 3 defense pairing. That was, shall we say, curious. He was wildly undisciplined in the opening weeks, overzealous perhaps in his eagerness to justify his $30 million deal. He settled his game down eventually and better identified times and ways to make a physical impact. Advertisement Much to his credit, as underscored by Sweeney on Wednesday, Zadorov (the New Z) repeatedly stuck up for teammates, an ingredient achingly absent in the years since Zdeno Chara's (the Old Z) departure. Nonetheless, Zadorov still finished with a league-leading 145 penalty minutes, on a team that could ill afford a PIM imbalance on the game sheet. Lindholm, who disclosed on locker cleanout day that he was hindered much of the season by a back he injured in August, was of virtually no use on offense pretty much up to the March 7 trade deadline, By midseason, interim coach Joe Sacco regularly, and justifiably, used him as the No. 3 center. Who saw that in the fine print of his $54.25 million deal? 'I think we were all struggling in the beginning, couldn't find our game,' noted Lindholm. 'Tough with coaching changes, things like that, a lot of stuff going on, but in the beginning, for myself, I wasn't good enough, and I think a lot of guys could say the same thing. Overall, we've got to be better at the start of next year.' Lindholm added that 'he takes a lot of responsibility' within that collective failure and hopes to build on late-season success he had pivoting a potent line with Morgan Geekie to his left and David Pastrnak to his right. Lindholm finished 6-9–15 over the last 17 games. Specific to Zadorov's case, Sweeney is hopeful that the return to the lineup of fellow blue liners Charlie McAvoy and Hampus Lindhom will square the pairings, setting up Zadorov with a regular partner and defined job description. Nikita Zadorov (right) is 30. Matthew J. Lee/Globe Staff 'He played with every different partner known to man this year that we put on the roster,' said Sweeney, who played a chunk of his career riding aside Hall of Famer Ray Bourque . 'And that didn't help him. It didn't help him settle his game down at times, certainly. Advertisement 'Could he get better? Absolutely. Do we expect both of them to get better and impact our team? Absolutely.' Sweeney again will be spending, perhaps liberally, when the UFA market opens at noon on July 1. More than once on autopsy day he noted the need to add at wing, in part because of the deadline departures of Trent Frederic , Brad Marchand , and Charlie Coyle , as well as the uncertainty as to whether Sweeney can bang out an extension with Geekie (RFA, career-high 33 goals). Notably, Sweeney did not say center was a point of concern, which points to a 2025-26 reset that includes a top-six forward group anchored by Elias Lindholm, Pavel Zacha , and likely Casey Mittelstadt . Is there an offensive rainmaker among those three? Debatable. The lead candidate, of course, will be Lindholm. If so, it will have to be the Lindholm we saw the last five weeks of the season. TOP 10 LIST Wins, losses early in draft The Bruins will pick no lower than No. 7 in the NHL Draft on June 27, with their spot to be locked in on May 5, the night of the lottery. They finished the regular season holding the No. 5 spot but could move up to No. 1 or 2, or remain at 5, or fall to 6 or 7. Apologies if you were told there would be no math. Joe Thornton , their last No. 1 overall pick (1997), ultimately played up to his franchise billing, though not until he was wheeled to the Sharks. The Bruins also nabbed Sergei Samsonov at No. 8 in the same draft, and the Magical Muscovite was named the 1997-98 Rookie of the Year. Advertisement Samsonov's career wasn't nearly as productive as Thornton's, but he was a solid, effective choice. Marian Hossa (No. 12, Ottawa) might have changed the fortunes of the franchise had he been chosen to be Jumbo Joe's right winger. Oh, to dream. Related : Beginning with that 1997 draft, the Bruins have made seven picks in the top 10 and twice selected players who turned out to be busts — Lars Jonsson , D, (No. 7 in 2000) and Zach Hamill , F, (No. 8 in 2007). Both were the biggest misses of their draft classes. Painful miscalculations. Their other three picks in the top 10 all turned out to be primo choices: Phil Kessel (No. 5, 2006), Tyler Seguin (No. 2, 2010), and Dougie Hamilton (No. 9, 2011) Not a single one of the five picks in the top 10 who made it spent their full careers in Black and Gold. Samsonov, who wore the Spoked-B for 514 games, was the lone pick who actually ended up playing the majority of his career as a Bruin. The five other Original Six franchises, dating to 1997, totaled 44 picks in the top 10, with the Blackhawks topping the pack with a dozen. Only five of those 44 were No. 1 overall picks: Patrick Kane , Chicago, 2007; Auston Matthews , Toronto, 2016; Alexis Lafreniere , NY Rangers, 2020; Juraj Slafkovsky , Montreal, 2022; and Connor Bedard , Chicago, 2023. As for who made the most hay from their high picks, that barroom debate looks like a tossup between the Blackhawks with their dozen and the Maple Leafs with their seven. Advertisement Chicago, with the third pick in 2006, selected franchise center Jonathan Toews . With Kane coming aboard the next year at No. 1, the Blackhawks went on to win the Stanley Cup three times (2010, '13, and '15) with Toews and Kane their offensive kingpins. In the same timeframe, the Maple Leafs connected on all seven of their top-10 picks: Nik Antropov (No. 10, 1998), Luke Schenn (No. 5, 2008), Nazem Kadri (No. 7, 2009), Morgan Rielly (No. 5, 2012), William Nylander (No. 8, 2014), Mitch Marner (No. 4, 2015), and Matthews. Nice piece of hitting, 7 for 7. Antropov retired after logging 788 games. The other six remain active. Career games for all seven to date: 5,689. ETC. This plus/minus tough to defend Among the most important tasks awaiting the Bruins' bench boss in 2025-26: untangle the train wreck that was Mason Lohrei's defensive game. A fluid and bold skater when wheeling through open ice, and perpetually shot-ready, Lohrei tops the organization's short list of emerging young talents. He's big (6 feet 5 inches, 220 pounds), eager to jump into opportunities on offense, and, oh, did I mention he likes to shoot? But then there's this: Lohrei's minus-43 plus/minus. Ouchamagoucha. It not only was the worst plus/minus among all Original 32 skaters, it was by far the worst on his own team, the most important lens through which to view plus/minus. Of all the other skaters with the Bruins from the season's October puck drop, the next worst was Andrew Peeke's minus-10. By comparison, Peeke looked like a Norris Trophy candidate. Related : While we're on this subject, Casey Mittlestadt played 18 games in Black and Gold after his March 7 acquisition from the Avalanche and rolled up a minus-17. That's a pins-in-the-eyes pace of minus-77. If he's going to be a regular pivot in the top-six rotation, and that appears to be on the fall menu, then Coach TBD will need to sketch out some basic rules of defensive engagement and spacial awareness. Or at least arrange for Mittelstadt to have a long lunch with Patrice Bergeron . Now, the asterisk that must be attached to Lohrei's minus-43 pertains to the protracted absences of fellow defensemen Hampus Lindholm and Charlie McAvoy . Because those two were out of the mix for a combined 97 games, the coaching staff for most of the season didn't have the luxury of easing Lohrei into more favorable matchups and easier minutes of work. He was force-fed an average 19:32 of ice time, amounting to an extra, say, 8-10 shifts per game that too often led him to the invisible fourth zone on the ice — the Twilight Zone. Lohrei's game upon return will be best suited for third-pairing minutes and in relief duty at the power-play point. Above all, he needs to sharpen his read-and-react time in the defensive zone — unfortunately, that processing skill is something that cannot be tuned up in the offseason. 'Obviously, it's a learning experience,' said Lohrei, reflecting on the overall season and the added time he received. 'Getting those minutes in this league and playing with that kind of responsibility, there's ups and downs to that. So, learn from it, continue to grow, and get better. Mason Lohrei (left) is 24. Matthew J. Lee/Globe Staff 'You can work on all the different intangibles that might help you with doing it,' he added, when asked what it will take to improve his defensive structure. 'But at the end of the day, it's just about doing it, and, you know, in the summer there's not a lot [of that] you can focus on. I want to be more consistent in it. I think I can defend, and [have] shown that I can defend against really good players, but it's about 82 games and going out there and doing it every night and not having any lapses. It's frustrating when you do.' Cronin a person of interest for Bruins' job Bruins general manager Don Sweeney's list of prospective coaching candidates remains hermetically sealed. Meanwhile, one of the finalists in Sweeney's coaching search in 2022, Greg Cronin , was abruptly dismissed last Saturday two years into his Anaheim tour, despite adding eight wins and 21 points to the Ducks' totals of last season. Proof again, success doesn't always breed job security. There could be coaches out there reluctant to take on the rebuild and resurrection of the Spoked-B brand, but the Arlington-born-and-raised Cronin is decidedly not one of them. 'Hey, I'm a coach, right?' said Cronin, 61, reached late in the week by telephone. 'All these openings, I'll throw my hat in and see what comes back. I mean, heck, I'd be doing handsprings and jumping over rainbows if I got the Bruins' job. I'm a Boston guy, and for a Boston guy, that's hitting the lottery times 10!' Related : Interim boss Joe Sacco , another Boston guy, remains on the list. Boston guys John Tortorella , Peter Laviolette , and David Quinn (qualified under Comm. Ave. birthright citizenship) also are expected to submit résumés. Loose pucks Bruins CEO Charlie Jacobs remained resolute Wednesday when asked if he would consider rescinding the 4 percent blended price bump for 2025-26 season tickets. Nope. Rising costs, he said, necessitate the increase, even after the 9 percent bump imposed a year earlier. Look, we get it, ticket pricing is a pure supply-demand play, and the price will keep bumping up as long as the demand remains in lockstep. The much smarter play would have been a year ago, presenting 9 percent as a three-year price fix through 2026-27 (average 4.33 percent per annum). A 13 percent wallop over these two years, especially now with the DNQ cross-check smacked across the fans' backs, might just be the one that shoots down the box office's Black and Golden goose … Average distance (air miles) between the four playoff series in the East: 326. In the West: 1,042. Yep, they travel in luxury, no question, but the 3:1 ratio underscores that the hockey life out West is a long haul. The shortest one-way hop in Round 1: Tampa to Sunrise (183 miles). Longest: Edmonton to Los Angeles (1,366 miles) … Amid his back-and-forth defense Wednesday of Bruins draft choices through the years, Cam Neely revealed he wished there'd been more time taken, more scrutiny by front office and scouts at the draft table, in 2015 after the club opted not to deal higher in the draft (likely to land Boston College defenseman Noah Hanifin at No. 5). 'What we should have done, looking back,' noted Neely, 'we should have taken some time out and said, 'Look, guys, let's regroup here. We didn't move up, we have three picks in row [Nos. 13, 14, 15).' I think it was very new for everybody. We stood backstage for those three picks. What we should have done was get back to our table and said, 'Are we OK with our list?' These are things you try to learn from.' Kevin Paul Dupont can be reached at
Yahoo
11-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Should we be bringing back extinct species? Ethical concerns raised after dire wolf allegedly resurrected
The recent claim that a U.S. biotechnology company resurrected the long-extinct dire wolf through genetic engineering seemed to shock the science world. The species of canine -- about the same size as a modern gray wolf -- was native to the Americas but went extinct about 10,000 years ago. Colossal Laboratories & Biosciences, the company behind the revived dire wolf and based in Dallas, said it is "a scientific breakthrough for global conservation efforts" and is even trying to bring back the extinct woolly mammoth by 2028. MORE: How the process of de-extinction will be used to restore this fabled species However, bioethicists and ecologists say they are skeptical that the animals created are actually dire wolves and said there are ethical concerns including where the animals would be kept and if they could ever survive in the wild. "All claims of de-extinction are the invocation of a metaphor, and what they have produced and what they will at some point produce, may be technologically impressive, but they are not and never can be the actual previously extinct creatures," Samuel Gorovitz, professor of philosophy at Syracuse University and a leader in the development of the medical ethics field, told ABC News. "Only adult dire wolves can raise a dire wolf and there aren't any. … One thing that we know for sure, that they are not, is dire wolves." Beth Shapiro, Colossal's chief scientist, previously told ABC News her team extracted dire wolf DNA from two existing fossils to better sequence the animal's genome. A close relative of the dire wolf was used as the base. Shapiro said the team took a gray wolf genome, which she described as genetically 99.5% identical to dire wolves, and edited those cells at multiple points to contain the dire wolf DNA. The company says no animals were harmed. Stuart Pimm, Doris Duke professor of conservation ecology at Duke University's Nicholas School of the Environment, called the news of the resurrected dire wolf a "colossal fabrication" and referred to the species created as a "designer dog." "This is just a big dog with a few genes inserted from a once extinct wolf," Pimm told ABC News. "Incidentally, a dire wolf is not really closely related to a regular wolf." He went on, "It's about as different to a regular wolf as we are from chimpanzees and if you inserted a chimpanzee gene into a human, I think that will be a horribly unethical thing to do." Dire wolves lived in a variety of habitats including plains and mountainous areas of North America and arid areas of South America. Fossils have been found in the asphalt pits at Rancho La Brea in Los Angeles and in paleontological sites in the midwestern U.S, according to the Illinois State Museum. Two of the dire wolves were born late last year, while the third arrived in early 2025. All three live in a secure 2,000-acre nature preserve at an undisclosed location, Colossal previously told ABC News. MORE: What scientists learned after reconstructing DNA of extinct New Zealand bird Experts argue keeping them in an enclosure could be seen as creating a tourist attraction and that these animals belong in the wild. However, today's environment does not resemble the environment in which historic dire wolves lived and releasing them into the wild could harm the ecosystem. "It has to live somewhere, and it isn't clear what the environment was that the dire wolf lived in, or what it ate, or sort of its behavior, and so you kind of face a possibility you won't know where to keep this animal that you made healthy," Arthur Caplan, a professor of bioethics at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine, told ABC News. He added that the behavior of dire wolves was likely shaped by the packs they roamed in or packs that they may have competed against. However, those groups also don't exist anymore. "If you bring back something that's been dead 10,000 or 40,000 or 100,000 years, you need to bring back its environment, not just the animal," Caplan continued. "Otherwise, you potentially are going to have issues." Jerry Coyne, professor emeritus in the department of ecology and evolution at the University of Chicago, said there is no way to release the "de-extincted" dire wolves back into the wild because they wouldn't know how to survive. Coyne told ABC News that if the revived dire wolves are let loose into the wild "without the social group that they're evolved to be in" it would be hard to expect them to "behave properly" around other animals because they've never been exposed to other species. "So that's also unethical, because those animals are kind of separate. They're not going to have the right thing to eat, it's not going to know what to eat, how to eat, probably got the wrong digestive system. … So that's one of the ethical considerations." Colossal Laboratories did not reply to ABC News' request for comment on these concerns. Experts say that bringing back extinct animals will not solve any conservation problems and that efforts would be better spent trying to find ways to save current critically endangered or vulnerable species. Worldwide, more than 41,000 species are currently threatened with extinction and more than 16,300 are considered endangered, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species. MORE: Fish species thought to be extinct for 85 years rediscovered Caplan said current endangered species have enough of the environment around them so we know how they live, how they behave and how to keep them alive. "You can also use it in situations where you are worried that a valuable species -- I'm going to say bees as an example -- whose populations have been falling," he said. "Maybe you could do something to help them, because we really need our pollinators, so to speak. I don't know that we really need a dire wolf." Pimm said another species, the red wolf, which lives in the coastal areas of North Carolina, is also on the verge of extinction and more efforts could be focused on saving the animal, and showing it is not a threat. "The difficulty that we have with the red wolf is that when its numbers increase, people are challenged, they don't want there to be too many red wolves," he said. "So, the challenge for us in our country is to find find more room for nature, and that's not always a politically easy thing to do." Should we be bringing back extinct species? Ethical concerns raised after dire wolf allegedly resurrected originally appeared on
Express Tribune
06-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Express Tribune
Drake said 'No Friends in the Industry,' he meant it—Rapper shuts down DJ Khaled's feature claims
DJ Khaled's grand announcement for his 14th studio album, Aalam of God , has vanished from the internet after Drake shut down claims of being featured on two tracks. The We The Best mogul had dropped a cinematic seven-minute trailer starring Mark Wahlberg and Anthony Ramos, hyping up his latest project and tagging Drake in the caption. 'FYI… DRAKE'S BACK TO WORK… SO AM I! THIS THE ONE WITH [2] DRAKES!' he wrote. However, Drake swiftly dismissed the claim, leaving a now-viral comment: 'Must be @drakebell,' referencing the former Nickelodeon star from Drake & Josh . YIKES… Drake does NOT approve the 2 records for DJ Khaled's album. Khaled has now deleted his entire album announcement/7 min trailer. 😭😭😭😭 — King Jared (@certifiedjared) Khaled's post, which originally hinted at the rapper's involvement, was quickly deleted after the response, sparking speculation across social media. Fans were quick to react, with many praising Drake's newfound energy. Drake Bell Ft DJ Khaled *LEAK**** — Kermit (@BKid704) 'Drake in his villain era and I love it!!!!' one user tweeted. Another joked, 'No more Drake stimulus package for him,' referring to Khaled's history of using Drake collaborations to secure chart-topping hits. Some questioned what Khaled might have done to land in Drake's bad books, especially given their long history of collaborations, from 'I'm On One' to 'Popstar.' No more Drake stimulus package for him — iamdchairman (@tobijubril_) Drake's response has only fueled speculation that his relationship with Khaled may have soured, particularly after the rapper's recent fallout with Kendrick Lamar. when drake said no friends in the industry he really meant it he cut ties with kanye kendrick abel future metro rick ross and dj khaled — blonded (@Khalednxtdoor) Many fans pointed out that Khaled remained silent during Drake's highly publicized feud, possibly leading to a rift. 'After everything that's happened, the opps now want Drake's help. Nah, stay on that side,' a user tweeted, while another added, 'Khaled shows everyone love. Drake making people choose sides is childish.' After everything that's happened, The opps now wants Drake's help, nah nigga stay on that side now 😂 — BOSS DADDY (@maduchi19) Drake upset that DJ Khaled didn't speak during the beef. Bro that man didn't even speak up for his own country — King Wow (@wowthatshiphop) Khaled has a long-standing tradition of hyping up his albums with major collaborations, and this isn't the first time he's teased Drake's involvement. During Drake's It's All a Blur Tour in September 2023, he famously held up a massive sign that read, 'I have 2 Drake songs on my new album—coming 2024.' The two last worked together in 2022 on 'Staying Alive' from Khaled's God Did . With Khaled now wiping his entire album announcement, it's unclear whether the Drake features were real or if plans changed behind the scenes. Meanwhile, Drake is focused on his Anita Max Win Tour , currently making stops in Australia and New Zealand.
