Blazers Sign Sean Pedulla; Waive MarJon Beauchamp, Andrew Carr, Liam Robbins
The Portland Trail Blazers have signed guard Sean Pedulla.
Pedulla (6-2, 190), a member of the 2025 Trail Blazers Summer League roster, averaged 15.4 points, 3.8 assists, 3.5 rebounds and 1.9 steals in 36 games (all starts) and was named All-SEC Third Team during his final collegiate season at Ole Miss in 2024-25.
In a subsequent move, the Trail Blazers have requested waivers on forward MarJon Beauchamp, forward Andrew Carr and center Liam Robbins.
As he deals with a nerve irritation in the glute, the 40-year-old Los Angeles Lakers star will reportedly sit out the rest of preseason to prepare for the team’s season opener, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania.
James, who is about to begin his 23rd NBA season, has been doing on-court work and is slowly ramping up his preparation.
Shams: “Lebron James has started to ramp up here. He’s doing a little bit on the court. But I’m told the expectation is still he’s likely gonna be out for the preseason the goal being to be ready for opening night” pic.twitter.com/y3JQRPmekr
Last week, Lakers head coach JJ Redick said that James would slowly build towards the regular season opener and wouldn’t be available when training camp opened.
“It’s probably a little bit longer of a ramp-up leading up to opening night for him,” Redick told reporters. “In year 23, uncharted territory here.”
Redick then admitted the team may not have managed James’ game management properly last preseason, saying they felt like James did “too much” during training camp in 2024. But it didn’t seem to affect the four-time NBA MVP during the regular season as he played 70 games and averaged 24.4 points, 8.2 assists and 7.8 rebounds in nearly 35 minutes of action per night.
Yet those games he missed were due to foot and ankle soreness, which kept him out of the All-Star Game. James later suffered a sprained MCL during Game 5 of the Lakers’ playoff series loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves, an injury that would have kept him out for weeks had it not been the final game of their season.
James has yet to say whether this will be his final NBA season, but at age 40, there aren’t many left for him and the Lakers are eager to see what sort of title run the team can make as he plays alongside Luka Dončić. They don’t necessarily need him in late October as they would prefer James to be 100% healthy when playoff time rolls around.
The Lakers have four more preseason games before they open the 2025-26 campaign on Oct. 21 against the Golden State Warriors.
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Grizzlies star guard Ja Morant is considered week to week due to a sprained left ankle he suffered during Sunday’s practice, according to a team spokesperson.
Silver: ASG to stay in L.A. despite Clippers probe
Adam Silver said there is “no contemplation” of moving the All-Star Game out of the LA Clippers’ home arena as it investigates the team for possible cap circumvention.
Hawks, Dyson Daniels Have ‘Distance’ In Extension Negotiations
There is “some distance” in the early stages of extension discussions between Dyson Daniels and the Atlanta Hawks, according to Jake Fischer of The People’s Insider.
The deadline for rookie scale extensions is on October 20.
Daniels could command an offer sheet of around $30 million per season should teams have cap space next summer.
Daniels, voted as Most Improved Player last season, averaged 14.1 points, 5.9 rebounds, and 3.0 steals.
Thus far, only Paolo Banchero, Jabari Smith Jr., Nikola Jovic, Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams have received extensions from the class of 2022.
College football rankings: Preseason 1-2 both tumble out of top-25 for first time ever
Saturday was catastrophic for both Texas and Penn State, the two teams ranked at the top of the college football AP Top 25 at the start of the season.
Now both are on the outside looking in at the Top 25 as the calendar flips to October.
Texas began the year ranked as the No. 1 team in the nation in the AP college football poll, but went into Columbus and lost in their first game by a final score of 14-7 to Ohio State, the defending National Champions. While that loss dropped Texas down a bit, they rebounded with three consecutive non-conference wins before going on the road this weekend to take on Florida, a team on the ropes with a 1-3 record at kickoff.
But Billy Napier, perhaps with his job on the line, guided the Gators to a 29-21 win, and the loss for Texas saw them tumble out of the Top 25. In today’s poll, the Longhorns fell into the “Others Receiving Votes” category with 111 total votes, second-most in that group behind Cincinnati.
However, that put the Longhorns ahead of James Franklin and Penn State. If what happened to Texas on Saturday was bad, what befell the Nittany Lions was worse.
After losing to Oregon in a double-overtime game that pitted two teams ranked inside the Top 10, Penn State — who began the year at No. 2 — went on the road to take on UCLA. That pitted them against a Bruins team that was 0-4, had yet to lead a game for even a single second this season, had already fired their head coach, and turned to Jerry Neuheisel mid-week to take over offensive play-calling duties.
That same Bruins team never trailed on Saturday. Final score: UCLA 42, Penn State 37.
The Nittany Lions were 25-point favorites.
The loss not only sent searches for “James Franklin buyout” skyrocketing during the game — that number is north of $50 million, by most estimates — but it also dropped the Nittany Lions to 3-2 (0-2 in the Big Ten) and out of the Top 25. They received 97 votes, third-most among teams in the “Others Receiving Votes” category.
This is also the first time in the history of the AP Top 25 that both preseason No. 1 and No. 2 fell out of the rankings in the same season. This was also the first time since 1986 that two teams ranked inside the Top 10 fell out of the AP Top 25 in the same week. That year, then-No. 8 Tennessee and then-No. 10 Ohio State fell out after a week in September.
Just a brutal weekend for the teams that began the year atop the rankings.
Here’s the full top-25, with the number of first place votes in parenthesis.
The first No. 24 jersey worn by Kobe Bryant with the Lakers was recently sold by Sotheby’s for $889,000, while a 1964-1967 Jerry West jersey fetched $533,400.
Nikola Jokic, who bypassed the opportunity to sign a four-year, $212 million deal this summer because next year he can sign that same four-year extension for $293 million, said his “plan is to be a Nugget forever.”
Bronny James struggled through a 1-for-12 shooting performance in the Lakers’ first preseason game, but coach JJ Redick said he is “a totally different player than he was a year ago.”
