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Sports
Sixers Hire Former Duke, WNBA Star Lindsey Harding As Full-Time Scout
BEAUTY UNLIMITED
AJA
Say hello to this week’s Beauty Unlimited feature, the lovely Aja. She describes herself as being young and determined, and has many goals in mind for her life, with modeling leading the way. Aja said she doesn’t want to just introduce herself to the pub- lic, but also to meet with all the beautiful people it takes to create the dream. She understands the need to market yourself to the right people, and be patient until the right opportunity comes along. Congratulations to Aja as this week’s Beauty Unlimited.
The front office of the Philadelphia 76ers is in a state of flux due to the va- cancy of the general manager position. However, the front office did just become more solidified with the hiring of former Duke star and WNBA player Lindsey Harding. She becomes the first female scout in Sixers history and she has all the experience necessary to hit the ground running.
Harding had a great col- lege career being the sixth player ACC to record at least 1,000 points, 500 assists, 500 rebounds and 250 steals. She was also named Nai- smith National Player of the Year, WBCA National Defen- sive Player of the Year, and All-American during her sen- ior season with the Duke Blue Devils. She was the first Duke player to be drafted first over- all in the WNBA draft.
She went on to have a suc- cessful career in the WNBA. She was named to the All- Rookie team and ended her
LINDSEY HARDING
playing days ranked 18th in total assists with 1,090 for her career. She held career averages of 9.8 points, 4.0 assists, 2.9 rebounds and 1.1 steals, while shooting 41.4 percent from the field.
Harding also was an as- sistant on the Toronto Rap- tors Summer League team prior to retiring from the WNBA. It should be noted that her experience with the Raptors gave her a strong push to work in the NBA after she had finished playing in the WNBA. After Harding’s days of playing were through,
she went through the NBA’s Basketball Operations Pro- gram.
In regards to women making their way into the NBA, this hiring is a big step. Harding becomes the fourth former women’s basketball player to make the transition to the NBA, following the likes of Becky Hammon, Jenny Boucek and Natalie Nakase. It’s important to note that Harding sees her career going to be in a front office.
Harding has all the ex- perience necessary to do her job very well for the Philadel- phia 76ers. Her being hired may help continue setting a trend of more NBA teams be- coming more integrated with female employees working closely with players and front offices. This is a good hire on multiple fronts for the Sixers and hopefully whoever be- comes the new general man- ager will appreciate Harding’s ability as a scout as much as Brown does.
Jr.’s Gym Shape
his company, Mayweather, Jr. said he will waive the fran- chise fee for existing qualified gyms seeking to become fran- chisees.
Floyd Mayweather, Franchise Takes
Kobe Bryant’s Stake
will pay a one-time $25,000 franchise fee and be required to pay 6% of income to the home office.
In a recent release from
In BodyArmor Drink
FLOYD MAYWEATHER, JR.
Famous faces make great brand ambassadors. In the world of sport and fitness, few are as recognizable as the leg- endary – and very wealthy – former boxer Floyd May- weather, Jr. Last summer it was announced that he would be launching a training app promising to put users through the fighter’s own workout regimen, followed by a brick and mortar gym con- cept. Mayweather also said the business would eventually look to sell franchise rights for gym.
Most recently the cost structure of the franchise con- cept has come to light: turning an existing gym into a May- weather Boxing + Fitness franchise would cost $70,000, while setting one up from scratch is expected to cost $200,000. New franchisees
Now Worth $200M
Kobe Bryant continues to rack up the wins even in re- tirement.
Bryant is a minority owner of the sports drink com- pany BodyArmor. According to a source, Kobe bought about a 10 percent stake in the company in March, 2014. He reportedly has invested about $6M in the company overall.
His investment reaped huge benefits after Coca-Cola on Tuesday announced that it had purchased a minority stake in the company. Based on the company’s new valua- tion, Bryant’s ownership stake in BodyArmor is said to be around $200M.
Based on those figures, Bryant saw an astronomical 3,300 percent return on in- vestment.
KOBE BRYANT
Basketball-Reference esti- mates Bryant’s career earn- ings as an NBA player at just under $330M. He obviously made a ton more in endorse- ment deals as well, but his fruitful investment in BodyArmor has lifted his wealth to another level.
Oh, and let’s also not forget that Kobe has won an Oscar since retiring, too.
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