TMZ Sports - Page 50

Jermaine Jones is DANGEROUS ... and David Charvet is scared the soccer superstar is going to physically hurt him -- the actor's attorney tells TMZ Sports.

We broke the story last month ... Charvet claims the former Team USA soccer star sent him threatening messages featuring photos of his assault rifle ... all because J.J. believed Charvet banged his wife and ruined his marriage.

Charvet adamantly denied he slept with Jones' wife -- and begged the court for a restraining order against the athlete.

Charvet's lawyer, Jacob Glucksman, was in an L.A. court on Tuesday in an effort to get a permanent restraining order against Jones and on his way out of the courthouse, he made it clear they believe Jones is a serious threat.

"[David's] very concerned about the potential of Jermaine doing harm to him, causing harm. Doing physical injury to him."

The case was continued to February. Charvet currently has a temporary restraining order in place.

We also saw Jermaine as he left court with his lawyer ... but they weren't in the talking mood.

Ex-Miami Marlins president David Samson egged on hecklers at a party this weekend ... flipping off the crowd, bragging about his team's sale and then screaming, "F*ck you!!!"

It all went down at ESPN personality, Dan Le Batard's birthday party in Miami ... where Samson -- one of the biggest sports villains in the city -- got up onstage for a speech.

The dude -- who many blame for making the Marlins a mess and forcing city's taxpayers to foot the bill for their new stadium -- was boo'd relentlessly before he could even open his mouth.

Samson's message to his haters??

"Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Here's why I love when you guys boo me. Right? I want you guys to keep booing me. Because guess what? $1.2 BILLION! F*ck you!!!!"

Of course, Samson's reference represents the amount of cash he and former owner Jeffrey Loria were able to sell the Marlins for, to Derek Jeter last year.

For their part ... both Samson and Le Batard say the whole thing was a joke, with Samson writing on Twitter, "Actually,not at all how it happened. All on tape and all in good fun. And, all for Lebatard’s birthday. No bragging, no fleecing."

Added Le Batard, "These bleeping fun suckers. Samson was playing the heel wrestling manager. No one would seriously wear that jacket. I was booing Samson before taking the mic from him. You don’t get the show."

Sorry, Tennessee ... Peyton Manning will NOT be the state's next senator -- so says one of its current ones, Bob Corker.

FYI, Corker is leaving office next month after 11 years in the Senate -- and fellow Tennessee Senator Lamar Alexander just announced he will not seek reelection in 2020.

Many are speculating the moves leave the door open for a beloved former NFL quarterback (and Univ. of Tennessee alum) to enter the mix.

So, when we spotted Corker out on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, we had to ask if he sees a Manning political run in the near future. Spoiler alert: don't get your hopes up.

"I think Peyton's liking coaching little league football," Corker says ... "I doubt that's going to be a topic of discussion based on last round."

Of course, Peyton's life after football has been a huge discussion ever since he retired from the Broncos after winning Super Bowl 50 in 2016.

Some wanted him to be an offensive coordinator, others wanted to hear him in the broadcast booth ... and then there was a big push to get him to be a senator in Tennessee.

But, Manning has consistently shot all that down, saying back in 2017, "Look, I certainly have an interest in politics and in our country. I just have zero interest in being a politician."

Corker seems to think nothing's changed with Peyton since ... 'cause when our photog asked straight-up, "You don't think it's happening -- no chance?"

Bob left us with a firm "No."

Penny Marshall, the amazing actress, comedian and director, has died ... TMZ has learned.

Marshall died Monday night at her Hollywood Hills home. We've learned the cause of death was complications from diabetes.

Penny's first recurring role was playing Myrna Turner on "The Odd Couple," which was directed by her brother. She also appeared on "Happy Days" with Cindy Williams, and they became famous from their spin-off sitcom, "Laverne & Shirley." It became a monster hit in 1976 and ran for 8 seasons. Her character's moniker -- the "L" for Laverne on her sweater -- became one of the most famous logos in television.

Penny's accomplishments were only beginning. She directed Tom Hanks in "Big" in 1988. She was the first woman in history to direct a film that grossed more than $100 million.

Penny also directed "A League of Their Own," and "Awakenings" starring Robin Williams.

Penny's family says, "Our family is heartbroken over the passing of Penny Marshall. Penny was a tomboy who loved sports, doing puzzles of any kind, drinking milk and Pepsi together and being with her family."

The family notes Penny gave Mark Wahlberg his first acting job in "Renaissance Man."

"As an actress, her work on 'Laverne & Shirley' broke ground featuring blue-collar women entertaining America in prime time."

"She was a comedic natural with a photographic memory and an instinct for slapstick," her family added.

"We hope her life continues to inspire other to spend time with family, work hard and make of their dreams come true."

Penny was once married to Rob Reiner and once dated Art Garfunkel. She had an amazing lineage ... her brother was famed director Garry Marshall. She directed her daughter, Tracy Reiner, who played Betty in "A League of Their Own."

One of Penny's closest friends was Carrie Fisher. They had joint birthdays and Penny was godmother to Carrie's daughter, Billie Lourd.

Penny was a massive basketball fan and was a staple at Lakers and Clippers games for years.

Penny also famously directed the 1996 movie "The Preacher's Wife" starring Denzel Washington, and "Jumpin' Jack Flash" in 1986 starring Whoopi Goldberg.

Her producer credits ain't too shabby either -- with movies like "Cinderella Man" and "Calendar Girl."

The family says a celebration of Penny's life will be held at a later date.

Henry Winkler tells TMZ he worked with Penny even before "Happy Days," and knew from the start she was a very funny woman and an incredible talent. He says her comedic partnership with Cindy was akin to Lucille Ball, but more modern.

Many more celebrity tributes have been pouring in, with Albert Brooks posting on social media -- "R.I.P. Penny Marshall. So talented and funny. A big loss."

Katie Couric added, "I'm so sad to hear about the passing of Penny Marshall. #RestInPeace."

"The Simpsons" producer Al Jean said, "Penny Marshall our first guest star and a great talent. You will be missed!"

Busy Philipps said, "Oh Penny Marshall. Rest In Peace and thank you for everything."

'Law & Order' star, Vincent D'Onofrio shared a memory -- "I was invited by Penny Marshall to her house one afternoon to talk about a film she was doing. She was so kind to me. She was so smart and funny. I will never forget that afternoon. My heart goes out to her family and friends."

Melissa Joan Hart -- "Heartbroken to learn that #PennyMarshall has passed away!! The Marshall family holds a special place in my heart for being so kind and creative and encouraging to other artists. But she was a special role model for female comedians like myself. #RIP #ThankYou."

The death of Penny Marshall -- a beloved actor and HUGE sports fan -- rocked the athletic world Tuesday ... with teams and athletes alike mourning her passing.

The L.A. Clippers -- one of Penny's favorite teams -- posted they were "deeply saddened" to learn "a resilient pioneer with legendary talent" had died.

The Globetrotters, meanwhile, posted an old pic of Penny and the team, saying, "RIP to a long-time friend of the Globetrotters, Penny Marshall."

The MLB and the Baseball Hall of Fame also paid tribute to the "A League Of Their Own" director ... with the MLB saying, "We join the baseball community in mourning the passing of Penny Marshall."

Individual athletes expressed their remorse ... with athletes like Michael Strahan, Isiah Thomas, Mark Jackson and even Donyell Marshall taking to Twitter to pay tribute.

"R.I.P Penny Marshall," Donyell wrote ... "Still remember when you asked me for my game Jersey. You said you would go around telling people I was your nephew. We always talked before and after games when we played against the Lakers."

Legendary NBA forward Vince Carter added, "RiP to my friend the great Penny Marshall. You will be missed!!!"

Penny was 75.

Don't need any more stress in your life heading into the holiday season??

Neither did we ... but thanks to Justin Turner -- we now have it.

The Los Angeles Dodgers superstar attempted the Buzz Wire Challenge on Tuesday ... and the video of him going through it couldn't cause us more anxiety.

Turner's first attempt is pretty painless ... dude barely gets a few inches before he taps out.

But, his next attempt?? That's when the white knuckles start forming.

Turner goes through the electrical maze in a painstaking 40 seconds ... nearly tapping the wire MULTIPLE times as he got through the twists and turns.

J.T. finally made it to the end (of course he did, dude hits 100 MPH heaters with steady hands for a living) ... and we all exhaled with him as he celebrated.

1:39 PM PT -- Nicholson posted bail $2,500 ... and is no longer in jail.

Redskins' safety Montae Nicholson was arrested and charged with assault and battery after officials say he was involved in a drunken street brawl, sending 2 people to the hospital.

Nicholson -- a 4th round draft pick in 2017 out of Michigan State -- was arrested with a female companion after allegedly fighting another man and woman in the street outside Washington D.C.

So, couples fight.

Cops from Loudoun County Sheriff's Dept. responded to a call for a fight involving multiple people ... and after investigating, determined Nicholson and his female friend were at fault -- and they were arrested.

Officers do NOT believe Nicholson hit the female victim.

As for the alleged victims ... cops say their injuries are, "serious but non-life-threatening."

Nicholson -- who's played in all 14 of the Skins games this season and has racked up 41 tackles -- is still behind bars in county jail.

Conor McGregor is too freakin' chicken to step into the ring with Anderson Silva, at least that's what Anderson Silva thinks, saying he'd love to fight Conor, but doubting Conor wants any part of him.

Conor has said back in October that he'd be interested in fighting Silva, saying he was willing to bulk up a little to get into the Octagon with Spider and duke it out.

Since then, Conor has taken a beating at the hands of Khabib, but when we got Silva out, he said he doesn't care about that, telling our guy he still wants the fight.

"I say let’s go do it. 180 is the perfect weight for me, I think it's good for McGregor, and let’s go do it because that’s amazing. That’s for the fans."

One problem ... Anderson isn't sure Conor still wants it, and is using the s-word as the reason why.

"It’s close to happening you know, but McGregor, come on, man. Let’s go do this. Don’t run, man, don’t run. You scared? I don’t believe that you're scared, let’s go."

Here's the thing ... the fight kinda makes sense now. Conor might want to take a tune-up before a Khabib rematch, and who better to fight than a much older opponent with a huge name?

"Why would you wanna watch someone play a video game?!"

Ninja's heard that question a lot recently ... and the eSports legend says his answer to his hating-ass haters is simple -- 'cause he's really freakin' good at it.

In fact ... the Fortnite prodigy says it's actually similar to why people watch NFL, MLB or NHL players!!!

"There's so many people like, 'Well, why do you watch people play video games when you can go play video games yourself?' And, it's like, can you do that? Can you compete at that high of level and be entertaining?"

"You watch the NFL and things like that because you want to watch people do things that you know you can't. It's the same thing with gaming and streaming."

Ninja made the statements Monday night on 'The Tonight Show' to Jimmy Fallon ... and it's pretty clear he's growing tired of people questioning his insane online popularity.

"Dude, it's so funny, man. Why would you want to watch the best of the best play football, soccer, hockey??"

It's a great point ... and Ninja's clearly proving it every day -- the guy has 12.5 MILLION followers on Twitch, AND over 20 MILLION subscribers on YouTube!!!

Nick Cannon says he has no doubt the NFL's random drug testing of Eric Reid before and after games is the league's way of messing with the DB ... saying, "It's f*cked up."

Reid was randomly selected to pee in a cup for the 7th time this season after the Panthers' loss to the Saints on Monday night ... and the dude was pissed about it afterward.

"I've been here 11 weeks, I've been drug tested seven times. That has to be statistically impossible. I'm not a mathematician, but there's no way that's right."

Enter Cannon ... who tells TMZ Sports he "absolutely" thinks the tests are the NFL's way of getting back at Reid for supporting Colin Kaepernick in his kneeling protests.

"I think it's f*cked up," the actor said outside of Ace of Diamonds.

For his part ... Eric says he'll be using the tests as part of his collusion case against the NFL.

The other side of the coin ... the drug testing is conducted by an independent company hired jointly by the NFL and the NFL Player's Association. Point being, the players had some control over which company is administering the tests.

10:08 AM -- Backpack Kid tells us his mom and manager feel Fortnite is taking advantage of him, and he's letting the grown-ups handle the legal process.

Backpack Kid spoke out on "TMZ Live" Tuesday, saying he doesn't care about getting a fat check from the lawsuit, because he just cares about people watching and enjoying his videos. Besides, he says he's got more important things on his plate, like his 17th birthday and new single.

Backpack Kid is the latest to jump into the lawsuit game over Fortnite allegedly ripping off signature dances.

Backpack Kid's mom filed the latest lawsuit on behalf of her 16-year-old kid, who blew up back in 2016 when he posted videos of himself on Instagram doing a dance, which he called The Floss.

Fortnite released the Season 2 Battle Pass in December of last year and, as part of the Pass, it offered a new, rare emote that it called The Floss. It allows the players who win the game to do the dance.

Just like Alfonso Ribeiro and 2 Milly, Backpack Kid says he's in the process of copyrighting the dance, but claims Fortnite has still ripped him off.

Interestingly enough ... we spoke to Backpack Kid about his dance in the game back in June. He told us he felt like they should cut him a check, but said, "It's not that big of a deal, I'm just glad it's in the game."

He's also suing 2K Sports, which makes NBA 2K, claiming it too stole his dance.

Backpack Kid is suing for unspecified damages and wants a judge to stop the companies from stealing his moves.

Carolynn Kyungwon Beck and David Hecht of Pierce Bainbridge Beck Price & Hecht are repping Backpack Kid.

It's not all bad for Backpack Kid tho ... he just premiered his music video for his single, "Drip on Boat," exclusively with us and his EP, "SwagPack Kid," comes out Wednesday.

The child Dikembe Mutombo brought to the United States for a surgery to remove a life-threatening tumor on his face, went into cardiac arrest during the operation ... TMZ has learned.

Sources familiar with the surgery tell us, at around 6 PM Sunday, more than 6 hours into the operation, 8-year-old Matadi went into cardiac arrest and was immediately taken to the Intensive Care Unit at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in L.A. We're told he's now in stable condition and is slowly recovering.

The emergency came toward the end of the surgery, which began at 11:30 AM.

We do not know if the surgeons had completed the surgery, but if it went according to schedule it should have been wrapping up.

Matadi and his family were staying at the Ronald McDonald house in Los Angeles leading up to Sunday's procedure. Mutombo, who met the little boy during a visit to the Congo, greeted the boy and his family when they landed Wednesday in Los Angeles.

A federal judge in Brooklyn says New York state's nunchucks ban -- made wildly popular in the U.S. by Bruce Lee in the '70s -- is unconstitutional because it violates the 2nd Amendment.

The judge says the right to bear arms is not limited to guns ... it applies to all weapons that have some legal purpose. In the case of nunchucks, Judge Pamela Chen says they have been widely used over many, many years for martial arts training and defense -- a perfectly legal activity.

Judge Chen says a weapon that has a legal purpose cannot be summarily banned under the 2nd Amendment. She says, the "relative dangerousness of a weapon is irrelevant when the weapon belongs to a class of arms commonly used for lawful purposes."

Her Honor draws a distinction between nunchucks and, say, pipe bombs, because the latter is really targeted for lawbreakers.

LeBron James and his wife had an interesting couples dinner date Monday -- hitting up an NYC steakhouse with Carmelo Anthony and La La ... and fueling rumors Melo's coming to the Lakers.

Remember, we spoke with John Salley a few days ago and he implied he had some inside information about Melo coming to the Lakers before the NBA All-Star break in February.

So, when we saw these pics of Melo and Bron leaving Quality Italian steakhouse in midtown ... made us think Salley's intel might be pretty solid!!

Of course, LeBron and Melo have been friends for years -- so, maybe they just wanted some quality meat and wine ... but hey, maybe there was some shop talk too!

The Lakers are in NYC to play the Brooklyn Nets on Tuesday night.

The other interesting thing about the dinner ... Melo and La La seem to be in a pretty good place.

Back in October, La La told People she and Melo were still figuring out their relationship after separating in 2017 ... but noted, "We're good."

Knee inflammation be damned ... nothing can keep Todd Gurley from a good Ugly Sweater party!

The L.A. Rams running back threw on his best Santa coat and red beanie for a big Christmas event at a mansion in the Hollywood Hills on Monday night.

Gurley seemed to be moving around the party pretty well -- sipping on drinks, posing for pics and even dancing around a little bit.

It's not like he was running wind sprints in the backyard -- but it was a big mansion with stairs and he handled it all just fine.

Gurley aggravated the injury in his left knee during Sunday night's game against the Philadelphia Eagles -- and coach Sean McVay has said he'll be monitoring the knee going into Week 16.

"If he's able to go, we want him to be able to go," McVay told the media ... "But, if it's something that whether you're playing for the playoffs or whether you're not, we're always going to be smart with a player like Todd."

Gurley wasn't the only star at the party -- comedian Michael Blackson was there with an attractive female friend.

An asst. coach for a WNBA team severed two arteries in his arm while allegedly punching through glass in a domestic violence incident and was rushed to the ICU ... TMZ Sports has learned.

The man at the center of the incident is Todd Troxel -- an assistant coach for the Phoenix Mercury. He's also famously worked with NBA stars like Yao Ming and Marko Jaric.

Todd was hospitalized on Dec. 1 -- and while he was there, he told cops that he accidentally sliced his arm on broken glass while putting up Christmas lights.

But, a nurse at the hospital told cops she had spoken to the fiancee and got a different story -- that he raged out during a fight and punched through a glass window at their home.

Cops spoke with the fiancee who told them the whole thing started after they left the Phoenix Suns game on Nov. 30. She claims they argued because Troxel wanted to smoke weed in their Uber.

Once they got to the home, Todd's fiance essentially broke up with him and he flipped out. She claims he grabbed her and pinned her to the ground and when she got up ... he yanked her hand, dislocating her finger. He then followed her to the front door and punched through a window.

The fiancee called 911 -- and then transported Troxel to a nearby hospital.

When investigators circled back with the fiancee hours later, they told her there was sufficient evidence to support possible criminal charges against Troxel.

But, the fiancee made it clear she did not want to cooperate with investigators -- and just just wanted him to get better.

Troxel required surgery to repair the damage to his arm. Cops documented the bloody scene at the home ... it's nasty.

Troxel has not been arrested or charged with a crime.

We reached out for comment, so far, no word back.