Magic

In a week when the Rutgers men's basketball coach was fired for, among other things, hurling gay epithets at his cowed players, how refreshing to see the professional basketball world, not always known for its tolerance, come a step closer to embracing gay rights. On Monday, the Hollywood gossip website TMZ posted a video of Magic Johnson's 20-year-old son, Earvin “EJ” Johnson III, strolling down the Sunset Strip holding hands with another man . Johnson, a student at NYU, wore what appeared to be a furry black Persian lamb vest, and a pink quilted leather Chanel-style bag over his arm. And he was very clearly coming out, as his father later confirmed.

CHICAGO — So sad, so unfortunate that the final 14 games of the regular season for the Anaheim Ducks will be Blackhawk-less. Three games between the Ducks and Chicago produced three chapters of riveting hockey theater, all featuring slightly different plots with the same ending. The Ducks won Part 3 with defenseman Sheldon Souray's blast from the left point with 2 minutes 8 seconds remaining in regulation, beating the Blackhawks, 2-1, Friday night at the United Center, sweeping their season series, three games to none.

Basketball Hall of Famers Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Bird and Bill Russell collaborated on a pair of AT&T "It's Not Complicated" commercials. AT&T's series of spots typically features actor Beck Bennett interviewing children on the benefits of concepts like "more," "speed" and "saving money. " Released Friday, Bennett asks the roundtable of legends, "In basketball, is it better to be bigger or smaller?" Bennett attempts to high-five each of the significantly taller retired players.  The tagline for the ad is the familiar "It's not complicated -- bigger is better.

All my crazy cooking friends with tweezers and buckets of sodium alginate have spent the last year cooking through Daniel Humm's “Eleven Madison Park” cookbook, which -- unbelievable as it may seem -- makes “The French Laundry” look like “Joy of Cooking.” So much of that book seems to me like obfuscation. Every ingredient is transformed so it looks like something else. Beautiful, perhaps, but the tricks are just too much in evidence. That's just not my thing. But Humm's new book “I [Heart]

Highlighting the importance of the African American vote in the May 21 mayoral runoff, Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti held dueling news conferences in South Los Angeles on Thursday to tout new endorsements from highly sought black leaders. At various points, some of the participants even got a little testy. Basketball legend Magic Johnson backed Greuel, saying that he selected the city controller because of her broad range of experience in the public and private sectors, her longtime ties to the African American community and the historic nature of her candidacy to be the city's first female mayor.

Muriel Spark understood better than most novelists the peculiar fascination of hermetic worlds. She set "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" in a Scottish girls day school, "The Abbess of Crewe" in a convent run like the C.I.A. and her last novel, "The Finishing School," at a Swiss academy of questionable ethics. Jenny Davidson, a comparative literature professor at Columbia University and fiction writer, has inspired Sparkian comparisons with her new novel, "The Magic Circle," which focuses on a strange subset society all its own - the brainy bubble of Columbia University's Morningside Heights neighborhood.

Basketball legend Magic Johnson endorsed Wendy Greuel to be Los Angeles' next mayor on Thursday, saying he selected her because of her broad range of experiences in the public and private sectors, her longtime ties to the African American community and the historic nature of her candidacy to be the city's first woman mayor. “We love this woman because she loves us. We love this woman because she's been in our community many, many years and the fact that she's going to get the job done,” he said, standing alongside religious, civic and elected officials who are backing Greuel.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar visited "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" on Tuesday night to talk about his participation on ABC's "Splash. " While he admitted he has no chance to actually win the reality-show diving competition, the 65-year-old former Lakers center said he's doing it to "show everybody that at my age you can live a healthy lifestyle and learn new things. " Abdul-Jabbar did manage to break a toe, climbing out of the pool after a dive. In Part 2, he talks about Magic Johnson and their different demeanors.

ORLANDO, Fla. - Think of this as an added victory during this win streak. Not only did the Miami Heat keep alive the second-longest streak in NBA history, they also provided another opportunity for one of their stars to recuperate. Guard Dwyane Wade sat for a second straight game because of knee soreness, but it didn't matter in a 108-94 victory Monday against the Orlando Magic at Amway Center. LeBron James nearly recorded a triple double with 24 points, 11 assists and nine rebounds, pulling the Heat closer to league history.

PHOENIX - Minority owner Magic Johnson visited the Dodgers for the first time this spring and spoke to players in a team meeting Friday morning. "To sum up the whole meeting, it was basically about winning," outfielder Carl Crawford said. "Everybody knows Magic is a winner. " During the hourlong meeting, Johnson took questions from players. "I thought that would be fun," Johnson said. "It was amazing. " Johnson said he was asked about how his Lakers teams approached road games.