Correction: The original version of this story referred to South Sudan facing a travel ban from the Trump administration. Only neighboring Sudan is facing a travel ban. The State Department has instead revoked existing visas and prevented the issuance of new visas to those from South Sudan.

Khaman Maluach was talking about the unprecedented route he took to the 2025 NBA Draft with a mixture of awe and inevitability last month, and no mention of the political headwinds that awaited him at the end of it. His explanation involved a Disney movie about Giannis Antetokounmpo. 

Maluach, a 7-foot-2 NBA draft lottery prospect, started down this path six years ago by showing up at a camp in Uganda organized by former NBA player Luol Deng. He was a refugee from war-torn South Sudan who played soccer until he got too tall and suddenly appeared on a new sport’s radar. He was inspired most of all by Antetokounmpo, the son of Nigerian immigrants but born and raised in Greece. 

“I watched his movie,” Maluach said, referencing the 2022 film, “Rise,” that chronicles Antetokounmpo and his brothers’ journey to the United States and the NBA. “But just his story, his background coming from Greece and then coming to America.”

Maluach didn’t linger long on that last part, as his advisors prefer given the geopolitics now swirling around the beginning of his career. 

He is not just an intriguing player in this year’s NBA draft class because of his 9-foot-6 standing reach, readymade rim protection skills and rapid ascent into an elite prospect. This 18-year-old is also the only potential draftee hailing from a country currently dealing with the revocation of visas by the United States. 

He’s both the next potential face for the NBA’s decades-long investment in an African basketball developmental pipeline and an unintended consequence of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

“They’re trying to use leverage against these countries, and oftentimes it’s through visa issuance,” said Philadelphia-based immigration attorney Adam Solow. “This kid is caught up in the middle of that.” 

Trump visa bans: How they impact 2025 NBA draft, Khaman Maluach

A quirk related to Maluach’s visa situation will play out on Wednesday night at the 2025 NBA Draft. The NBA is preparing for the complicated scenario that would be triggered if Maluach were to be taken by the Toronto Raptors with the No. 9 overall pick. 

Given the current Trump administration policy related to South Sudan, Maluach would have to apply for a United States tourism visa and a waiver to South Sudan’s visa ban any time he enters the United States if he plays for the Raptors, according to the NBA. That would also be in addition to having to obtain a Canadian work visa. The Raptors had to cross the United States border from Canada for road games 19 times based on their 2024-25 schedule.

If Maluach were to be drafted by any of the 29 other NBA teams, the league told USA TODAY Sports he would only have to apply for a waiver upon re-entering the United States each time his future team played at Toronto. The league acknowledged Maluach’s situation is more complex than the typical draftee.

But the NBA’s evolution into an international business, with MVP winners from outside the United States the past seven years, has often put the league at the forefront of immigration issues that arise due to events and policies occurring around the world outside the realm of sport.

Maluach became the league’s most prominent case of this in 2025 on the same day Duke played in the Final Four in April. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced visa and travel restrictions on South Sudan that remain in place ahead of the start to the NBA draft. 

“Enforcing our nation’s immigration laws is critically important to the national security and public safety of the United States,” a State Department spokesperson wrote in a statement provided to USA TODAY Sports on June 20. “In accordance with the April 5 decision made by Secretary Rubio, the Department took appropriate steps to revoke visas held by South Sudanese passport holders. South Sudanese passport holders who were notified of their visa revocation are not required to depart the United States before their Admit Until Date. Any future travel to the United States will require a new visa application.”

The spokesperson added that the State Department does not generally comment on actions related to specific visa cases due to concerns about privacy and visa confidentiality. More details about the policy related to South Sudan have emerged in court.

A federal judge in Massachusetts ruled on May 21 that the Trump administration violated a previous order when it attempted to send migrants convicted of serious crimes in the United States to third countries – in this case, South Sudan – without providing clear information and ample time to raise any concerns about being sent to that country. But the Supreme Court agreed on Monday, June 23 to pause that order in a 6-3 decision, allowing migrants to be deported to third countries, including South Sudan.

It also included a clause providing an exemption for “any athlete or member of an athletic team, including coaches, persons performing a necessary support role, and immediate relatives, traveling for the World Cup, Olympics, or other major sporting event as determined by the Secretary of State.”

The NBA told USA TODAY Sports the league does not believe Maluach is in danger of being deported and it is comfortable with the process to apply for a waiver to the South Sudan visa restrictions based on how often it runs into complex international visa situations, including the travel bans Trump instituted during his first term in the White House. 

“The NBA has a voice in this that is bigger and louder and more influential,” said Ksenia Maiorova, an Orlando, Florida-based immigration attorney who works extensively with international college athletes to obtain visas.

Maluach, according to the NBA, had been playing at Duke on a student visa and the university has been helping him during the transition between his college season and the draft. Upon being drafted Wednesday, Maluach would be eligible to apply for an O1 or P1 visa given by the United States to professional athletes and those with ‘extraordinary abilities.’ 

Duke, through an athletics department spokesperson, declined to comment when USA TODAY Sports sought comment on its role in Maluach’s visa situation. Maluach told USA TODAY Sports at the NBA Draft combine in May that his representatives at Klutch Sports are dealing with any potential visa issues. A spokesperson at Klutch Sports declined to comment when reached by USA TODAY Sports.

“I let them handle that and focus on what’s important to me and what’s ahead of me,” Maluach said.

Why Khaman Maluach is so important for NBA in Africa

They all use some variation of the same phrase to describe Khaman Maluach, even the biggest star of the 2025 NBA Draft. 

‘Everything about him is so pure,’ said Cooper Flagg, Maluach’s teammate at Duke this past season and the presumptive No. 1 pick this year. ‘Some people you can just tell their intentions and whether they are pure. Khaman is one of those people.”

The NBA sees a model for future African players in Maluach. 

He joined the NBA Academy Africa as a 14-year-old, leaving his family in Uganda to join a first-of-its-kind elite basketball training center in Senegal despite having never played organized basketball before. In just a few years’ time, he blossomed in a program the NBA began in 2017 to “double down on a new way of player development and investment on the continent,” according to Troy Justice, the NBA’s senior vice president of international basketball. 

Maluach eventually competed against professionals for three seasons in the Basketball Africa League (BAL) through a partnership between the league and NBA Academy Africa, and also impressed scouts at Basketball Without Borders camps and G League showcases. He then played for South Sudan’s first Olympic basketball team at the 2024 Paris Games. Maluach said the NBA Academy program “not only shaped me on the basketball court, but … I had to learn to be a man off the basketball court and the Academy helped me through all that.”

More than 50 African basketball players have earned Division-I scholarships through NBA Academy Africa, with two already in the NBA. But none of them are the level of prospect Maluach became in short order. He is expected to be the first first-round draft pick to emerge from NBA Academy Africa. 

“Draft night is going to be life-changing for him,” Justice said. “His (journey) has been very unique, special in a lot of ways because it connects all his dots. It literally shows the NBA’s complete pathway.”

Maluach is part of a wave of players that has seen multiple generations of Africans like them make it to the NBA from seemingly remote circumstances. He believed those around him when they said he could do it, too. Only how quickly he got here seems far-fetched to him at this point. 

Maluach is still considered a work-in-progress by NBA scouts because of his limited experience, with an offensive skill set and on-court instincts that will require patience from the team that drafts him. But his length and defensive potential, and the reality he’s much closer to the start of his career than any other prospect on the board, could make him a top-10 pick if the mock drafts are correct. 

Maluach thinks about the possibility with wonder, unbothered by the conflicts going on around him, just like when he arrived at that first basketball camp and his road to the NBA draft really began.

“I saw a lot of tall people happy, and I was like, ‘This is where I belong,’” Maluach said.

George Kittle is entering his age-32 season in 2025, but the San Francisco 49ers tight end doesn’t appear to have retirement on his mind any time soon.

Kittle was asked in a Tuesday appearance on ‘Bussin’ With The Boys’ about when he might walk away from the NFL.

‘Literally until I don’t have fun anymore,’ Kittle replied. ‘Or if Claire (his wife) looks at me and goes, ‘You kinda look like (expletive) out there, you should retire.’ I’ll be like, ‘All right.”

Kittle hasn’t reached the latter stage yet. He continues to be one of the NFL’s top tight ends and is coming off a season during which he posted 78 catches, 1,106 yards and eight touchdowns across 15 games. He made his fourth consecutive Pro Bowl and was named to the All-Pro second team for the third time in his career.

As such, Kittle believes he still has at least a few years left in the tank – provided he can remain healthy.

‘I think if I get to like I’m 35 and it hurts just to put pants on in the morning, I think I’ll be like, ‘Ah, this isn’t that much fun anymore,’ and I’ll have a conversation with myself,’ Kittle explained. ‘But I’m feeling great right now.’

While Kittle is happy to be playing in the NFL and ‘hasn’t daydreamed’ about retirement, he is excited about the potential opportunities he might have when he does call it quits. He believes he could eventually ‘talk football’ somewhere and also noted he is hoping to be an extra in Henry Cavill’s upcoming TV series based on the ‘Warhammer’ games.

However, there is one opportunity he is hoping to pursue above all else.

‘I would love to do WWE,’ Kittle said. ‘I think there’s definitely opportunity within that world, and I would love nothing more than to be a part of it.’

Kittle, a long-time wrestling fan, has appeared in WWE programming before. Most notably, he was at WrestleMania 39 in 2023, where he came out of the crowd clad in a ‘TEU’ tank top and helped Pat McAfee defeat The Miz.

That said, Kittle acknowledged any future effort he makes to join WWE full-time would take a lot more practice than his guest spots in the past.

‘I would only do WWE if I bought a ring and practiced my ass off for a while so I wouldn’t look like an idiot out there,’ Kittle explained. ‘I’ve been in a WWE ring like three times. I don’t know what I’m doing out there. I have an understanding of how it works, but I haven’t moonsaulted off the top rope at WrestleMania like Pat McAfee did.’

The 49ers will be hoping Kittle’s WWE training won’t begin for another handful of years. San Francisco signed Kittle to a four-year contract extension in April that will tether him to the organization through his age-36 season in 2029.

It’s practically a given for leagues and owners to cry poverty at some point during contract talks.

David Stern famously did it in 2011, saying the NBA was losing money. Adam Silver raised similar concerns four years later. Major League Baseball’s current contract doesn’t expire until the end of next season, yet Rob Manfred is already putting the idea out there.

The implication of this kind of hand-wringing, of course, is that the leagues can’t possibly have the money needed to give the players what they’re asking. But it’s usually more negotiating tactic than reality, a way of moving the bar lower.

The WNBA won’t have that luxury this time around.

Sportico released its latest valuation of the 13 WNBA teams on Tuesday, and the numbers are jaw-dropping. The Golden State Valkyries lead the league with a $500 million valuation, which is a whopping 10 times what owners Joe Lacob and Peter Gruber paid to get the expansion team just two years ago.

The average valuation is $269 million, and six teams are worth $250 million or more.

Now, those numbers pale in comparison to the $10 billion the Los Angeles Lakers sold for last week. But aside from the fact the W is still playing catchup, beginning 50 years after the NBA, that average valuation of $269 million is a 180% increase from last year.

And that, according to Sportico, is more than double the previous record gain by a sports league.

To put it simply, the W is a growth stock. A rocket-fueled one. And the players know it.

‘This is a defining moment for the WNBA. As the league grows, it’s time for a CBA that reflects our true value,” Chicago Sky veteran Elizabeth Williams said over the weekend, echoing a message shared by several other player reps.

“We’re fighting for a fair share of the business that we built. It’s business. We’re not fighting for anything unreasonable. We’re fighting to share in the growth that we’ve created,” Williams added. ‘Every other category across this business has grown: Media rights, ticket sales, team values. The only thing that’s still capped is player salaries. We deserve our fair share. We’re demanding salaries that reflect our true value. Again, it’s business.”

Negotiations between the WNBA and the Players Association are private, so it’s unclear what prompted the collective warning from players over the weekend. Maybe they got wind of Sportico’s valuations. Maybe it’s a result of the op-ed in the New York Times earlier this month by Noble Prize-winning economist Claudia Goldin, who said W players are making 1/80th of what NBA players make rather than the one quarter or one third that would be required for equitable pay.

And before the peanut gallery chimes in, W players are not asking for LeBron money. They’re not even asking for Cooper Flagg money, assuming he’s the No. 1 pick that he’s expected to be Wednesday night.

What they are asking for is a fair share, and the W and its owners are going to have to open their wallets to get them there.

Currently, W players get about 10% of the league’s revenues. That’s less — way less — than the roughly 50% of revenues that players in the NBA, NFL, MLB and NHL get. Yes, the W has stepped up, finally providing charter flights last year for the entire season and boosting the payout for the Commissioner’s Cup. Some individual teams now have their own practice facilities, an “amenity” that’s been a given in men’s sports for years.

But there’s more to be done. Much more.

This isn’t a charity project, either. The Sportico valuations confirm what has been evident for the last five years: There is money to be made in women’s sports. A lot of it. But sports are driven by stars, not owners. Fans are shelling out for tickets, merch and the league pass because of Caitlin Clark, A’ja Wilson, Napheesa Collier, Angel Reese, Breanna Stewart and Paige Bueckers, not because of any owner.

Which means the players need to be equal partners.

“The current system is unsustainable for us and that means it’s unsustainable for the business that we created. Nothing short of transformational change will do for the future we see and the fans clearly see,” Williams said. “So we’re paying attention.”

The W players know their value. More importantly, they know the value of the league and its teams, too.

Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on social media @nrarmour.

Terron Armstead blocked in front of both Drew Brees and Tua Tagovailoa during his 12-year NFL career with the New Orleans Saints and Miami Dolphins.

‘The anticipation, the accuracy, timing of throws, the ability to knock a wing off a fly, repeatedly. Those guys throw darts,’ Armstead said of Brees and Tagovailoa. ‘They don’t throw to areas, they are very precise. And that’s an elite talent, it’s an elite trait [that] very few people possess. He’s one of them and Drew Brees is another.’

The recently retired offensive tackle was careful to note he wasn’t claiming the two were ‘the same player or same person.’

‘No two people are,’ Armstead explained.

Still, the 33-year-old expressed confidence Tagovailoa could eventually work his way into consideration as one of the best quarterbacks in the league, much like Brees did during his time with the Saints.

What has stopped Tagovailoa from reaching those heights over his first six seasons?

‘I would say time on task,’ Armstead told Eisen. ‘Having more experience, getting more reps, getting more snaps. I don’t know exactly where Drew Brees was going into his sixth year. I know he had a shoulder that had to get reconstructed when he signed to New Orleans and really pushed his career even further, to be the Hall of Famer player that he was.’

Armstead also lauded Tagovailoa for being a ‘fierce competitor’ who plays ‘with such love for the game.’

However, Armstead also noted the 27-year-old quarterback needs to better protect himself in order to stay on the field.

‘He is willing to put his body on the line in any situation,’ Armstead explained. ‘But he has to understand – and I think he’s starting to understand – his value is deeper than any one play or any one game. Him being out of the lineup changes the franchise. It does. It changes the identity of the offense, it changes the franchise.

‘So, I believe that he has to play the game with that in mind, as opposed to let me do whatever I need to do to get this first down,’ Armstead added. ‘That first down is not nearly as valuable as him being there the next series.’

Armstead understands Tagovailoa will continue to face scrutiny until he can consistently stay on the field and lead the Dolphins to playoff success.

He remains confident Tagovailoa will be able to challenge those narratives as he continues to progress during his NFL career.

‘Tua has his questions, and it’s up to him to answer these question – not me,’ Armstead said. ‘Do I believe he can? I do. Do I believe he will? I do.’

MADRID — Spain’s High Court on Wednesday, June 25, upheld a verdict that found former soccer federation president Luis Rubiales guilty of sexual assault for an unsolicited kiss on the lips of national team player Jenni Hermoso at the 2023 World Cup in Sydney.

The court rejected multiple appeals against the conviction, reaffirming Rubiales kissed Hermoso without her consent during the medal ceremony after Spain’s women had won the trophy, according to the ruling seen by Reuters.

Rubiales was fined over 10,000 euros ($11,592) and acquitted of coercion charges alongside three co-defendants. Prosecutors had sought a 2-1/2-year prison sentence and called for a retrial, both of which were dismissed.

The incident sparked widespread debate about sexism in Spanish society and women’s football, fueling momentum for the ‘Me Too’ movement in the country.

Rubiales argued that his actions were motivated by an uncontrollable joy, but the court ruled that his restraint with other players and attendees demonstrated he could have avoided such behaviour with Hermoso.

‘Since that emotion did not lead him to express his joy so effusively by kissing the other players or the accompanying persons in the box, and he restrained himself, he could also have done so, without too much effort, with the captain of the team,’ the court said.

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