Cleveland superstar LeBron James surpassed NBA icon Michael Jordan as the league&#39;s all-time playoff scoring leader on Thursday in the Cavaliers&#39; Eastern Conference finals game against the Celtics in Boston.

With a three-pointer in the third quarter James, 32, took his total of playoff points to 5,989 -- two more than Jordan&#39;s 5,987. He entered the contest needing 28 points to surpass Jordan.

Jordan, who led the Chicago Bulls to six NBA titles in the 1990s, played 179 post-season games in his career.

James moves past him to the top of the list in his 212th career playoff game.

(AFP)

With a three-pointer in the third quarter, James took his total of playoff points to 5,989, or two more than Jordan's 5,987

Cleveland superstar LeBron James surpassed NBA icon Michael Jordan as the league's all-time playoff scoring leader on Thursday in the Cavaliers' Eastern Conference finals game against the Celtics in Boston. With a three-pointer in the third quarter James, 32, took his total of playoff points to 5,989 -- two more than Jordan's 5,987. He entered the contest needing 28 points to surpass Jordan. Jordan, who led the Chicago Bulls to six NBA titles in the 1990s, played 179 post-season games in his career. James moves past him to the top of the list in his 212th career playoff game. (AFP)

LeBron James overtakes Michael Jordan for most playoff points in NBA history

Music legend Bruce Springsteen, basketball star Michael Jordan and actor Robert De Niro are among 21 people who will be honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the White House said Wednesday.

The nation&#39;s highest civilian honor is &quot;a tribute to the idea that all of us, no matter where we come from, have the opportunity to change this country for the better,&quot; said US President Barack Obama in an announcement.

&quot;From scientists, philanthropists and public servants to activists, athletes, and artists, these 21 individuals have helped push America forward, inspiring millions of people around the world along the way,&quot; Obama said.

The list loaded with entertainers and celebrities also includes comedian and talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres, actors Tom Hanks and Robert Redford, stage performer Cicely Tyson and cultural icon Diana Ross, known for her more than half-a-century career in music, film, television, theater and fashion.&nbsp;

Lorne Michaels, a screenwriter and producer best known for creating the sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live is also a recipient.

Broadcaster Vin Scully, who was the voice of the Brooklyn and Los Angeles Dodgers baseball teams for 67 years, will receive the top award, along with basketball great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the National Basketball Association&#39;s all-time leading scorer and an ardent social justice advocate.

Philanthropists Bill and Melinda Gates will be recognised for their work with the Gates Foundation, which focuses on fighting extreme poverty and improving global health.&nbsp;

Other honorees include leading architect Frank Gehry and artist Maya Lin, who designed the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington.

Lawyer and former Federal Communications Committee chief Newt Minow will be honored, along with Miami Dade College President Eduardo Padron, a champion of access to education and inclusion.

Obama will also recognise physicist Richard Garwin and mathematician Margaret Hamilton, who led the team that created on-board flight software for NASA&#39;s Apollo missions.

The late Elouise Cobell, a Blackfeet Tribal community leader and &quot;advocate for Native American self-determination and financial independence,&quot; will receive the award posthumously, as will Grace Hopper, known as &quot;the first lady of software&quot; for her coding innovations.

The award ceremony will take place at the White House on November 22.

(AFP)

The list also includes comedian and talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres and two-time Oscar winner Tom Hanks

Music legend Bruce Springsteen, basketball star Michael Jordan and actor Robert De Niro are among 21 people who will be honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the White House said Wednesday. The nation's highest civilian honor is "a tribute to the idea that all of us, no matter where we come from, have the opportunity to change this country for the better," said US President Barack Obama in an announcement. "From scientists, philanthropists and public servants to activists, athletes, and artists, these 21 individuals have helped push America forward, inspiring millions of people around the world along the way," Obama said. The list loaded with entertainers and celebrities also includes comedian and talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres, actors Tom Hanks and Robert Redford, stage performer Cicely Tyson and cultural icon Diana Ross, known for her more than half-a-century career in music, film, television, theater and fashion. Lorne Michaels, a screenwriter and producer best known for creating the sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live is also a recipient. Broadcaster Vin Scully, who was the voice of the Brooklyn and Los Angeles Dodgers baseball teams for 67 years, will receive the top award, along with basketball great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the National Basketball Association's all-time leading scorer and an ardent social justice advocate. Philanthropists Bill and Melinda Gates will be recognised for their work with the Gates Foundation, which focuses on fighting extreme poverty and improving global health. Other honorees include leading architect Frank Gehry and artist Maya Lin, who designed the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington. Lawyer and former Federal Communications Committee chief Newt Minow will be honored, along with Miami Dade College President Eduardo Padron, a champion of access to education and inclusion. Obama will also recognise physicist Richard Garwin and mathematician Margaret Hamilton, who led the team that created on-board flight software for NASA's Apollo missions. The late Elouise Cobell, a Blackfeet Tribal community leader and "advocate for Native American self-determination and financial independence," will receive the award posthumously, as will Grace Hopper, known as "the first lady of software" for her coding innovations. The award ceremony will take place at the White House on November 22. (AFP)

Springsteen, De Niro, Michael Jordan to receive Presidential Medal of Freedom

Michael Keaton capped a glorious late-career return from the wilderness on Thursday when he finally received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, almost four decades after his first movie. 
 
The 64-year-old actor gave a crowd-pleasing but political speech, mixing self-effacing jokes with a show of support for efforts to improve relations between black communities and police in the United States. 
 
Dressed in a green sports jacket and open-neck shirt in the steamy California sunshine, Keaton described his up-and-down career in acting as &quot;a never-ending quest&quot; for self-improvement. 
 
&quot;To say this is a dream is kind of incorrect because I really never thought about being famous,&quot; he told friends, family and a large crowd of well-wishers on Hollywood Boulevard. 
 
&quot;It sure is fun, but that&#39;s not the thing I really thought of. I always wanted to be good, that&#39;s all I really ever wanted to be. 
 
&quot;And honestly, to tell you the truth, I think sometimes I am and sometimes I think I&#39;m pretty damn good.&quot; 
 
Keaton used his speech to praise his friend, basketball legend Michael Jordan, who said this week he could &quot;no longer stay silent&quot; over the rash of police shootings and troubled race relations in the US. 
 
The 53-year-old athlete, who has long been criticised reluctance to speak out on social issues, announced he was donating $2 million to groups working to improve relations between black Americans and law enforcement. 
 
&quot;I gotta tell you I&#39;m going to thank (Jordan) myself,&quot; Keaton said. 
 
&quot;And I don&#39;t care if people say it took him too long to do it, the fact is, he did it.&quot; 
 
The actor also thanked the Los Angeles police, &quot;especially in a time when things are really,&nbsp;really tough right now.&quot; 
 
In the last two years, Keaton has won a Golden Globe for &quot;Birdman&quot;, about a washed-up former superhero film star battling to resurrect his career and received rave reviews for his work in the Oscar-winning film &quot;Spotlight&quot;. 
 
The parallels between the &quot;Birdman&quot; role and the real-life actor, whose real name is Michael Douglas, but who uses Keaton to avoid confusion with the &quot;Fatal Attraction&quot; star are striking. 
 
Keaton played Bruce Wayne and his alter ego in 1989&#39;s &quot;Batman&quot;, made by Tim Burton, with whom he also collaborated on &quot;Beetlejuice&quot; at the start of his career. 
 
Like his &quot;Birdman&quot; character, the actor was then almost forgotten. 
 
By the late 1990&#39;s, he found himself relegated to B-movies, minor TV roles, and voiceover work, until the role of Riggan Thompson in &quot;Birdman&quot; offered him a stunning return to the big time. 
 
He has since won a string of awards for his portrayal of investigative journalist Walter &quot;Robby&quot; Robinson in &quot;Spotlight&quot;, which chronicles The Boston Globe&#39;s investigation into sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. 
 
&quot;You can be a good parent, you can be a good friend, a good husband, a good pal, a good actor, that&#39;s what you&#39;re supposed to do. You don&#39;t get extra credit for being those things, that&#39;s the job,&quot; Keaton said. 
 
&quot;That&#39;s what you&#39;re supposed to do and I&#39;m never going to see it any other way than that.&quot; 
 
With the back end of his career going from strength to strength, Keaton has just finished filming &quot;The Founder&quot;, a biopic on Ray Kroc, who built McDonald&#39;s into the world&#39;s most successful fast-food chain. 
 
(AFP)

In last two years, Keaton has won a Golden Globe for 'Birdman' and received rave reviews for his work in the Oscar-winning film 'Spotlight'

Michael Keaton capped a glorious late-career return from the wilderness on Thursday when he finally received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, almost four decades after his first movie. The 64-year-old actor gave a crowd-pleasing but political speech, mixing self-effacing jokes with a show of support for efforts to improve relations between black communities and police in the United States. Dressed in a green sports jacket and open-neck shirt in the steamy California sunshine, Keaton described his up-and-down career in acting as "a never-ending quest" for self-improvement. "To say this is a dream is kind of incorrect because I really never thought about being famous," he told friends, family and a large crowd of well-wishers on Hollywood Boulevard. "It sure is fun, but that's not the thing I really thought of. I always wanted to be good, that's all I really ever wanted to be. "And honestly, to tell you the truth, I think sometimes I am and sometimes I think I'm pretty damn good." Keaton used his speech to praise his friend, basketball legend Michael Jordan, who said this week he could "no longer stay silent" over the rash of police shootings and troubled race relations in the US. The 53-year-old athlete, who has long been criticised reluctance to speak out on social issues, announced he was donating $2 million to groups working to improve relations between black Americans and law enforcement. "I gotta tell you I'm going to thank (Jordan) myself," Keaton said. "And I don't care if people say it took him too long to do it, the fact is, he did it." The actor also thanked the Los Angeles police, "especially in a time when things are really, really tough right now." In the last two years, Keaton has won a Golden Globe for "Birdman", about a washed-up former superhero film star battling to resurrect his career and received rave reviews for his work in the Oscar-winning film "Spotlight". The parallels between the "Birdman" role and the real-life actor, whose real name is Michael Douglas, but who uses Keaton to avoid confusion with the "Fatal Attraction" star are striking. Keaton played Bruce Wayne and his alter ego in 1989's "Batman", made by Tim Burton, with whom he also collaborated on "Beetlejuice" at the start of his career. Like his "Birdman" character, the actor was then almost forgotten. By the late 1990's, he found himself relegated to B-movies, minor TV roles, and voiceover work, until the role of Riggan Thompson in "Birdman" offered him a stunning return to the big time. He has since won a string of awards for his portrayal of investigative journalist Walter "Robby" Robinson in "Spotlight", which chronicles The Boston Globe's investigation into sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. "You can be a good parent, you can be a good friend, a good husband, a good pal, a good actor, that's what you're supposed to do. You don't get extra credit for being those things, that's the job," Keaton said. "That's what you're supposed to do and I'm never going to see it any other way than that." With the back end of his career going from strength to strength, Keaton has just finished filming "The Founder", a biopic on Ray Kroc, who built McDonald's into the world's most successful fast-food chain. (AFP)

Michael Keaton receives Hollywood Walk of Fame star

Basketball icon Michael Jordan, long reluctant to speak out on social issues, yesterday condemned gun violence that has heightened racial tensions in America and pledged $2 million toward finding a solution. 
 
&quot;I know this country is better than that, and I can no longer stay silent,&quot; Jordan said in a letter released via theundefeated.com, a website backed by ESPN. 
 
It was a watershed moment for a superstar who throughout his playing career, in which he led the Chicago Bulls to six National Basketball Association championships between 1991 and 1998, was criticised for his hesitance to wade in on politics. 
 
A wave of police killings of African Americans and deadly attacks against police officers prompted his rare public stand. 
 
&quot;As a proud American, a father who lost his own dad in a senseless act of violence, and a black man, I have been deeply troubled by the deaths of African Americans at the hands of law enforcement and angered by the cowardly and hateful targeting and killing of police officers,&quot; he said. 
 
&quot;I grieve with the families who have lost loved ones, as I know their pain all too well.&quot; 
 
His father, James Jordan, was shot and killed in 1993 at a highway rest area, not long after his son led the Bulls to a third NBA title. 
 
Jordan used the letter to announce grants of $1 million each to two organisations working to improve relations between law enforcement and the communities in which they work - the Institute for Community Police Relations and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. 
 
The first was launched in May by the International Association of Chiefs of Police, while the Legal Defense Fund was originally established in 1940 to work for civil rights as part of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. 
 
&quot;Although I know these contributions alone are not enough to solve the problem, I hope the resources will help both organisations make a positive difference,&quot; he said. 
 
Activist athletes 
 
Now the only African-American majority owner of an NBA club, the Charlotte Hornets, Jordan has joined a wave of social comment in US sports sparked by a spate of police shootings of unarmed black men - and shootings of police officers in Dallas, Texas, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana. 
 
Current NBA stars LeBron James, Chris Paul, Carmelo Anthony and Dwyane Wade opened the recent ESPYs sports awards show urging their peers to take the lead in combating racial injustice and gun violence. 
 
And in April, when a North Carolina law seen as discriminatory to the LGBT community was pushing the NBA toward moving the 2017 All-Star Game from the Hornets&#39; arena, a move the league ultimately made, Jordan issued a statement saying the club was &quot;opposed to discrimination in any form.&quot; 
 
The league made the decision official last week. 
 
A Jordan spokeswoman told theundefeated.com that Jordan had resolved to speak out two weeks ago, but delayed his comments to avoid overshadowing the concerns of the lesbian, gay and transgender community over the All-Star Game. 
 
His comments are a far cry from his past reticence. 
 
He once famously said &quot;Republicans buy sneakers, too&quot; in explaining his reluctance to comment on thorny political issues. 
 
In 2015, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar took Jordan to task in a National Public Radio interview saying he &quot;took commerce over conscience,&quot; although Jordan has in fact quietly backed political candidates, including donating to the senatorial and presidential campaigns of Barack Obama. 
 
Jordan was spurred to comment in 2014 when racially charged remarks by then-Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling rocked the NBA. 
 
Jordan said he was &quot;disgusted that a fellow team owner could hold such sickening and offensive views.&quot; 
 
(AFP)

In a letter released by an ESPN backed website, Jordan pledged $2 million toward finding a solution

Basketball icon Michael Jordan, long reluctant to speak out on social issues, yesterday condemned gun violence that has heightened racial tensions in America and pledged $2 million toward finding a solution. "I know this country is better than that, and I can no longer stay silent," Jordan said in a letter released via theundefeated.com, a website backed by ESPN. It was a watershed moment for a superstar who throughout his playing career, in which he led the Chicago Bulls to six National Basketball Association championships between 1991 and 1998, was criticised for his hesitance to wade in on politics. A wave of police killings of African Americans and deadly attacks against police officers prompted his rare public stand. "As a proud American, a father who lost his own dad in a senseless act of violence, and a black man, I have been deeply troubled by the deaths of African Americans at the hands of law enforcement and angered by the cowardly and hateful targeting and killing of police officers," he said. "I grieve with the families who have lost loved ones, as I know their pain all too well." His father, James Jordan, was shot and killed in 1993 at a highway rest area, not long after his son led the Bulls to a third NBA title. Jordan used the letter to announce grants of $1 million each to two organisations working to improve relations between law enforcement and the communities in which they work - the Institute for Community Police Relations and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. The first was launched in May by the International Association of Chiefs of Police, while the Legal Defense Fund was originally established in 1940 to work for civil rights as part of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. "Although I know these contributions alone are not enough to solve the problem, I hope the resources will help both organisations make a positive difference," he said. Activist athletes Now the only African-American majority owner of an NBA club, the Charlotte Hornets, Jordan has joined a wave of social comment in US sports sparked by a spate of police shootings of unarmed black men - and shootings of police officers in Dallas, Texas, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Current NBA stars LeBron James, Chris Paul, Carmelo Anthony and Dwyane Wade opened the recent ESPYs sports awards show urging their peers to take the lead in combating racial injustice and gun violence. And in April, when a North Carolina law seen as discriminatory to the LGBT community was pushing the NBA toward moving the 2017 All-Star Game from the Hornets' arena, a move the league ultimately made, Jordan issued a statement saying the club was "opposed to discrimination in any form." The league made the decision official last week. A Jordan spokeswoman told theundefeated.com that Jordan had resolved to speak out two weeks ago, but delayed his comments to avoid overshadowing the concerns of the lesbian, gay and transgender community over the All-Star Game. His comments are a far cry from his past reticence. He once famously said "Republicans buy sneakers, too" in explaining his reluctance to comment on thorny political issues. In 2015, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar took Jordan to task in a National Public Radio interview saying he "took commerce over conscience," although Jordan has in fact quietly backed political candidates, including donating to the senatorial and presidential campaigns of Barack Obama. Jordan was spurred to comment in 2014 when racially charged remarks by then-Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling rocked the NBA. Jordan said he was "disgusted that a fellow team owner could hold such sickening and offensive views." (AFP)

'I can no longer stay silent,' Michael Jordan condemns US gun violence

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LeBron James overtakes Michael Jordan for most playoff points in NBA history

Springsteen, De Niro, Michael Jordan to receive Presidential Medal of Freedom

Michael Keaton receives Hollywood Walk of Fame star

'I can no longer stay silent,' Michael Jordan condemns US gun violence