title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: Since Tampa Bay's entrance into the NFL, at least one player has been included on each NFL All-Decade Team, excluding the 1970s which Tampa Bay only had existed for four seasons. Tampa Bay has had players elected to the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s teams. Among the three Anniversary Teams, the franchise did not exist for the 50th Anniversary Team, no players were selected to the 75th Anniversary Team, and five players were selected to the 100th Anniversary Team. Players are only included on lists which they played for the team within the years of the decade; members, such as Tom Brady, did not join the Buccaneers until 2020, despite being a member of the 2000s and 2010s All-Decade Teams.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: In 1991, the organization initiated the "Krewe of Honor" to recognize top players, and featured a mural of the first class of three members. The display was located on the east side of the stadium, and honorees were presented with a plaque. Quarterback Doug Williams was inducted September 6, 1992, and owner Hugh Culverhouse on September 5, 1993. No additional members were added before Tampa Stadium was closed and demolished; when the stadium was demolished in 1998, so was the Krewe.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: On November 8, 2009, the team unveiled a new Ring of Honor at Raymond James Stadium. Hall of Fame defensive tackle,


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: as well as the team' first-ever draft pick, Lee Roy Selmon was the first inductee. On October 19, 2008, one year prior to the inception of the Ring of Honor, Mike Alstott was honored by the club following his retirement. He would be formally inducuted into the ring in 2015. Former head coach Jon Gruden was inducted in 2017, but due to controversy surrounding emails he sent while working for ESPN, he was removed in 2021. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the induction ceremony for 2020 inductee Monte Kiffin was postponed until 2021. There was no separate 2021 inductee, except that previous inductee John Lynch was honored again for having been subsequently named to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. No others members have required an additional Hall of Fame celebration, as their Ring of Honor ceremonies all came after their respective HOF induction.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: As of 2022, all players that had been named to the defunct "Krewe of Honor" have been subsequently inducted into the new Ring of Honor, with the lone exception of Ricky Bell. The 2022 inductee is scheduled to be Bruce Arians.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: The ring initially featured the player's number and last name in protruding, illuminated letters, along the frieze of the stadium's upper deck. When the stadium underwent renovations in 2015–2016, the ring was refreshed to flat white letters on a red background, expanded to include both first and last names. Pro Football Hall of Fame inductees are additionally denoted by a hall of fame logo next to their names.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: Many current and former members of the Buccaneers have been selected to the Associated Press All-Pro first and second teams. While the AP All-Pro teams are generally considered the highest nomination, Pro Football Writers of America, Newspaper Enterprise Association, Pro Football Weekly, Pro Football Focus, and The Sporting News have also nominated Buccaneers players to their All-Pro teams.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: Many former and current Tampa Bay Buccaneers players have represented the<br>franchise in the Pro Bowl:


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: Many members drafted by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have been selected to the Pro Football Writers of America NFL All-Rookie Team:


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: The Bucs created an official cheerleading squad in their first season, called the "Swash-Buc-Lers". In 1999, they were renamed as the "Tampa Bay Buccaneers Cheerleaders".


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: "" is a made-for-television movie that recounts the life of the late Buccaneer running back Ricky Bell. The movie takes place through a dramatic reenactment of the 1981 season, including actual footage of gameplay around the dramatized role by Mario Van Peebles playing Bell himself. Bell finds himself befriending an impaired child who inspire each other to become better in their own ways. It also includes other former Buccaneer players, like Lee Roy Selmon, Charley Hannah, and Doug Williams (only through gameplay footage).


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: The Buccaneers have rivalries several teams in the NFL, most notably with the other three teams in the NFC South, which include the following: the Atlanta Falcons, the Carolina Panthers, and the New Orleans Saints. Despite being places in the NFC South, the Buccaneers had fierce rivalries with the Chicago Bears, the Minnesota Vikings, the Detroit Lions, and the Green Bay Packers during their days in the NFC Central from 1977 to 2001 with their rivalry with the Packers being the most famous of the bunch. The Buccaneers also have a rivalry with the Philadelphia Eagles that began in the late 1970s but reached new heights during the early 2000s when the two teams met each other in the playoffs. The rivalry would return in the early 2020s when the two teams meet in January 2022 when Buccaneers knocked Philly out of the playoffs. The Buccaneers also have geographical rivalries with the Jacksonville Jaguars and Miami Dolphins.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: The Buccaneers and Panthers first meet in 1995, back when the later team joined the NFL as expansion franchise. However, the rivalry would take off during the 2000s with the creation of the NFC South and was described as "heated" and "physical" due to two main reasons; the first being that both teams fought for dominating control over the NFC South throughout most of the 2000s. The second reason being that players on both franchises suffered season ending injuries during their annual games. Examples include Chris Simms, Dante Wesley, Clifton Smith, and Kavika Pittman. Carolina leads the rivalry 24-19.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: The Saints and Buccaneers have one noticeable parallel throughout the two franchises history, they were both regarded as unsuccessful franchises until the 21st century, which was both teams were placed in the NFC South in 2002, as well as when their rivalry would truly begin to take off, when both teams improved their fortunes, though the Buccaneers got over the hump first with by winning Super Bowl XXXVII and the Saints winning their first Super Bowl 7 years later in Super Bowl XLIV. The first meeting between these two franchises first occurred in 1977 when the Buccaneers beat the Saints and ended their 26 game straight losing streak. While it isn't the most well known rivalry in the NFL, it did reach new heights in the 2000s, which was when the Buccaneers had a higher advantage over the Saints in the regular season, when both teams started posting winning seasons in that decade. New Orleans Saints leads the rivalry 39-21 and the two franchises meet once in the playoffs in which the Buccaneers defeated the Saints 30 to 20 and eventually won Super Bowl LV.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: The Buccaneers' current flagship radio stations are WXTB 97.9 FM and WDAE 620 AM. The play-by-play announcer since 1989 has been Gene Deckerhoff. Former Bucs tight end Dave Moore joined Deckerhoff as analyst for the 2007 season. T. J. Rives works as the sideline reporter.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: Broadcast legend and former Green Bay Packers' announcer Ray Scott was the play-by-play man for the Bucs' first two seasons in 1976 and 1977. Dick Crippen called the team's games in the first half of the 1978 season, with Jim Gallogly taking over for the second half. From 1979 to 1988 Mark Champion, who became the radio voice of the Detroit Lions (1989–2004) and then the Detroit Pistons (2001–present), held that position with the Bucs.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: Former Buccaneer Hardy Nickerson served as color commentator for one season in 2006, until he signed with the Bears as a linebackers coach on February 23, 2007. Nickerson had replaced Scot Brantley, who was the commentator from 1999 through 2005. Jesse Ventura, the famous professional wrestler, actor, and former governor of Minnesota, was Deckerhoff's partner on the Bucs radio broadcasts for one year, 1990, and former Buc David Logan held that position after Ventura until his death after the 1998 season. Dave Kocerek and Fran Curci were also color commentators for the Buccaneers during their earlier years.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: The Bucs have broadcast on FM radio since signing with Top 40 station WRBQ-FM in . The team moved to WQYK-FM in , then to WFUS in , and then to WXTB in .


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: While regular-season and post-season games in the NFL are all broadcast by national television contracts on CBS, Fox, NBC, ESPN and NFL Network, the television broadcasts are for the most part handled by the individual teams. Effective with the 2011 season, preseason games not picked up for national broadcast are seen on WTSP. WESH simulcasts the broadcast in the Orlando area.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: CBS, Fox and NBC games are shown respectively in Tampa Bay on WTSP, WTVT and WFLA-TV, while they are shown respectively in Orlando on WKMG, WOFL and WESH. The great majority of games are aired on Fox owned-and-operated stations WTVT and WOFL, by virtue of Fox owning the rights to NFC games. WTSP and WKMG air any Buccaneers home games against American Football Conference teams. "Monday Night Football" games on ESPN and Thursday night games on NFL Network are simulcast locally on WMOR-TV, who also previously carried the Bucs' "Sunday Night Football" games when they were televised on ESPN and TNT; previously, the Bucs' appearances on the cable networks were seen locally on WFLA-TV and WFTS.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: WFLA was the previous home to Buccaneers preseason games, where they were televised from 2003 to 2010. At WFLA, Chris Myers was the play-by-play announcer with John Lynch as color commentator. Both Myers and Lynch worked nationally with Fox Sports at the time until Lynch became the general manager of the San Francisco 49ers in 2017. Ron Jaworski previously served as color commentator, until he signed with "Monday Night Football" for 2007. Charles Davis also served as color commentator from 2007 to 2008.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: WTOG channel 44 also previously broadcast Buccaneers preseason games for many years, ending in 2002. Former CBS play-by-play and ESPN golf broadcaster Jim Kelly was the play-by-play announcer for many of those games in the 1980s, and Joe Namath was a commentator.


title: Tampa Bay Buccaneers

text: In the early years of the franchise, WTVT, then a CBS affiliate, broadcast some Buccaneers preseason games. Sports anchor Andy Hardy handled the play-by-play, and for one game in 1978, his broadcast partner was his friend, Florida State alumni, and movie actor Burt Reynolds.


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: Alexandra Hetherington Breckenridge is an American actress. She began her career with supporting roles in the teen comedy films "Big Fat Liar" (2002) and "She's the Man" (2006). She later played reporter Willa McPherson in the FX series "Dirt" and had a supporting role in the short-lived series "The Ex List". She starred as a young Moira O'Hara in of FX's "American Horror Story", and played Kaylee in . She played Jessie Anderson in the AMC series "The Walking Dead" and Sophie in the NBC series "This Is Us". She is also the voice of various characters in the animated comedy series "Family Guy". Since 2019, she has starred as Melinda "Mel" Monroe in the Netflix series "Virgin River".


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: Alexandra Hetherington Breckenridge was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut. She lived in nearby Darien until the age of 10, when she and her mother moved to California, where they moved around for a year before settling in Mill Valley. Breckenridge became interested in acting, photography, and singing at age 13. When she was 15, she moved with her mother back to Los Angeles to pursue her acting career.


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: In 2000, Breckenridge guest starred as Shelly Weaver in "Freaks and Geeks". She also guest starred in "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", "Charmed", "", "Dawson's Creek", "JAG", "Medium", "Psych", and "Undeclared". Breckenridge also guest-starred as Francise in three episodes of "Opposite Sex". In 2002, she appeared in the film "Big Fat Liar", starring Frankie Muniz, as Jason Shepherd's older sister Janie.


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: Breckenridge has had numerous voice roles in the animated television series "Family Guy". During an interview with "FHM", she stated: "When I first went for "Family Guy", I auditioned for a guest voice. I don't know why, but [creator] Seth MacFarlane really likes the sound of my voice. I'll never understand that. He just liked me and they call me back all the time to do different things." Breckenridge often does celebrity impressions in the series, such as Sarah Jessica Parker and Renée Zellweger. She also had roles in MacFarlane's web series "Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy". Breckenridge also guest starred in the episode "With Friends Like Steve's" of "American Dad!", also created by MacFarlane.


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: In 2006, Breckenridge starred as Monique in the film "She's the Man". She has also appeared in a couple of series that have later been canceled, such as the FX drama series "Dirt" from 2007 to 2008, in which she played Willa McPherson, a young upstart writer. In 2009, Breckenridge co-starred in the independent film "The Bridge to Nowhere", directed by Blair Underwood. In 2012, she had a role in the film "Ticket Out".


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: Breckenridge had a recurring role in season four of HBO's "True Blood" as Katerina Pelham and also in of FX's "American Horror Story" as young Moira O'Hara, the ghost of a maid trapped in the house in which she was employed. In addition, she returned for two episodes in season three of the series, "", as Kaylee, a young witch who excels in pyrokinesis.


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: From 2015 to 2016, Breckenridge portrayed Jessie Anderson, a character from the comic book series of the same name, in season five and season six of the AMC post-apocalyptic horror series "The Walking Dead". In 2015, she co-starred in the psychological thriller "Dark" from executive producer Joe Dante and director Nick Basile. In 2017, Breckenridge appeared in the recurring role of Sophie, Kate's childhood friend and Kevin's ex-wife, in the first season of the NBC drama series "This Is Us". She was promoted to a series regular for the second season, and appeared in one episode in the third season two episodes in the fourth season, one episode in the fifth season, and the final sixth season


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: Since 2019, Breckenridge has played lead character Melinda "Mel" Monroe, a nurse-midwife who moves to a small northern California town following a personal tragedy, in the Netflix series "Virgin River". The series was renewed for fourth and fifth seasons by Netflix in September 2021.


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: Breckenridge married guitarist Casey Hooper in September 2015. They had their first child, a son, in September 2016. Their second child, a daughter, was born in December 2017.


title: Alexandra Breckenridge

text: Breckenridge is the niece of actor Michael Weatherly. She has several tattoos that are covered by make-up for her on-screen projects, but not during photo shoots.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Deus ex machina ( , ; plural: "dei ex machina"; English "god out of the machine") is a plot device whereby a seemingly unsolvable problem in a story is suddenly and abruptly resolved by an unexpected and unlikely occurrence. Its function is generally to resolve an otherwise irresolvable plot situation, to surprise the audience, to bring the tale to a happy ending, or act as a comedic device.


title: Deus ex machina

text: "Deus ex machina" is a Latin calque . The term was coined from the conventions of ancient Greek theater, where actors who were playing gods were brought onto stage using a machine. The machine could be either a crane ("mechane") used to lower actors from above or a riser that brought them up through a trapdoor. Aeschylus introduced the idea, and it was used often to resolve the conflict and conclude the drama. The device is associated mostly with Greek tragedy, although it also appeared in comedies.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Aeschylus used the device in his "Eumenides", but it became an established stage machine with Euripides. More than half of Euripides' extant tragedies employ a "deus ex machina" in their resolution, and some critics claim that Euripides invented it, not Aeschylus. A frequently cited example is Euripides' "Medea", in which the "deus ex machina" is a dragon-drawn chariot sent by the sun god Helios, used to convey his granddaughter Medea away from her husband Jason to the safety of Athens. In "Alcestis", the heroine agrees to give up her own life to spare the life of her husband Admetus. At the end, Heracles shows up and seizes Alcestis from Death, restoring her to life and to Admetus.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Aristophanes' play "Thesmophoriazusae" parodies Euripides' frequent use of the crane by making Euripides himself a character in the play and bringing him on stage by way of the "mechane".


title: Deus ex machina

text: The device produced an immediate emotional response from Greek audiences. They would have a feeling of wonder and astonishment at the appearance of the gods, which would often add to the moral effect of the drama.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Shakespeare uses the device in "As You Like It", "Pericles, Prince of Tyre", and "Cymbeline". John Gay uses it in "The Beggar's Opera" where a character breaks the action and rewrites the ending as a reprieve from hanging for MacHeath. During the politically turbulent 17th and 18th centuries, the "deus ex machina" was sometimes used to make a controversial thesis more palatable to the powers of the day. For example, in the final scene of Molière's "Tartuffe", the heroes are saved from a terrible fate by an agent of the compassionate, all-seeing King Louis XIV — the same king who held Molière's career and livelihood in his hands.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Aristotle was the first to use a Greek term equivalent to the Latin phrase "deus ex machina" to describe the technique as a device to resolve the plot of tragedies. It is generally deemed undesirable in writing and often implies a lack of creativity on the part of the author. The reasons for this are that it does damage to the story's internal logic and is often so unlikely that it challenges suspension of disbelief, allowing the author to conclude the story with an unlikely ending.


title: Deus ex machina

text: In medicine, the phrase is often used for supposedly "magical remedies" which are not likely to work in practice. For instance, in the 2020 COVID-19 outbreak, when double lung transplantation for terminal COVID-19 patients was suggested, it was immediately denounced as a "deus ex machina." In 2006, when electronic fetal heart monitoring was being touted as a preventive measure for cerebral palsy, The New England Journal of Medicine, denounced it as "deus ex machina".


title: Deus ex machina

text: The "deus ex machina" device is often criticized as inartistic, too convenient, and overly simplistic. However, champions of the device say that it opens up ideological and artistic possibilities.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Antiphanes was one of the device's earliest critics. He believed that the use of the "deus ex machina" was a sign that the playwright was unable to properly manage the complications of his plot.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Another critical reference to the device can be found in Plato's dialogue "Cratylus", 425d, though it is made in the context of an argument unrelated to drama.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Aristotle criticized the device in his "Poetics", where he argued that the resolution of a plot must arise internally, following from previous action of the play:


title: Deus ex machina

text: Aristotle praised Euripides, however, for generally ending his plays with bad fortune, which he viewed as correct in tragedy, and somewhat excused the intervention of a deity by suggesting that "astonishment" should be sought in tragic drama:


title: Deus ex machina

text: Such a device was referred to by Horace in his "Ars Poetica" (lines 191–2), where he instructs poets that they should never resort to a "god from the machine" to resolve their plots "unless a difficulty worthy of a god's unraveling should happen" ["nec deus intersit, nisi dignus uindice nodus inciderit; nec quarta loqui persona laboret"].


title: Deus ex machina

text: Following Aristotle, Renaissance critics continued to view the "deus ex machina" as an inept plot device, although it continued to be employed by Renaissance dramatists.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Toward the end of the 19th century, Friedrich Nietzsche criticized Euripides for making tragedy an optimistic genre by use of the device, and was highly skeptical of the "Greek cheerfulness", prompting what he viewed as the plays' "blissful delight in life". The "deus ex machina" as Nietzsche saw it was symptomatic of Socratic culture, which valued knowledge over Dionysiac music and ultimately caused the death of tragedy:


title: Deus ex machina

text: Nietzsche argued that the "deus ex machina" creates a false sense of consolation that ought not to be sought in phenomena. His denigration of the plot device has prevailed in critical opinion.


title: Deus ex machina

text: In Arthur Woollgar Verrall's publication "Euripides the Rationalist" (1895), he surveyed and recorded other late 19th-century responses to the device. He recorded that some of the critical responses to the term referred to it as 'burlesque', 'coup de théâtre', and 'catastrophe'. Verrall notes that critics have a dismissive response to authors who deploy the device in their writings. He comes to the conclusion that critics feel that the "deus ex machina" is evidence of the author's attempt to ruin the whole of his work and prevent anyone from putting any importance on his work.


title: Deus ex machina

text: However, other scholars have looked at Euripides' use of "deus ex machina" and described its use as an integral part of the plot designed for a specific purpose. Often, Euripides' plays would begin with gods, so it is argued that it would be natural for the gods to finish the action. The conflict throughout Euripides' plays would be caused by the meddling of the gods, so would make sense to both the playwright and the audience of the time that the gods would resolve all conflict that they began. Half of Euripides' eighteen extant plays end with the use of "deus ex machina", therefore it was not simply a device to relieve the playwright of the embarrassment of a confusing plot ending. This device enabled him to bring about a natural and more dignified dramatic and tragic ending.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Other champions of the device believe that it can be a spectacular agent of subversion. It can be used to undercut generic conventions and challenge cultural assumptions and the privileged role of tragedy as a literary/theatrical model.


title: Deus ex machina

text: Some 20th-century revisionist criticism suggests that "deus ex machina" cannot be viewed in these simplified terms, and contends that the device allows mortals to "probe" their relationship with the divine. Rush Rehm in particular cites examples of Greek tragedy in which the "deus ex machina" complicates the lives and attitudes of characters confronted by the deity, while simultaneously bringing the drama home to its audience. Sometimes, the unlikeliness of the "deus ex machina" plot device is employed deliberately. For example, comic effect is created in a scene in "Monty Python's Life of Brian" when Brian, who lives in Judea at the time of Christ, is saved from a high fall by a passing alien space ship.


title: Sean Payton

text: Sean Patrick Payton (born December 29, 1963) is a former American football player and coach. He served as the head coach of the New Orleans Saints of the National Football League (NFL) from 2006 to 2021, leading the franchise to its first Super Bowl victory during the 2009 season. Payton was a quarterback at Naperville Central High School and Eastern Illinois University and played professionally in 1987 with the Chicago Bears and 1988 overseas in Britain for the Leicester Panthers.


title: Sean Payton

text: He began his coaching career as offensive assistant for San Diego State University and had several assistant coaching positions on college and NFL teams before being named as the tenth full-time coach in Saints history in 2006. Payton has always been known for his offensive prowess, having scored more points (2,804) and gained more yards (40,158) than any other team in a coach's first 100 games in NFL history. Payton had the second-longest NFL single-team tenure among active head coaches, behind New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick, who has coached the Patriots since the 2000 season.


title: Sean Payton

text: Under Payton's leadership, the Saints made the 2006 NFL playoffs after a 3–13 season in 2005 and advanced to their first NFC Championship appearance in franchise history. Because of this effort, Payton won the AP NFL Coach of the Year Award. Following the 2009 season, the Saints won their first Super Bowl championship in franchise history. In 16 seasons with the Saints as head coach, Payton helped guide the team to three NFC Championship games (2006, 2009, and 2018), a victory in Super Bowl XLIV, and nine total playoff berths with seven division titles, making him the most successful coach in Saints franchise history.


title: Sean Payton

text: In April 2012, Payton was suspended for the entire 2012 NFL season as a result of his involvement in the New Orleans Saints bounty scandal, under which "bounties" were allegedly paid for contact that would try to injure players on opposing teams. Payton filed an appeal, but was denied, with him remaining suspended until being reinstated in January 2013.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton was born in San Mateo, California, and raised in Naperville, Illinois, by parents Thomas and Jeanne Payton. Payton's parents were originally from Scranton, Pennsylvania; Thomas worked in the insurance industry. Sean Payton lived in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania, during his grade school and middle school years (1970–1978). Sean attended Naperville Central High School in Naperville, Illinois, starting as quarterback his senior year before graduating in 1982. Winning a football scholarship, Payton had a successful career playing quarterback at Eastern Illinois University, leading the Panthers to an 11–2 record and the quarter-finals of the Division I-AA Playoffs in 1986; while at EIU, he became a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity with his close friend, Rick Henghold. Under coach Al Molde, Payton's Eastern Illinois teams were known as "Eastern Airlines" due to their prolific passing attack that frequently topped 300 yards per game (and had 509 passing yards in one game, still a school record).


title: Sean Payton

text: Although he was not drafted in the 1987 NFL Draft, Payton tried out for the Kansas City Chiefs for one day. In 1987, he played quarterback for the Chicago Bruisers and Pittsburgh Gladiators during the inaugural season of the Arena Football League, before his rights were sold for $1,000.00 to the Ottawa Rough Riders of the Canadian Football League. He was also a member of the Chicago Bears squad of strikebreaking replacement players, known as the "Spare Bears", during the 1987 NFL players strike. In 3 games he completed 8 of 23 passes (34.8%), for 79 yards, no TDs, and 1 INT, a passer rating of 27.3. He was also sacked 7 times for 47 yards and had one rush attempt for 28 yards. His one interception came against the New Orleans Saints, the team he would later go on to coach to a Super Bowl victory.


title: Sean Payton

text: In 1988, he played for the Leicester Panthers of the professional UK Budweiser National League. Payton landed the starting quarterback role for the Panthers. Payton led the Panthers to a touchdown on their first possession. That same season saw the Panthers go to the Quarterfinals of the British League, eventually losing to the London Olympians. After Payton returned to the US to take up a coaching position.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton began his coaching career in 1988 as an offensive assistant at San Diego State University. He made a series of assistant coaching positions at Indiana State University, Miami University (offensive coordinator), Illinois, and again at San Diego State (running backs coach), before landing a job as the quarterbacks coach with the Philadelphia Eagles in 1997.


title: Sean Payton

text: As OC at Miami University, he helped RB Deland McCullough run for over 1,100 yards. In 1995, the team scored the most points in a season (326) since 1986 and finished 8–2–1. RB Deland McCullough ran for over 1,600 yards with 14 TD and QB Sam Ricketts also threw 14 TD.


title: Sean Payton

text: At the University of Illinois in 1996, he coached QB Scott Weaver, who completed 56% of his passes for over 1,700 yards and 7 TD.


title: Sean Payton

text: From 1997 to 1998, Payton was quarterbacks coach for the Philadelphia Eagles and worked with offensive coordinator Jon Gruden and offensive line coach Bill Callahan. In 1998, Gruden and Callahan left for the Oakland Raiders, and Eagles head coach Ray Rhodes and Payton were fired. The Eagles' quarterbacks passed for 4,009 yards in 1997. Payton would not be retained by new head coach Andy Reid.


title: Sean Payton

text: In 1999, Payton was hired as the quarterbacks coach for the New York Giants and was promoted to the role of offensive coordinator in 2000. Under his guidance, the Giants would go on to represent the NFC in Super Bowl XXXV. During this time, he was known to lock himself in the stadium and sleep on the couches while studying plays during off-days.


title: Sean Payton

text: At around 6:45 a.m. on September 11, 2001, the New York Giants' flight from Denver, where the Giants played the Denver Broncos for the first "Monday Night Football" game of 2001, landed at the gate of Newark Liberty International Airport next to United Airlines Flight 93, the flight that was hijacked and eventually crashed in rural Pennsylvania. Payton recalls this moment in his autobiography "Home Team: Coaching the Saints and New Orleans Back to Life". During the 2002 season, after several poor showings by the Giants' offense, Payton's role in play-calling was taken over by then head coach Jim Fassel. Under Fassel the offense improved and propelled the team to a wild-card playoff berth.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton joined Bill Parcells and the Cowboys as an assistant head coach and a quarterbacks coach in 2003. He guided three different quarterbacks (Quincy Carter, Vinny Testaverde, and Drew Bledsoe) to 3,000-yard passing seasons, while contributing to improve the passing offense from a 31st rank to 15th in the league. He also has been attributed as the primary factor for the team signing undrafted free agent Tony Romo in 2003.


title: Sean Payton

text: In 2004, he became a sought-after assistant in the league, so the Cowboys gave him a pay raise to remain as their assistant head coach and quarterbacks coach. In 2005, he was promoted by Parcells to assistant head coach/passing game coordinator.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton began his first head coaching assignment in 2006, with the New Orleans Saints. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, during the 2005 season the Saints had finished with a 3–13 record, ranking as the second worst team in the league. However, Payton turned the struggling team around, and, with newly acquired free agent quarterback Drew Brees, led them to their first playoff appearance in six years. The team had one of the league's most productive offenses, ranking first in passing, and fifth in points scored. The Saints won the NFC South with a 10–6 record, earned a first-round playoff bye and notched only the second playoff win in franchise history, giving them a berth in the against the top-seeded Chicago Bears. The Saints out-gained the Bears in total yards on offense, but lost the game by the lopsided score of 39–14. Receiving 44 out of 50 votes from a panel of sports journalists and broadcasters, Payton won the AP NFL Coach of the Year Award in January 2007.


title: Sean Payton

text: In the 2007 season, the Saints tried to improve upon their 10–6 record from the previous season. They and the Pittsburgh Steelers opened the NFL preseason, playing the Hall of Fame Game on August 5, 2007. The Saints were 3–2 in the pre-season. The Saints also had the honor of opening the season against the defending champion Indianapolis Colts. The Saints finished the 2007 season 7–9.


title: Sean Payton

text: In 2009, Payton coached the Saints to their most successful season, with a 13–3 mark. They won their playoff games and went to the Super Bowl, in which Tracy Porter intercepted Peyton Manning during the fourth quarter and returned the pick for a touchdown, securing a 31–17 victory over the Indianapolis Colts in Super Bowl XLIV, the team's first Super Bowl win.


title: Sean Payton

text: In June 2010, Payton published a book (written with journalist Ellis Henican) entitled "Home Team: Coaching the Saints and New Orleans Back to Life". The book opened at number 8 on the non-fiction bestseller list of "The New York Times". Payton described the concept of "Home Team": "I didn't want to write another winning-on-the-field book or about modern-day leadership...I wanted to write a book about the stories, ones that you sit around and tell your friends."


title: Sean Payton

text: On October 16, 2011, while coaching against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Payton broke his tibia and tore his MCL in a collision with tight end Jimmy Graham's helmet after Graham was tackled on the sideline. Unable to stand on the sidelines, Payton coached from the booth during rehabilitation. In a memorable moment the week after, Payton was spotted eating a hot dog in a relaxed state while the Saints blew out the Indianapolis Colts 62–7.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton agreed to a new multi-year contract extension as head coach of the Saints, beginning in 2013. On January 6, 2016, he announced that he would stay with the Saints despite interest from other teams that had led to speculation that he would be traded.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton agreed to a new five-year contract extension as head coach of the Saints on March 23, 2016. On Christmas Eve 2016, Payton notched his 94th victory as Saints head coach, passing Jim E. Mora as the winningest coach in franchise history.


title: Sean Payton

text: The 2017 season saw the Saints achieve their first winning season since 2013, with an 11–5 record. In the , New Orleans defeated the division rival Carolina Panthers 31–26 to advance to the against the second-seeded Minnesota Vikings. Against the Vikings, after falling behind 17–0, the Saints were able to regain a 24–23 lead in the final minute of the fourth quarter. But on the last play of the game, Vikings quarterback Case Keenum threw a 27-yard pass to wide receiver Stefon Diggs, who evaded Saints safety Marcus Williams and ran to the end zone to complete a 61-yard touchdown pass as time expired to win the game for Minnesota, 29–24. This game was the first in NFL playoff history to end in a touchdown as time expired. The play would later be known as the Minneapolis Miracle.


title: Sean Payton

text: In the 2018 season, the Saints attained the top-seed in the NFC after finishing with a 13–3 record. Upon eliminating the defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles 20–14 in the , the team advanced to the NFC Championship Game against the Los Angeles Rams for the right to represent the conference in Super Bowl LIII. The game was marred with controversy after the referees missed a pass interference call of Rams cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman's hit on Saints wide receiver Tommylee Lewis on 3rd-and-10 with 1:45 remaining in the fourth quarter. The Saints went on to lose 26–23 in overtime. Some fans, players, and analysts believe the missed call is among the worst in NFL history. The NFL admitted to missing the call soon after the game was over, but did not apologize for the situation until a week and a half later. They also did not overturn the result of the game. The fallout from the missed call was a factor in the NFL's decision to expand instant replay, making pass interference (including non-calls) reviewable. However, that ability to change PI calls did not last past the 2019 season.


title: Sean Payton

text: On September 15, 2019, the Saints and Payton agreed to a five-year contract extension. The Saints once again finished 13–3 in 2019. However, they were upset in the by the Minnesota Vikings in overtime 26–20, a third consecutive disappointing playoff finish for the Saints.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton was fined by the NFL for not properly wearing a face mask, as required for coaches during the COVID-19 pandemic, during a week 2 game in the 2020 NFL season on September 22, 2020.


title: Sean Payton

text: Following the 2021 NFL season and a year after his long-time quarterback, Drew Brees, retired from the NFL, Payton announced he would be stepping down as head coach after 16 years. Payton finished his tenure in New Orleans with an overall record of 161–97 and as the winningest coach in franchise history. On February 28, 2022, it was revealed that the Miami Dolphins had requested permission from the Saints to interview Payton for their vacant head coaching spot, but were reportedly denied permission and had scrapped the idea after their former head coach, Brian Flores, filed a lawsuit against the NFL over racial discrimination in hiring practices early that month. The Dolphins were considering pairing Payton with quarterback Tom Brady, who had briefly retired from the NFL from February 1, 2022 until March 13, 2022. On June 13, 2022, it was reported that the Dolphins offered Payton a five-year deal worth $100 million, a deal that would have made him the highest paid coach in NFL history, and would have been only the second $100 million deal signed by a head coach, after Jon Gruden's 10-year, $100 million contract to return to the Oakland Raiders in 2018. Six months after the pursuit was first reported, on August 2, 2022, the Dolphins and team owner Stephen M. Ross were fined $1.5 million and forfeited a 2023 first-round draft pick along with a 2024 third-round pick due to impermissible communication with both Payton and Tom Brady, who both share the same agent, Don Yee, between the 2019 and 2021 seasons. Ross also received a six-game suspension as a result and Dolphins vice chairman/limited partner Bruce Beal was fined $500,000 and received a year-long suspension for the 2022 season.


title: Sean Payton

text: On March 2, 2012, the NFL concluded after a thorough investigation that from 2009 to 2011, the Saints implemented a bounty program that rewarded players for deliberately attempting to knock opposing players out of games. The slush fund was determined to be administered by defensive coordinator Gregg Williams, who joined the team in 2009. An extensive league investigation found that Payton was implicated in the Bounty Scandal. The league determined Payton went as far as to orchestrate a cover-up when the league first investigated it in the 2009–10 offseason. When informed that the league was investigating reports of a bounty program, Payton met with Williams and assistant head coach Joe Vitt and told them, "Let's make sure our ducks are in a row."


title: Sean Payton

text: According to a league memo, the NFL reopened its investigation late in the 2011 season. Just before the Saints' playoff game against the Detroit Lions, league officials alerted Saints owner Tom Benson that they had found irrefutable evidence of the Saints' bounty program. When general manager Mickey Loomis informed Payton that the league had reopened its investigation, Payton failed to shut the alleged program down.


title: Sean Payton

text: On March 22, 2012, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell suspended Payton for the entire 2012 season, effective April 1. Payton became the first head coach in modern NFL history to be suspended for any reason. Goodell was particularly upset that Payton and other Saints officials had lied to him about the scheme. For instance, during its investigation, the league uncovered an email that Michael Ornstein, the agent for former Saints running back Reggie Bush, had sent to Payton. In reality, the Ornstein email wasn't directly sent to Payton, instead it came to team spokesman Greg Bensel, who then forwarded it to the coaching staff with this message: "email from Orny (he asked that I send it) the dude is in prison so I told him I would." The email stated "put me down for $15,000 on "Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers". "It's a running joke going for three years," Ornstein said. "Ornstein's email is just another example of the speciousness of the quote-unquote evidence that Commissioner (Roger) Goodell claims to have to support his erroneous accusations against Jonathan and the other players," lawyer Peter Ginsberg said. "As more of the evidence is revealed in the media, it is becoming more and more apparent how irresponsible the NFL's actions have been." When confronted with the email, Payton initially claimed he never read it, but subsequently admitted that he had. In an interview with ESPN's Adam Schefter, Goodell implied that Payton would have faced significant punishment even if he'd been more forthcoming. In Goodell's view, Payton's contractual obligation to supervise his assistants meant that, at the very least, he should have known about the scheme and shut it down immediately. In the league's announcement of sanctions against the Saints, Payton was faulted for violating a provision of the league constitution that requires coaches to inform their owners about team operations, as well as to "avoid actions that undermine or damage the club's reputation or operating success."


title: Sean Payton

text: On March 30, 2012, Payton lodged a formal appeal of his suspension. Goodell held an expedited hearing on the matter and was expected to render a decision in "days, not weeks," according to ESPN's Schefter. Payton also used the hearing as a chance to get clarification on the terms of his ban. Goodell turned the appeal down on April 9, meaning that Payton's suspension was set to begin on April 16. He was to remain suspended until the end of Super Bowl XLVII, which was held in New Orleans. According to ESPN's Chris Mortensen, Payton was to forfeit $7.8 million of his $8.1 million salary. He was barred from even casual contact with anyone in the NFL; any such contact would have to be reported to NFL executive Ray Anderson.


title: Sean Payton

text: Soon after the suspension was announced, Payton began discussions with his mentor, Parcells, about serving as interim coach for the 2012 season.


title: Sean Payton

text: In September 2011, the Saints and Payton agreed to extend Payton's contract through 2015. However, on November 4, 2012, the NFL revealed that it had disallowed the extension because it contained a clause the NFL deemed to violate its rules, which would have allowed Payton to leave if Saints general manager Mickey Loomis were not with the team. The NFL's action left Payton's contract status in doubt beyond the 2012 season, although Payton said that he intended to return to the Saints.


title: Sean Payton

text: During his 2012 suspension from the NFL, Payton served as the offensive coordinator for his son Connor's sixth-grade team in Argyle, Texas. Payton used a simplified version of the Saints playbook, and the team went unbeaten until they suffered a loss near the end of the regular season to a team that ran the single-wing, which his team was unable to stop. Since he believed he would face that team again in the league's playoffs, he obtained video that the father of one of his players had recorded, and then contacted his mentor Bill Parcells to help him break down the opponent's offense. The teams indeed faced one another in the league finals; Payton's team lost a considerably closer game in which they were able to slow down the opposing offense.


title: Sean Payton

text: After stepping down as head coach of the Saints, Payton joined Fox to work in studio throughout 2022, becoming a part of the Fox NFL Sunday panel as a fill-in for Jimmy Johnson's off days. Payton was also in talks to join Amazon's NFL coverage before accepting the role.


title: Sean Payton

text: Payton met Beth Shuey, an Indiana State University graduate, while coaching there. The couple have two children, daughter Meghan (born 1997) and son Connor (born 2000). Payton is Irish Catholic. Payton and his family moved to a home in Mandeville, Louisiana when he became the Saints' head coach. The home, like many built on the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina, later turned out to be constructed with defective Chinese drywall, and Payton eventually became a named plaintiff in a widely reported class action lawsuit against the manufacturer, Knauf Plasterboard Tianjin Co. Ltd.


title: Sean Payton

text: In the wake of the issues with their home in Mandeville, the Paytons decided to move the family back to the Dallas area in 2011, when they purchased a home in the Vacquero Club, an upscale golf community in Westlake that is home to several PGA Tour professionals, as well as the Jonas Brothers and Josh Hamilton. Rumors swirled over the 2011 Super Bowl weekend that the move would coincide with Payton returning to the Cowboys as the General Manager or in some other executive capacity, but these turned out to be groundless. At the time, he maintained a residence in the New Orleans area during the season, while his family resided full-time in Westlake, a 90-minute trip via a privately chartered flight.


title: Sean Payton

text: In 2014, after his suspension and the finalization of his divorce, he moved from the New Orleans suburbs where he had kept his in-season home to Uptown New Orleans, buying a condo in that neighborhood, and now lives there year-round. Shortly before the 2015 season, which coincided with the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, he hosted a dinner for the four coaches and four players who had continuously been with the Saints since he became head coach, and presented each of them with a Rolex watch.


title: Sean Payton

text: In January 2018 New Orleans musician Shamarr Allen dedicated a song to Payton entitled "Hit the Sean Payton" which he composed after watching an Instagram live video of Payton dancing in celebration with the Saints players after defeating the Carolina Panthers for the third time that season. Saints running back Alvin Kamara had recorded the locker room celebrations for his Instagram live feed and the video went viral on social media.


title: Sean Payton

text: On November 10, 2019, at the end of the Saints vs. Falcons games, it was announced that Payton had gotten engaged two days prior on November 8 to his girlfriend, Skylene Montgomery. They married in a private ceremony on June 18, 2021 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. The wedding was officiated by former NBA player and coach Avery Johnson.


title: Sean Payton

text: On March 19, 2020, it was reported that Payton had tested positive for COVID-19. Payton became the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in the NFL.


title: 8chan

text: 8kun, previously called 8chan, Infinitechan or Infinitychan (stylized as ∞chan), is an imageboard website composed of user-created message boards. An owner moderates each board, with minimal interaction from site administration. The site has been linked to white supremacism, neo-Nazism, the alt-right, racism and antisemitism, hate crimes, and multiple mass shootings. The site has been known to host child pornography; as a result, it was filtered out from Google Search in 2015. Several of the site's boards played an active role in the Gamergate harassment campaign, encouraging Gamergate affiliates to frequent 8chan after 4chan banned the topic. 8chan is the home of the discredited QAnon conspiracy theory.


title: 8chan

text: Shortly before the 2019 El Paso shooting, a four-page message justifying the attack was posted to the site, and police have stated that they are "reasonably confident" it was posted by the perpetrator. In the aftermath of the back-to-back mass shootings on August 3 in El Paso and August 4 in Dayton, Ohio, respectively, the site was taken off clearnet on August 5, 2019, when network infrastructure provider Cloudflare stopped providing their content delivery network (CDN) service. Voxility, a web services company that had been renting servers to Epik, the site's new domain registrar, as well as Epik's CDN provider subsidiary BitMitigate, also terminated service. After several attempts to return to clearnet were ultimately stymied by providers denying service to 8chan, the site returned to the clearnet as "8kun" in November 2019 through a Russian hosting provider.


title: 8chan

text: 8chan was created in October 2013 by computer programmer Fredrick Brennan. Brennan created the website after observing what he perceived to be rapidly escalating surveillance and a loss of free speech on the Internet. Brennan, who considered the imageboard 4chan to have grown into authoritarianism, described 8chan as a "free-speech-friendly" alternative, and originally conceptualized the site while experiencing a psychedelic mushrooms trip.


title: 8chan

text: No experience or programming knowledge is necessary for users to create their own boards. Since as early as March 2014, its FAQ has stated only one rule that is to be globally enforced: "Do not post, request, or link to any content illegal in the United States of America. Do not create boards with the sole purpose of posting or spreading such content." Brennan claimed that, while he found some of the content posted by users to be "reprehensible", he felt personally obligated to uphold the site's integrity by tolerating discussion he did not necessarily support regardless of his moral stance.


title: 8chan

text: Brennan agreed to partner 8chan with the Japanese message board 2channel, and subsequently relocated to the Philippines in October 2014.


title: 8chan

text: In January 2015, the site changed its domain after multiple people filed reports complaining to 8chan's registrar that the message board hosted child pornography. Despite subsequently regaining the original domain, the site remained at the new domain with the old domain redirecting to it.


title: 8chan

text: Numerous bugs in the Infinity software led to the funding and development of a successor platform dubbed "Infinity Next". After a several-month-long testing period, a migration to the new software was attempted in December 2015, but failed. In January 2016, development was halted, and the main developer, Joshua Moon, was fired by Brennan. Brennan himself officially resigned in July 2016, turning the site over to its owner, Jim Watkins and his son, Ron Watkins. He cited the failure of the "Infinity Next" project and disillusionment with what 8chan had become as reasons.


title: 8chan

text: Following the three shootings in 2019 (Christchurch, New Zealand, in March; Poway, California, in April; El Paso, Texas, in August) in which the perpetrators of each used 8chan as a platform to spread their manifesto, there was increased pressure on those providing 8chan's Internet services to terminate their support.


title: 8chan

text: Matthew Prince, CEO of Cloudflare, initially defended his firm's technological support of 8chan on August 3, 2019, the day of the El Paso shooting: "What happened in El Paso today is abhorrent in every possible way, and it's ugly, and I hate that there's any association between us and that ... For us the question is which is the worse evil?"


title: 8chan

text: However, by the next day, August 4, with increasing press attention, Cloudflare changed its position, and rescinded its support for 8chan effective midnight August 5 Pacific Time, potentially leaving the site open for denial of service attacks. Prince stated: "Unfortunately the action we take today won't fix hate online ... It will almost certainly not even remove 8chan from the Internet. But it is the right thing to do." The Cloudflare Blog wrote:


title: 8chan

text: Brennan, the creator of 8chan who ceased being the owner in 2015 and ceased working for the website in 2018, stated on August 4, 2019, that 8chan should be shut down, and subsequently thanked Cloudflare for its decision to pull support for 8chan.


title: 8chan

text: Tucows also terminated its support as 8chan's domain name registrar, making the site difficult to access. In the wake of Cloudflare and Tucows' changes, 8chan switched its domain register to BitMitigate, a division of Epik, a provider that had previously serviced far-right sites like Gab and "The Daily Stormer". After 8chan moved to Epik, the company's CEO Rob Monster wrote: "Freedom of speech and expression are fundamental rights in a free society. We enter into a slippery slope when we start to limit speech that makes us uncomfortable." However, Voxility, the company that provided BitMitigate and Epik with its own servers and Internet connectivity, then took steps to stop leasing servers to BitMitigate, taking that site offline, and stated that the intended use of their servers violated their acceptable use policy. Monster changed his decision to provide content hosting to 8chan soon after the company's removal from Voxility, citing concerns that 8chan did not have the ability to adequately moderate content. However, "Ars Technica" noted that the company had begun providing 8chan with DNS services.


title: 8chan

text: Although the website was unreachable through its usual domain on the clearnet, users continued to access the site through its IP address and via its .onion address on the Tor hidden services darknet. Security researcher and terrorism analyst Rita Katz noted that a site claiming to be 8chan had also appeared on ZeroNet, another darkweb network, although an 8chan administrator tweeted that their team was not the one running the site.


title: 8chan

text: On August 6, 2019, the United States House Committee on Homeland Security called 8chan's owner, Jim Watkins, an American living in the Philippines, to testify about the website's efforts to tackle "the proliferation of extremist content, including white supremacist content". On August 11, 2019, Watkins uploaded a YouTube video saying that 8chan had been offline "voluntarily", and that it would go back online after he spoke with the Homeland Security Committee. In early September, Watkins traveled to Washington, D.C. for congressional questioning. In an interview with "The Washington Post", Watkins said that 8chan staff were building protections against cyberattacks to replace Cloudflare's services, and that the website could come back online as early as mid-September.


title: 8chan

text: On October 7, 2019, 8chan's official Twitter account and Jim Watkins' YouTube channel released a video that unveiled a new "8kun" logo. In it, a snake (which resembles that of the Gadsden flag) forms a shape of number 8 on top of the logo. The "8chan" name was based on the '-chan' suffix (shortened from 'channel') used by the imageboards that employ the 2channel-like format, but it was suggested that the new name is a wordplay based on Japanese honorifics; in that case, '-chan' can be interpreted as the one generally used for young children, especially females, while '-kun' suffix is used for younger males in general, or sometimes subordinates in the workplace. On October 9, 2019, 8chan's official Twitter account posted a notification that instructed board owners who wish to migrate to 8kun to send their "shared secrets" (a tool that enables board owner to recover an 8chan board) to an email address at 8kun.net.


title: 8chan

text: Brennan has vocally opposed 8chan's relaunch as 8kun, claiming the effort will not change the reputation previously associated with 8chan, and also citing his troubled relationship with 8chan administrators. Brennan has also suggested that the success of 8kun will depend on the return of "Q" and its followers. The new 8kun domain was registered with Tucows on September 7, 2019, but a spokesperson from Tucows stated that the company was unaware of the situation until the news about 8kun broke out, and that it was looking into the matter. 8kun was set to launch by October 17, 2019, however the attempt failed as British server provider Zare discontinued support. A spokesperson for Zare claimed in a statement to "Vice" that the team behind 8kun may have provided false details while registering themselves. On October 22, Watkins packed 8chan's servers into a van and transported them to an unknown location. This was later revealed to be in preparation for a move to the network VanwaTech, owned by Nicholas Lim, the founder of BitMitigate. On November 5, 8chan came briefly back online as 8kun by using a bogon IP through Media Land LLC. Media Land LLC is owned by the Russian Alexander "Yalishanda" Volosovyk, who has been described as the "world's biggest 'bulletproof' hosting operator" and is known for enabling cybercriminal activity. 8kun's trouble getting back online continued in the subsequent weeks, with Ron Watkins telling "The Wall Street Journal" "8chan is on indefinite hiatus" on November 16. 8kun moved to a .top domain on November 16, after the Tucows domain registrar stopped providing services earlier in the month. CNServers, which indirectly provided DDoS protection to VanwaTech via Spartan Host, cut ties in October 2020, taking 8kun briefly offline as a result. VanwaTech subsequently moved to DDoS-Guard, a Russian-owned service provider registered in Scotland.


title: 8chan

text: 8kun, which is one of the primary platforms used by followers of QAnon and those on the far-right, was used by rioters to plan the January 6, 2021 storming of the United States Capitol. Some posts on the message board discussed which politicians the posters would kill once they entered the building, and some suggested killing police, security guards, and federal employees.


title: 8chan

text: After receiving questions from "The Guardian" following the attack, the cyberattack protection company DDoS-Guard terminated its service to 8kun's hosting provider, VanwaTech. Speaking to "The Guardian", one of DDoS-Guard's owners explained that the company had been providing their services to VanwaTech, not to 8kun directly, but that they "were not related to any political issues and don't want to be associated in any sense with customers hosting such toxic sites like QAnon/8chan". Cyberattack protection services were restored to 8kun when VanwaTech began using the American company FiberHub.


title: 8chan

text: On August 27, 2021, the U.S. House of Representatives select committee investigating the storming of the Capitol demanded records from 8kun (alongside 14 other social media companies) going back to the spring of 2020.


title: 8chan

text: Numerous controversies related to content posted on 8chan have arisen, to the extent that participation by individuals or companies in the website can itself cause controversy. On February 25, 2019, THQ Nordic hosted an AMA (ask me anything) thread on the video games board of the website, /v/, for which it later apologized.


title: 8chan

text: On September 18, 2014, 8chan became entangled in the Gamergate harassment campaign after 4chan banned discussion of Gamergate, whereupon 8chan became one of several hubs for Gamergate activity. The site was little-known prior to the controversy. 8chan's initial Gamergate-oriented board also gained attention after being compromised by members of the internet troll group Gay Nigger Association of America, forcing Gamergate activists to migrate to "/gamergate/". This replacement quickly became the site's second-most accessed board.


title: 8chan

text: In January 2015, the site was used as a base for swatting exploits in Portland, Seattle, and Burnaby, British Columbia, most of them tied to the victims' criticism of Gamergate and 8chan's association with it; the attacks were coordinated on a board on the website called "/baphomet/". One of the victims of a swatting attack said that she was singled out because she had followed someone on Twitter. On February 9, 2015, content on the "/baphomet/" subboard was wiped after personal information of Katherine Forrest, the presiding judge in the Silk Road case, had been posted there.


title: 8chan

text: In 2019, a post threatening a mass shooting against Bethel Park High School was posted on 8chan; as a result, an 18-year-old individual was arrested and charged with one count of terroristic threats and one count of retaliation against a witness or victim.


title: 8chan

text: Boards have been created to discuss topics such as child rape. While the sharing of illegal content is against site rules, "The Daily Dot" wrote that boards do exist to share sexualized images of minors in provocative poses, and that some users of those boards do post links to explicit child pornography hosted elsewhere. When asked whether such boards were an inevitable result of free speech, Brennan responded: "Unfortunately, yes. I don’t support the content on the boards you mentioned, but it is simply the cost of free speech and being the only active site to not impose more 'laws' than those that were passed in Washington, D.C."


title: 8chan

text: In August 2015, 8chan was blacklisted from Google Search for what Google described as content constituting "suspected child abuse content".


title: 8chan

text: In July 2016, U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump tweeted an image of Hillary Clinton with a background of money and a six-pointed star which resembled the Star of David, containing the message "Most corrupt candidate ever". The image had been posted to 8chan's /pol/ board as early as June 22, over a week before Trump's team tweeted it. A watermark on the image led to a Twitter account which had published many other overtly racist and antisemitic images.


title: 8chan

text: In October 2017, a 4chan user that referred to himself as "Q" started gaining attention by promoting conspiracy theories about the deep state. The next month, citing security concerns, Q moved to 8chan and only posted there from then on, eventually leading to an international movement. Sean Hannity has retweeted QAnon hashtags on his Twitter feed. On March 14, 2018, the initial group of Q followers on Reddit were banned over their promotion of the theory. They quickly regrouped into a new subreddit, which featured posts from Q and other anonymous posters on 8chan in a more reader-friendly format. The subreddit was banned for a second time on September 12, 2018. With a flood of new users on the board, Q asked one of the website's owners, Ron Watkins, to upgrade the website's servers in order to accommodate all of the board's website traffic on September 19, 2018.


title: 8chan

text: The movement has been linked with the Pizzagate conspiracy theory. The Q movement has also been linked to the hashtags #TheGreatAwakening and #WWG1WGA, which stands for "where we go one, we go all"; it's also sometimes linked with the phrase "Follow the White Rabbit".


title: 8chan

text: In September 2018, the Louisiana State Police were scrutinized for using a hoax list of personal information about supposed antifa activists originally posted on 8chan's politics board. The document, dubbed "full list of antifa.docx" by police officers, actually contained the names of several thousand people who signed online petitions against then-President Donald Trump. The State Police has refused to disclose the list, claiming it would "compromise" ongoing criminal investigations in which it expects arrests. A lawsuit against Louisiana State Police was filed on behalf of the record requester by Harvard lecturer and former public defender Thomas Frampton, alleging that the Police's refusal to release the list indicates that it actually believed the credibility of the hoax list and used it in investigations and litigations.


title: 8chan

text: The perpetrators of three mass shootings, all in 2019, each used 8chan to spread their manifesto. As a result, there was increased pressure on those providing 8chan's Internet services to terminate their support, which led to the services companies' withdrawal from providing CDN and domain registry, taking the website off the clearnet.


title: 8chan

text: Prior to attacks on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, on March 15, 2019, the perpetrator, Brenton Harrison Tarrant, posted links to what was ultimately a 17-minute Facebook Live video of the first attack on Al Noor Mosque and his white nationalist, neo-fascist manifesto "The Great Replacement" (named after the French far-right conspiracy theory of the same name by writer Renaud Camus) detailing his anti-Islamic and anti-immigration reasons for the attack. The shootings overall left 51 dead and 40 more injured. Some members of 8chan re-shared it and applauded the attacks.


title: 8chan

text: On March 20, 2019, Australian telecom companies Telstra, Optus, and Vodafone denied millions of Australians access to the websites 4chan, 8chan, Zero Hedge, and LiveLeak as a reaction to the Christchurch mosque shootings.


title: 8chan

text: New Zealand ISPs Spark, Vodafone, and 2degrees, with a near monopoly of the broadband and mobile market share in New Zealand, also followed suit in blocking 4chan, 8chan, Zero Hedge, and LiveLeak for a number of weeks following the shootings, blocking 8chan and other similar websites at a DNS level in an attempt to prevent the proliferation of widely accessible content that was classified as objectionable by the Chief Censor of New Zealand.


title: 8chan

text: John T. Earnest, the alleged perpetrator of a shooting at a synagogue in Poway, California, on April 27, 2019, and an earlier arson attack at a mosque in nearby Escondido on March 25, had posted links to his open letter and his attempted livestream on 8chan, which Earnest also named as a place of radicalization for him. According to 8chan's Twitter, the shooter's post was removed nine minutes after its creation.


title: 8chan

text: Patrick Crusius, the suspect in a mass shooting at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, on August 3, 2019, allegedly posted a four-page white nationalist manifesto "The Inconvenient Truth" on 8chan less than an hour before the shooting began. 8chan moderators quickly removed the original post, though users continued to circulate links to this manifesto.


title: Alan Arkin

text: Alan Wolf Arkin (born March 26, 1934) is an American actor, director and screenwriter known for his performances on stage and screen. Throughout his career spanning over six decades, he has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, a British Academy Film Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Tony Award.


title: Alan Arkin

text: Arkin started his career on the Broadway stage acting in "Enter Laughing" in 1963 for which he received the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play, and the comedic play "Luv" (1964). He is also was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play for "The Sunshine Boys" in 1973.


title: Alan Arkin

text: He gained stardom acting in "The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming" (1966), "Wait Until Dark" (1967), "The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter" (1968), "Popi" (1969), "Catch-22" (1970), "The In-Laws" (1979), "Edward Scissorhands" (1990), "Glengarry Glen Ross" (1992), "Grosse Point Blank" (1997), "Thirteen Conversations About One Thing" (2001), "Little Miss Sunshine" (2006), "Get Smart" (2008), and "Argo" (2012). For his performance in "Little Miss Sunshine", he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, and BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.


title: Alan Arkin

text: He is also known for his roles in television including his performances as Leon Felhendler in "Escape from Sobibor" (1987), and as Harry Rowen in "The Pentagon Papers" (2003) which he earned Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited or Series or Movie nominations. From 2015 to 2016 he voiced J.D. Salinger in the Netflix animated series "BoJack Horseman". From 2018 to 2019 he starred in the Netflix comedy series "The Kominsky Method", earning two consecutive Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series nomination.


title: Alan Arkin

text: Arkin was born in Brooklyn New York, on March 26, 1934, the son of David I. Arkin, a painter and writer and his wife, Beatrice (née Wortis), a teacher. He was raised in a Jewish family with "no emphasis on religion". His grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Ukraine, Russia, and Germany. His parents moved to Los Angeles when Alan was 11, but an 8-month Hollywood strike cost his father his job as a set designer. During the 1950s Red Scare, Arkin's parents were accused of being Communists, and his father was fired when he refused to answer questions about his political ideology. David Arkin challenged the dismissal, but he was vindicated only after his death.


title: Alan Arkin

text: Arkin, who had been taking acting lessons since age 10, became a scholarship student at various drama academies, including one run by the Stanislavsky student Benjamin Zemach, who taught Arkin a psychological approach to acting. Arkin attended Los Angeles State College from 1951 to 1953. He also attended Bennington College.


title: Alan Arkin

text: Arkin was an early member of the Second City comedy troupe in the 1960s. In 1957 he made his feature film acting debut in a small role the musical film "Calypso Heat Wave". In the early sixties he appeared in episodes of "East Side/West Side" (1964), and "ABC Stage 67" (1966). He also made his Broadway debut as a performer in "From the Second City" at the Royale Theatre in 1961.


title: Alan Arkin

text: He starred in 1963 on Broadway as David Kolowitz in Joseph Stein's comedic play "Enter Laughing." Critic Howard Taubman of "The New York Times" gave the play a mixed review but praised Arkin's performance, describing it as "a choice specimen of a shrewd actor ribbing his profession". For his performance he received the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play, and a Theatre World Award. The following year he returned to Broadway starring as Harry Berlin in "Luv" directed by Mike Nichols. Arkin starred opposite Eli Wallach and Anne Jackson.


title: Alan Arkin

text: Arkin is one of only six actors to receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for their first screen appearance (for "The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming" in 1966).


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1966 he starred in Norman Jewison's comedy film "The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming" opposite Carl Reiner, and Eva Marie Saint. Robert Alden of "The New York Times" praised Arkin's performance describing it as his, "first full-length film appearance and a particularly wonderful performance". For his performance Arkin received a Academy Award for Best Actor nomination and a BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer nomination. He also received the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy.


title: Alan Arkin

text: The following year he appeared in Vittorio De Sica sex comedy film "Woman Times Seven" starring Shirley MacLaine, and Terence Young's psychological thriller film "Wait Until Dark" starring Audrey Hepburn.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1968 he starred as Inspector Jacques Clouseau in the third installment of "The Pink Panther" franchise, titled "Inspector Clouseau," after Peter Sellers dissociated himself from the role. The film was not well received by Sellers' fans and critics but Penelope Gilliatt of "The New Yorker" called it "an incredibly bad film, but Alan Arkin is sometimes very funny in it, especially when he doesn't try to be." That same year he starred as a deaf mute in a small southern town during the depression era in "The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter" (1968). For his performance he received nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama. He also won the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actor. In 1969 he starred in Arthur Hiller's comedy "Popi" opposite Rita Moreno. The film focuses on a Puerto Rican widower struggling to raise his two young sons in the New York City neighborhood of Spanish Harlem. Arkin received another nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1969, Arkin's directorial debut was the Oscar-nominated 12-minute children's film titled "People Soup", starring his sons Adam Arkin and Matthew Arkin. Based on a story of the same name he published in "Galaxy Science Fiction" in 1958, "People Soup" is a fantasy about two boys who experiment with various kitchen ingredients until they concoct a magical soup which transforms them into different animals and objects.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1970 Arkin starred as Capt. John Yossarian in the Mike Nichols film "Catch-22,". The film is a satirical black comedy war film adapted from the 1961 novel of the same name by Joseph Heller. Arkin co-starred alongside Bob Balaban, Martin Balsam, Buck Henry, Bob Newhart, Austin Pendleton, Martin Sheen, Jon Voight and Orson Welles. Arkin received a Laurel Award nomination for his performance. Arkin and his second wife Barbara Dana appeared together on the 1970–1971 season of "Sesame Street" as a comical couple named Larry and Phyllis who resolve their conflicts when they remember how to pronounce the word "cooperate."


title: Alan Arkin

text: His most acclaimed directorial effort is "Little Murders", released in 1971. Written by cartoonist Jules Feiffer, it is a black comedy film starring Elliott Gould and Marcia Rodd about a girl, Patsy (Rodd), who brings home her boyfriend Alfred (Gould) to meet her dysfunctional family amid a series of random shootings, garbage strikes, and electrical outages ravaging the neighborhood. The film opened to a lukewarm review by Roger Greenspan, and a more positive one by Vincent Canby in "The New York Times". Roger Ebert's review in the "Chicago Sun-Times" was enthusiastic, stating "One of the reasons it works and is indeed a definitive reflection of America's darker moods is that it breaks audiences down into isolated individuals, vulnerable and uncertain." Arkin also directed "Fire Sale" (1977)


title: Alan Arkin

text: During the 1970s Arkin starred in films of various genres including the Vernon Zimmerman road comedy "Deadhead Miles" (1972), the Gene Saks adaptation of the Neil Simon play of the same name "Last of the Red Hot Lovers" (1972), the black comedy action film "Freebie and the Bean" (1974), the dramedy "Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins" (1975), the western comedy "Hearts of the West" (1975), and the British mystery "The Seven-Per-Cent Solution" (1976). In 1979 he starred and co-produced the buddy comedy film "The In-Laws". Arkin starred opposite Peter Falk in a film directed by Arthur Hiller written by Andrew Bergman. The film was a financial and critical success.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1975, Arkin directed the Broadway production of Neil Simon's "The Sunshine Boys". He received the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play nomination.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1980 Arkin starred in the Marshall Brickman comedy "Simon" which gained mixed reviews but earned him a Saturn Award nomination. The following year he starred in three comedy films, "Improper Channels", "Chu Chu and the Philly Flash" opposite Carol Burnett, and "Full Moon High". During the 1980s, Arkin appeared frequently in various television programs including "The Muppet Show" and "St. Elsewhere". Arkin later appeared in 1987 on the sitcom "Harry", which was canceled after four low-rated episodes. In 1985 Arkin starred in the television film "The Fourth Wise Man" starring Martin Sheen, and Eileen Brennan.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1987, he starred in another television film "Escape from Sobibor" portraying Leon Felhendler. The film revolves around the mass escape from the Nazi extermination camp at Sobibor. Arkin received nominations for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie and the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Series, Miniseries or Television Film.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1990, Arkin appeared in a supporting role in Tim Burton's fantasy romance "Edward Scissorhands" starring Johnny Depp and Winona Ryder. He also appeared in the live action Disney film "The Rocketeer" (1991) starring Bill Campbell and Jennifer Connelly, and the film adaptation of the David Mamet play "Glengarry Glen Ross" (1992) starring Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, and Kevin Spacey. In 1993, he appeared in the comedies "Indian Summer" and "So I Married an Axe Murderer". The following year Arkin starred in the Rob Reiner film "North".


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 1996 Arkin appeared in the film adaptation of the Kurt Vonnegut novel "Mother Night" starring Nick Nolte, Sheryl Lee, John Goodman, and Kirsten Dunst. The following year Arkin appeared in the comedy "Grosse Point Blank" starring John Cusack and Minnie Driver as well as the dystopian science fiction film "Gattaca" starring Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman. Arkin also Directed "Samuel Beckett Is Coming Soon" (1993), and "Arigo" (2000).


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 2001 he appeared in the comedy "America's Sweethearts" starring John Cusack, Julia Roberts, Billy Crystal, and Catherine Zeta-Jones. He also starred in the Jill Sprecher directed drama "Thirteen Conversations About One Thing" with Matthew McConaughey, John Turturro, and Clea DuVall. For his performance he received the Boston Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor. In 2003 he starred in the television film "The Pentagon Papers" starring James Spader and Paul Giamatti for which he received a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie nomination. That same year he starred in another television film "And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself" starring Antonio Banderas. In 2005 he appeared as Marty Adler in the NBC sitcom "Will & Grace" in the episode "It's a Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad World".


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 2006, Arkin appeared in a supporting role in the ensemble comedy-drama "Little Miss Sunshine" opposite Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Paul Dano, and Abigail Breslin. His role in the independent film "Little Miss Sunshine" as a foul-mouthed grandfather with a taste for snorting heroin won him the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role and the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.At 72 years old, Arkin was the sixth oldest winner of the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. On receiving his Academy Award on February 25, 2007, Arkin said:


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 2006–2007, Arkin was cast in supporting roles in "Rendition" as a U.S. Senator and "" as Bud Newman (Carol's Father). In 2008 he appeared in the comedy films "Sunshine Cleaning" with Emily Blunt and Amy Adams, "Get Smart" opposite Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway and "Marley & Me" starring Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston. The following year he appeared in Rebecca Miller's "The Private Lives of Pippa Lee" and Raymond De Felitta's "City Island" (both 2010).


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 2012 he appeared in a supporting role as a Hollywood agent Lester Siegel in Ben Affleck's drama "Argo" with Affleck, John Goodman, and Bryan Cranston. For his performance he received his fourth Academy Award nomination, his second for Best Supporting Actor losing to Christoph Waltz in "Django Unchained". He also received nominations for the Golden Globe Award, the BAFTA Award, and Screen Actors Guild Award. He did receive the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. That same year he appeared in the crime drama "Stand Up Guys" opposite Al Pacino and Christopher Walken. The following year he appeared in the comedy "The Incredible Burt Wonderstone" with Steve Carell, Steve Buscemi, Olivia Wilde and Jim Carrey and "Grudge Match" with Robert De Niro, Sylvester Stallone, and Kim Basinger. He continued to act in supporting roles in films such as the sports drama "Million Dollar Arm" (2014) with Jon Hamm, the Christmas comedy "Love the Coopers" (2015), the comedy "Going in Style" (2017) with Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine and Tim Burton's "Dumbo" (2019).


title: Alan Arkin

text: From 2015 to 2016 Arkin voiced J.D. Salinger in the Netflix animated series "BoJack Horseman". From 2018 to 2019 he starred opposite Michael Douglas in the Netflix series "The Kominsky Method" for which he received two Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series nominations, two Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Series, Miniseries or Television Film nominations and four Screen Actors Guild Award nominations.


title: Alan Arkin

text: Arkin is the author of many books, including "Tony's Hard Work Day" (illustrated by James Stevenson, 1972), "The Lemming Condition" (illustrated by Joan Sandin, 1976), "Halfway Through the Door: An Actor's Journey Toward Self" (1979), and "The Clearing" (1986 continuation of "Lemming"). He has released two memoirs: "An Improvised Life" (2011) and "Out of My Mind" (2018).


title: Alan Arkin

text: With two friends, he formed the folk group The Tarriers, in which Arkin sang and played guitar. The band members co-composed the group's 1956 hit "The Banana Boat Song", a reworking, with some new lyrics, of a traditional, Jamaican calypso folk song of the same name, combined with another titled "Hill and Gully Rider". It reached No. 4 on the "Billboard" magazine chart the same year as Harry Belafonte's better-known hit version. The group appeared in the 1957 Calypso-exploitation film "Calypso Heat Wave", singing "Banana Boat Song" and "Choucoune". Arkin was a member of The Tarriers when they recorded "Cindy, Oh Cindy" which went to the top of the charts.


title: Alan Arkin

text: From 1958 to 1968, Arkin performed and recorded with the children's folk group The Baby Sitters. He also performed the role of Dr. Pangloss in a concert staging of Leonard Bernstein's operetta "Candide", alongside Madeline Kahn's Cunegonde. In 1985, he sang two selections by Jones and Schmidt on Ben Bagley's album "Contemporary Broadway Revisited".


title: Alan Arkin

text: Arkin has been married three times, with two ending in divorce. He and Jeremy Yaffe (m. 1955–1961) have two sons: Adam Arkin, born August 19, 1956, and Matthew Arkin, born March 21, 1960. He was married to actress-screenwriter Barbara Dana from 1964 to 1994: she appeared with him in segments of "Sesame Street" in the 1970s. They lived in Chappaqua, New York. In 1967, they had a son, Anthony (Tony) Dana Arkin. In 1996, Arkin married psychotherapist Suzanne Newlander, whose surname he adopted for his character Norman Newlander in "The Kominsky Method". They live in Carlsbad, California.


title: Alan Arkin

text: In 2014, Arkin received the Gregory Peck Award for Cinematic Excellence to honor his life's work at the San Diego Film Festival.


title: George Weah

text: George Tawlon Manneh Oppong Ousman Weah (; born 1 October 1966) is a Liberian politician and former professional footballer who is the incumbent president of Liberia, in office since 2018. Prior to his election to the presidency, Weah served as Senator from Montserrado County. He played as a striker in his prolific 18-year professional football career, which ended in 2003. He is the first African former professional footballer to become a head of state.


title: George Weah

text: After beginning his career in his native Liberia, Weah spent 14 years playing for clubs in France, Italy and England. Arsène Wenger first brought him to Europe, signing him for Monaco in 1988. Weah moved to Paris Saint-Germain in 1992 where they won the Ligue 1 in 1994 and became the top scorer of the 1994–95 UEFA Champions League. He signed for AC Milan in 1995 where he spent four successful seasons, winning the Serie A twice. He moved to the Premier League towards the end of his career and had spells at Chelsea and Manchester City, winning the FA Cup at the former, before returning to France to play for Marseille in 2001. He ended his career with Al Jazira in 2003. "FourFourTwo" named Weah one of the best players never to win the UEFA Champions League.


title: George Weah

text: Weah represented Liberia at the international level, winning 75 caps and scoring 18 goals for his country and playing at the African Cup of Nations on two occasions. He also played an international friendly in 2018, where his number 14 jersey was retired. Regarded as one of the best players never to have played at the World Cup, Scott Murray in "The Guardian" refers to Weah as "hamstrung by hailing from a global minnow".


title: George Weah

text: Widely regarded as one of the greatest African players of all time, in 1995, Weah was named FIFA World Player of the Year and won the Ballon d'Or, becoming the first and only player to win these awards while representing an African country internationally. In 1989, 1994 and 1995, he was also named the African Footballer of the Year, and in 1996, he was named African Player of the Century. Known for his acceleration, speed, and dribbling ability, in addition to his goalscoring and finishing, Weah was described by FIFA as "the precursor of the multi-functional strikers of today". In 2004, he was named by Pelé in the FIFA 100 list of the world's greatest living players.


title: George Weah

text: Weah became involved in politics in Liberia following his retirement from football. He formed the Congress for Democratic Change and ran unsuccessfully for president in the 2005 election, losing to Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in the second round of voting. In the 2011 election, he ran unsuccessfully for vice president alongside Winston Tubman. Weah was subsequently elected to the Liberian Senate for Montserrado County in the 2014 elections. Weah was elected President of Liberia in the 2017 election, defeating the incumbent vice president Joseph Boakai and was sworn in on 22 January 2018.


title: George Weah

text: Weah was born and raised in the Clara Town district of Monrovia. He is a member of the Kru ethnic group, which hail from south-eastern Liberia's Grand Kru County, one of the poorest areas of the country. His father, William T. Weah Sr., was a mechanic while his mother, Anna Quayeweah (d. 2013), was a seller. He has three brothers, William, Moses and Wolo. He was one of thirteen children largely raised by his devoutly Christian paternal grandmother, Emma Klonjlaleh Brown after his parents separated when George was still a baby. He attended middle school at Muslim Congress and high school at Wells Hairston High School, and reportedly dropped out in his final year of studies. He began to play football for the Young Survivors youth club at the age of 15 and later moved to other local football clubs, assuming starring roles for Mighty Barrolle and Invicible Eleven. Before his football career allowed him to move abroad, Weah worked for the Liberia Telecommunications Corporation as a switchboard technician.


title: George Weah

text: After playing in the Liberian domestic league at the beginning of his successful career and winning several national honors (including the Liberian Premier League and the Liberian Cup), Weah's abilities were discovered by the Cameroon national team coach, Claude Le Roy, who relayed the news to Arsène Wenger. Weah moved to Europe in 1988, for just £12,000 from Cameroonian club Tonnerre Yaoundé, when he was signed by Wenger – the manager of Monaco at the time – who flew to Africa himself prior to the signing, and whom Weah credits as an important influence on his career. During his time with Monaco, Weah won the African Footballer of the Year for the first time in 1989; this was his first major award and he took it back home for the entire country to celebrate. Weah also won the Coupe de France in 1991, and he helped Monaco reach the final of the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1992, scoring four goals in nine cup appearances.


title: George Weah

text: Weah subsequently played for Paris Saint-Germain (1992–95), with whom he won the Coupe de France in 1993 and 1995, the French league in 1994, and the Coupe de la Ligue in 1995 during a highly prolific and successful period; he also became the top scorer of the 1994–95 UEFA Champions League, with seven goals, after reaching the semi-finals with the club, one of which was a skilful individual "wonder-goal" against Bayern Munich in the group stage, on 23 November 1994. During his time at the club, he also managed to reach the semi-finals of the 1992–93 UEFA Cup, and the semi-finals of the 1993–94 European Cup Winners' Cup; in total, he scored 16 goals in 25 European games. In 1994, he won the African Footballer of the Year Award for the second time in his career.


title: George Weah

text: Weah joined AC Milan in 1995, with whom he immediately won the Italian league in 1996 under Fabio Capello, playing alongside Roberto Baggio and Dejan Savićević in Milan's attack, as well as Marco Simone, on occasion, and finishing the season as Milan's top goalscorer; he won the Serie A title once again in 1999. During his time with the club, he also reached the 1998 Coppa Italia final, and finished as runner-up in the Supercoppa Italiana on two occasions, in 1996 and 1999. Despite their European dominance in the early 1990s, Milan were less successful in Europe during this time, however, with their best result being a quarter-final finish in the 1995–96 UEFA Cup.


title: George Weah

text: Exhibiting skill, athleticism and goalscoring prowess, Weah became famous at Milan for scoring several notable goals, in particular a solo goal against Hellas Verona at the San Siro which saw him deftly control the ball from Verona's corner kick just outside his own penalty area, before he set off. With all his teammates back defending the corner Weah made a beeline for goal, leaving his own teammates in his wake. His teammate Zvonimir Boban stated, "It was an incredible run. We were thinking, 'When's he going to stop? When's he going to stop? He's not going to stop! He's never going to stop!'". Weah finished by rifling the ball into the bottom left corner before an exuberant goal celebration.


title: George Weah

text: Due to his performances with both Paris Saint-Germain and Milan, in 1995 Weah was the recipient of several individual awards: he won the Ballon d'Or, the Onze d'Or, and was named FIFA World Player of the Year, becoming the first and, currently, only African player (by FIFA nationality) to win these awards, and second African-born player to do so after Eusébio. Weah dedicated his FIFA World Player of the Year victory to his former manager, Arsène Wenger, stating that it was thanks to him that he was able to develop into a world class player. That year, Weah also won the African Player of the Year Award for the third time in his career, and was named to the "Onze de Onze" by the French football magazine "Onze Mondial". In 1996, Weah finished second in the FIFA World Player of the Year ranking; he was also the recipient of the FIFA Fair Play Award, and was voted the African Player of the Century by sport journalists from around the world.


title: George Weah

text: Weah was banned from six European matches for breaking the nose of the Portuguese defender Jorge Costa on 20 November 1996 in the players' tunnel after Milan's draw at Porto in the Champions League. Weah said he exploded in frustration after putting up with racist tauntings from Costa during both of the teams' Champions League matches that autumn. Costa strenuously denied the accusations of racism and was not charged by UEFA as no witnesses could verify Weah's allegations, not even his Milan teammates. Weah later attempted to apologize to Costa but this was rebuffed by the Portuguese, who considered the charges of racist insults leveled against him to be defamatory and took Weah to court. The incident led to Costa undergoing facial surgery and he was subsequently sidelined for three weeks. Despite the incident, Weah still received the FIFA Fair Play Award in 1996.


title: George Weah

text: Weah signed for Premier League club Chelsea on loan from Milan on 11 January 2000, in a deal which would keep him with the West London club until the end of the 1999–2000 English season. Although past his prime, Weah's time in England was deemed a success, especially at Chelsea where he instantly endeared himself to their fans by scoring the winner against rivals Tottenham Hotspur on his debut, and scored further league goals against Wimbledon and Liverpool. He also scored twice in Chelsea's victorious 1999–2000 FA Cup netting crucial goals against Leicester City and Gillingham. This led to him starting in the final, which Chelsea won 1–0.


title: George Weah

text: Chelsea manager Gianluca Vialli did not make Weah's move permanent, and, on 1 August 2000, he officially left Milan, and signed for newly promoted Premier League side Manchester City on a free transfer on a two-year contract worth £30,000 a week, declining the offer of a £1 million pay-off from Milan owner Silvio Berlusconi. He played 11 games in all competitions for City, scoring four times, before leaving on 16 October 2000 after becoming dissatisfied with manager Joe Royle for selecting him as a substitute too frequently; he had only played the full 90 minutes in three of his 11 games for the Maine Road club. At City, he scored once in the league against Liverpool (as he did at Chelsea), and three times against Gillingham (again as he had at Chelsea), this time in the League Cup; once in the first leg and twice in the second.


title: George Weah

text: Following his time in England, Weah returned to France and had a spell at Marseille, where he remained until May 2001. He later played with Al-Jazira in the UAE Pro-League, where he remained until his retirement as a player in 2003, at age 37. He had planned on joining the New York/New Jersey MetroStars of Major League Soccer, but elected to join Al-Jazira on a temporary basis.


title: George Weah

text: Since making his debut for the Liberia national team against Sierra Leone in 1986, Weah played 75 games over 20 years, scoring 18 goals. Representing one of the smaller nations in world football and perennial underdogs, Weah did much to support the national squad: aside from being the team's star player, he also later coached the squad and even funded his national side to a large extent. Despite his efforts, he was unsuccessful in helping Liberia qualify for a single FIFA World Cup, falling just a point short in qualifying for the 2002 tournament. However, he did help Liberia to qualify for the African Cup of Nations on two occasions: Weah represented his country in the 1996 and 2002 editions of the tournament, although Liberia failed to make it out of their group both times, suffering first-round eliminations.


title: George Weah

text: Weah has been named by several media outlets as one of the best players to never play at the World Cup.


title: George Weah

text: Weah returned to the national team for a specially arranged friendly against Nigeria on 11 September 2018, his final international appearance, playing at the age of 51 while in office as the country's president. His number 14 shirt, worn at his playing peak, was retired after the friendly, with Weah receiving a standing ovation when he was substituted.


title: George Weah

text: During his prime in the 1990s, Weah was regarded as one of the best strikers in the world. He was lauded for his speed, work-rate, stamina, and attacking instincts, as well as his physical and athletic attributes, which he combined with his finishing, technical ability and creativity. A fast, powerful, physically strong player, with an eye for goal, many observers agree that he successfully filled the void left in the Milan attack by club great Marco van Basten. In addition to his pace, acceleration, dribbling skills, and goalscoring ability, as a multi-functional forward Weah was also a team player who was capable of creating chances and assisting goals for teammates.


title: George Weah

text: Along with Ronaldo and Romário, Weah was viewed as a modern, new style of striker in the 1990s who would also operate outside the penalty area and run with the ball towards goal, at a time when strikers primarily operated inside the penalty area where they would receive the ball from teammates. Among the next generation of strikers who were inspired, Thierry Henry states, "George Weah, Romário, and Ronaldo changed the game for me. It was the first time as a striker I saw players that could score on their own. Pick the ball up anywhere and score. Before as a number nine, people would say ‘stay within the line of the box, don’t move too much, don’t go to the wings, don’t drop, stay.’ Then I saw George Weah. And then I saw Ronaldo. And I saw Romário in a different way before those two. And it was like ‘hang on a minute, someone has lied to me’."


title: George Weah

text: One such goal that exemplified this ability was against Verona in 1995 where he received the ball in the edge of his own penalty box and ran the length of the field. Scoring such a goal in Serie A – the best defensive league in the world – saw media outlets such as "Gazzetta dello Sport" running pages of analysis for days afterwards, and calling it the greatest strike of all in Italian football. On his impact on the sport, Weah states, "When I look at my idols – Pelé, Maradona, Beckenbauer, Cruyff – they did a lot of great things. I came into the game and made history too."