Thursday night’s NBA Draft will mark a seminal moment for a company that’s providing prospects with new pathways to the league.

The draft begins at 8 p.m. ET on ESPN and Victor Wembanyama is expected to go first overall to the San Antonio Spurs.

Twin brothers Amen and Ausar Thompson are widely projected to be selected early in the evening after spending the last two years playing in the Overtime Elite league. They’ll be the first players drafted from the Atlanta-based developmental competition for 16-to-20-year-olds.

“It feels validating,” said Dan Porter, co-founder and CEO of the Overtime, which has raised $250 million and carved out its place alongside the NBA’s G League as more players look for alternatives to college basketball. 

“It’s exciting. It’s crazy,” he told Front Office Sports. “Six years ago, Overtime didn’t exist. Four years ago, Overtime was an Instagram account, and now … there are two guys who are potentially going to go top-10 in the NBA draft. It’s amazing.”

Porter is confident Overtime can continue building and attracting talent like the Thompsons. “We’re just really excited to plug into the ecosystem and to help people who want a different path and want to accelerate their development in basketball,” he said.

Beyond basketball, Porter pointed to the off-court teachings Overtime provides — “basketball, business, and brand” — highlighting the Thompsons’ growth on social media from virtually zero since arriving at Overtime. The twins now both boast Instagram followings of over 100,000.

“The best thing you can do is speak to the results,” Porter said of his strategy for the future.

The NBA is embracing a Final Four-type model for part of its 2024 All-Star Game showcase in Indianapolis, Indiana.

The league will hold its All-Star Saturday Night on Feb. 17 at Lucas Oil Stadium, home of the NFL’s Indianapolis Colts.

By moving the event from the Indiana Pacers’ Gainbridge Fieldhouse, attendance for All-Star Saturday Night will more than double from about 17,200 to around 35,000 — a shift similar to that of the NCAA, which now holds the Final Four in domed football stadiums.

All-Star Saturday Night features the Skills Challenge and the 3-Point and Dunk Contests, and the fan energy for those events often surpasses that of the NBA All-Star Game itself, something also reflected in sagging All-Star Game television ratings.

The basketball court will be set up at the south end of the stadium, while the north end will feature a stage for concerts and other performances.

“All-Star Saturday is one of the most exciting and entertaining nights in all of sports, and holding it at Lucas Oil Stadium, one of football’s most iconic venues which was also thoughtfully designed for basketball events, enables us to make it more accessible than ever,” said Rick Fuson, CEO of Pacers Sports & Entertainment.

Lucas Oil Stadium has hosted three Final Fours since its 2008 opening and will do so again in 2026 and 2029. The NBA will still hold the 2024 All-Star Game at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on Feb. 18.

The Cincinnati Reds won their 11th straight game on Wednesday, the team’s longest winning streak since 1957 — a run continuing a dramatic turnaround on and off the field that stands as one of MLB’s most remarkable stories this season.

The team — with a payroll of just $91.3 million that’s far less than the New York Mets’ league-high $344 million — has made the playoffs just once since 2014, and Reds ownership and management haven’t helped matters. 

The front office has frequently drawn local ire with comments such as club president Phil Castellini’s caustic taunt last year to unhappy fans, “Where are you gonna go?”

Reds attendance fell to 1.4 million last year, a 23% drop compared to pre-pandemic levels in 2019 and a new unrestricted low at Great American Ball Park.

Now, the club has surged to the NL Central division lead despite the fact that three of its four highest-paid players this year include the now-released Mike Moustakas and Wil Myers, as well as Hall of Famer Ken Griffey Jr. — who retired in 2010 but is still being paid $3.6 million this year due to salary deferrals more than two decades ago.

Fans have responded to the Reds’ youth movement. With average attendance up by more than 10% so far this season, club officials are projecting further lifts. “The response from this market, this Reds fan base … it has been overwhelming,” said Karen Forgus, Reds senior vice president of business operations, to WLWT-TV.

On another front, the Reds are among the MLB clubs next up regarding rights fee decisions from Diamond Sports Group, Bally Sports’ bankrupt parent.

A group of former MLB scouts has sued the league, commissioner Rob Manfred, and all 30 clubs, alleging age discrimination and claiming they were “blacklisted” in favor of younger, cheaper, and more analytically oriented personnel.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Colorado, alleges that MLB and the clubs violated the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act and similar age-discrimination laws in 12 states.

The action lists 17 plaintiffs aged 55 to 71, but the group is seeking to move the litigation forward as a class action in which “over 100 older scouts” would also join — which could push the potential liability in lost wages and damages beyond $100 million.

“When clubs are acting together to profile scouts by age and prevent us from being rehired, it’s very difficult for most to reinvent themselves when approaching the twilight of their professional careers,” said Rick Ragazzo, who scouted for the Braves, Giants, and Dodgers over a 35-year career.

The lawsuit marks another flashpoint in the analytics revolution that has transformed baseball over the past two decades, one in which scouts from the “Moneyball” era have been joined by statistical- and video-based methods of player evaluation.

Beyond the cultural shift, the complaint also describes a financial squeeze in which former scouts are often too young to claim Social Security or pensions, frequently don’t have health insurance, and (if still employed) often work with a fear of retaliation.

MLB said it “looks forward to refuting these claims in court.”