Voxcali

Yul Kwon made history as the first Asian American to win Survivor, then later used his voice to inspire the Asian community and extend his legacy far beyond reality TV. 

In 2006 Yul Kwon arrived on the beaches of the Cook Islands to compete on the 13th season of Survivor, while also representing the Asian American community on reality TV.

Kwon was born in Queens, New York in 1975 to South Korean immigrant parents. When Kwon was six, his family moved to Concord, California, where he excelled in academics. He graduated as valedictorian of his high school and went on to attend Stanford University to graduate with a degree in Symbolic Systems. Kwon then earned his Juris Doctor from Yale Law School and began building an impressive resume across law, business, and government.

He worked as a judicial clerk on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and served as a legislative aide to Senator Joseph Lieberman in Washington, D.C. Kwon later began management consulting at McKinsey & Company before joining Google’s business strategy team, which is where he currently serves as the VP of Paradigms of Intelligence.

Yul Kwon’s life completely changed in 2006 after joining CBS’s Survivor: Cook Islands. This season specifically brought forth major controversy because of the division of contestants into tribes based on ethnicity. While this decision was heavily criticized by viewers, Kwon used it as an opportunity to challenge stereotypes and provide positive Asian representation on national TV screens. During his time on the show, he was a fan favorite due to his strategic game play and leadership, ultimately becoming the very first Asian American winner of Survivor.

After Survivor, Kwon wanted to continue to serve as a voice for the Asian community and worked as a CNN special correspondent covering issues affecting Asian Americans. He later became the host of Link TV’s LinkAsia and then in 2020, Kwon returned to CBS to compete on Survivor: Winners at War along with nineteen other former Survivor winners.

Aside from national TV, Kwon has also launched campaigns that encourage Asian Americans to register as bone marrow donors after losing a close friend to leukemia. He has also raised awareness about diversity in media, the “bamboo ceiling” in corporate America and increasing Asian American representation in leadership positions.

Not only did Yul Kwon succeed on one of America’s biggest reality competition shows, he managed to remain authentically himself and helped expand what Asian American representation looks like in the new generation of reality TV.

Over 200 years ago, two conjoined twin brothers from Siam forever changed how people understood their condition.

Most people have heard the phrase “Siamese twins”, but did you know its origins come from a story of two conjoined brothers from Thailand?

Chang and Eng Bunker were born as conjoined twin brothers on May 11, 1811 to a Chinese family in Siam, which is now known as Thailand. They were joined at the chest by a band of tissue that connected to their livers and the brothers became famous during the 19th century, giving rise to the phrase “Siamese twins”. While the term is considered synonymous for conjoined twins all over the world, medical professionals stick with “conjoined twins” due to accuracy and respectfulness.

When Chang and Eng were first born, there was very little known information about conjoined twins and many people viewed them with fear and superstition, while doctors saw a rare opportunity to learn more. Even with all the public attention they received, Chang and Eng still grew up living ordinary lives in Siam, helping their family fish and raise ducks, until everything changed in 1829 when a Scottish merchant Robert Hunter learned about the twins and made an effort to capitalize.

Chang and Eng were only seventeen years old when they agreed to travel West with Hunter and his crew, arriving in Boston in August 1829. The agreement? The twins would be "exhibited to the public”. Their arrival was reported in newspapers and crowds would flock to see the brothers, just out of pure curiosity. After seeing Chang and Eng, their intelligence and athleticness stood out completely and audiences were fascinated by their capability of living active and independent lives despite being connected physically.

The brothers toured throughout the U.S. and Europe, eventually leaving their manager and taking control of their own exhibitions. After years of traveling, they retired from the exhibition life and settled in North Carolina where they became naturalized U.S. citizens, adopted the surname Bunker, and purchased multiple farms and plots of land. In 1843, Chang and Eng married sisters Adelaide and Sarah Yates and fathered 21 children together, sticking to alternating schedules so the brothers could spend time with both families.

Chang and Eng found success in America and remained conjoined until their deaths in January 1874 at the age of 62 when Chang passed away from a stroke and Eng just a few hours later. Their autopsy would later lead to one of the earliest and most important medical studies regarding conjoined twins and has helped advance doctors’ understanding of the condition, cementing the remarkable story of Chang and Eng Bunker as an enduring part of history.

Haeran Ryu captured her second consecutive major title at the Evian Championship while Tom Kim secured his first victory in three years at the Genesis Scottish Open.

South Korean LPGA star Haeran Ryu claimed her second consecutive major title at the Amundi Evian Championship this weekend.  She fired a 60 in the third round to set the pace, before securing victory in a sudden-death playoff over Brooke Henderson.  Ryu finished at -19, earning $1.4 million.  Asian golfers rounded out the top five with Aki Iwai in third place, while Jin Hee Im, Miyu Yamashita, and Mao Saigo tied for fourth.

At the Genesis Scottish Open, 24-year-old Tom Kim captured his first championship in three years with a -17 finish, taking home nearly $1.6M.  The Korean was elite down the stretch, utilizing a bogey-free fourth round to secure the win by two strokes.  Korean Australian Min Woo Lee followed in second place, while Japanese golfer Keita Nakajima tied for third.

The highly anticipated UFC 329 in Las Vegas ended in an anticlimactic fashion.  The main event between Conor McGregor and Max Holloway lasted only 69 seconds before the contest was stopped due to a knee injury sustained by McGregor on his opening kick, resulting in a TKO victory for Holloway.

Vinod Khosla and his family have reached a formal agreement to purchase the Seattle Seahawks in a historic deal valued at $9.6 billion, setting a new record for an NFL franchise sale.  Khosla currently owns a 3.1% minority stake of the NFC West rival San Francisco 49ers, which he will be required to sell pending approval of the Seahawks’ acquisition.  Khosla is among several Asian NFL owners including Jaguars’ principal owner Shahid Khan, and Dolphins’ minority owner Lin Bin.

Before finding fame in XO, Kitty, Gia Kim built a career as a news reporter and navigated a global upbringing.

This April’s third season premiere of XO, Kitty on Netflix officially established Gia Kim’s professional screen career, effectively launching her out of relative obscurity and into the mainstream.  As a central figure in the hit To All the Boys spin-off series, Kim anchors primary cast member Yuri Han across 26 episodes.

Before her major commercial television breakthrough, Kim pursued a completely different path in front of the camera.  She completed her bachelor’s degree in journalism and music at the University of Hong Kong in 2015, going on to work as a news reporter for Arirang Newsroom in South Korea and anchoring broadcast stints in New York and Beijing.

Driven to pivot toward her artistic dream of performing, she relocated to Los Angeles in 2019 to formally train at the Art of Acting Studio.  Her only other screen acting credit prior to her breakout role is in an independent short film.

The 33-year-old Korean actress was born in Seoul, but grew up moving between South Korea, Indonesia, and Hong Kong, where she attended international schools.

Kim’s rising industry profile is set to expand significantly into Hollywood studio features with high-profile upcoming projects, most notably joining the ensemble cast of K-Pop: The Debut.  The pending coming-of-age musical drama, co-produced by Paramount Pictures and HYBE America, is scheduled for release in early 2027 and marks a major milestone as one of the first major studio features to shoot entirely on location in South Korea.

Growing up Asian American in Los Angeles isn't a one-size-fits-all experience, so in this episode I opened up about what it was like growing up Vietnamese and Chinese in the San Fernando Valley, where Asians made up only a small part of my community.

Kelli (00:00)

I grew up in the San Fernando Valley, where Asians make up only 11% of the population. Looking back, I didn't realize how much that this shaped my identity until I became an adult. So I'm going to be discussing a little bit about my culture and the difference that I have noticed in growing up in the San Fernando Valley versus Asians that I have met that have grown up somewhere else.

My parents immigrated here after the Vietnam War at a very young age. My mom was six years old, and my father was 13 or 14 when he came here.

My mom is full Vietnamese and my dad is Chinese but was born in Vietnam.

Both of my parents went through their own struggles getting to America.

My mom was separated on a boat with her three younger siblings from their parents, and it so happened that they ended up all meeting on the same island together. And my dad his family in Vietnam had built their own private boat to escape in, and was eventually attacked by pirates on their journey here to America. I've always known these stories, but it wasn't until

After I was around 21 years old, where I was genuinely realizing how different my life was compared to my parents. And it I had once I got older, I had more of an understanding of how much pressure and how much hardship it really took for my parents to get here. So when they arrived, they settled in the San Fernando Valley and they

And they had to transition into American culture because of how young they were. My mom and her brothers attended a Christian school called Faith Baptist in West Hills. And they lived in a very cute family-style home.

Right in the middle of the San Fernando Valley.

So I would say my mom is definitely a valley girl and that transitioned over to me because I am definitely a valley girl. I love the San Fernando Valley. I don't like going out of the San Fernando Valley. I'm very comfortable here. I don't like driving far.

One thing about the valley though is that there's not that many Asians here. There are Asians in the San Fernando Valley. A lot of them do reside in the Granada Hills and Northridge area.

My mom was a teacher and she taught at a very good elementary school in Woodland Hills. So I started off going there and then my middle school was in Encino, Tarzana area, and my high school was in Calabasas, Woodland Hills.

The demographic of Asian students at all of the schools that I went to was very, very small. Most of the time I was the only Asian, only Asian student in the class. I remember it being very difficult for me in elementary school to fit in.

I spoke Vietnamese up until I was about four years old, five years old. And once I went into kindergarten, that's when it stopped because I started to learn English, I started to have American friends, and my parents never forced me to continue to speak it. My parents were very

supportive of me trying to assimilate to American culture. And at the same time, because they came over to America at such a young age, they also had to assimilate to American culture.

My parents never forced us to speak to them. My parents never forced us to follow certain Vietnamese traditions. And this was completely okay with me because when I would go to school and I would bring up anything Vietnamese, I'd get

Picked on for it. If I brought Vietnamese food to school, I would get laughed at because it smells funny. If I were to wear a Vietnamese dress, I would get laughed at for it. Starting in elementary school, a lot of the students already were coming up to me and slanting their eyes and saying funny things like Chinese, Vietnamese, look at these. And this happened quite often.

This was something that happened to me all the time. And this definitely traveled into my middle school years. I again went to an I went to a middle school where there was not that many Asians there as well. The demographic was a lot of Persians and a lot of Israelis, lots of Middle Easterns there. So it was really hard for me to, again, feel like

I was comfortable enough to truly be myself. I loved speaking Vietnamese as a child. And once I got into once I got into like the real world,

I felt like that it was weird to do that. I felt it was weird to speak Vietnamese. I felt it was weird to talk about my culture and to talk about so many different things that people don't know about because they're obviously not part of my culture and I completely wanted to shut that out in order to make my life outside of my house easier.

So since there were not that many Asians, I didn't have many Asian friends growing I noticed that most of my friendships developed with the black and Hispanic classmates.

I didn't feel that welcomed with the Middle Eastern classmates because they were always talking about my race and they would always talk about stereotypical things, ask me if I was good at math, or ask me if I ate rice this morning. So I didn't I never felt comfortable whenever I would hang out with the Persian crowd.

Middle school definitely taught me how to be strong and hard-headed and not take these kinds of things to heart. But now when I look back at it, it truly, I truly did take these things to heart. These things did hurt me, and these things made me not want to be Asian. These things made me not want to express that side of me. And because my parents weren't forcing the culture on me or telling me that, you know.

you shouldn't feel like that. You should be proud of your Asian culture. You should be proud of being Vietnamese. You should be proud of being Chinese. Instead of them telling me that, they tell me to just, you know, like try to be nice to them. Try to be nice to everybody. Try to just fit in. That's kind of what my parents would tell me.

So on one end, when I go to school, I feel like I'm not American enough. But the thought of not feeling Asian enough never crossed my mind until I got older.

Once society kind of deemed that being racist was not okay, that's when the Asian comments kind of trickled down. People weren't just saying things to me out of nowhere. People weren't coming up to me and slanting their eyes anymore. It still happens, of course. definitely people joke about I hear jokes about it.

But what's so funny is I didn't really feel I didn't really realize that I wasn't Asian enough or I didn't feel sad that I wasn't Asian enough until when I got older when Asian culture became more prominent in America. So during COVID, I feel like we all definitely experienced a time where

People were looking at us funny because we were Asian, because everyone thought that the Asians brought over the coronavirus. And after COVID, there seemed to be an increase in the popularity of K-pop and K dramas and K-beauty. And so much of American pop culture started to become derived from.

From Asian culture. And once that happened, it was suddenly cool to be Asian.

Now I feel like that I'm missing out on something.

I kind of started to feel like now I don't think I'm going to be accepted by my own people. So I wasn't already, I already wasn't accepted by the other kids that went to my schools, and now I feel like I'm not gonna be accepted by my own people because I'm not speaking Vietnamese fluently, because I completely stopped speaking Vietnamese because the kids in my school would make fun of me if I said something in Vietnamese. My parents were not overly traditional, so they didn't celebrate.

Chinese New Year. They didn't eat traditional food every single day. We didn't have we didn't have a little temple shrine in our home like my other family members did. But when I met other Vietnamese Americans in recent years, I've noticed how different their parents are. I realized that a lot of a lot of people from Orange County or the San Gabriel Valley, their parents are much more traditional.

And they have completely different upbringings. And I realize that's because they've grown up in that Asian community. With all of the Asians there, you're not getting made fun of. You guys are they're keeping their culture relevant. They are immersed in their culture still because they are growing up with those people. And unfortunately, I wasn't able to do that. So

I genuinely feel like I became much more curious about my culture later, which I regret. I wish I could speak Vietnamese fluently and converse. I can only understand it now,

Growing up and getting older definitely allowed me to take that step and really make the effort to try and understand my culture more. I've done a lot more research, I've read a lot more, I've watched a lot of different things that taught me about Vietnamese culture and Chinese culture. I've taken the initiative to talk to my family members in Vietnamese now and try to really learn the language.

Overall, I feel like all of this is a part of my complete identity journey over the years. I've met so many people and I have made a lot of friends that are not Asian, and I've made friends that are Asian. and being able to talk to all of these other Asian people, I've noticed that a lot of people can resonate with the same story that I have. A lot of Asian Americans specifically

we all can relate to a story like this. We all can relate to being laughed at because of our smelly food. we can all relate to losing our language and wanting to relearn it.

I think growing up in the San Fernando Valley definitely was a big part of what made me who I am today. I was able to see different perspectives and learn about different cultures and build these diverse friendships that I probably wouldn't have been able to develop if I lived elsewhere. I think that the San Fernando Valley as a whole is kind of like a community itself. And I don't want to say that I missed out. I would just say that I had a very different experience.

Being older now, I'm very grateful that I have that urge to want to learn more about my culture and

And really the truth is that growing up in the valley gave me a version gave me a version of the Asian American experience that other kids wouldn't have been able to get. It's still authentic. today I am still trying to relearn Vietnamese, trying to relearn all the stories that I may have missed out on before, but now I just feel like I'm more reconnecting with a part of myself that was always there. But

I'm older and smarter now, and I can understand it just a little bit better.

Despite a population of 1.4 billion, India remains absent from the World Cup due to fractured development, rigid academics, and restrictive nationality laws.

It is a profound demographic paradox: within a population of 1.4 billion people, the Indian men’s national football team has never once stepped onto a World Cup pitch.  While the nation’s cricketers enjoy religion-like worship, Indian soccer remains mired in a state of perpetual underachievement, leaving observers to wonder – how can the world’s most populous country remain completely invisible on the world’s largest sporting stage?

In 1950, India earned a spot at the World Cup in Brazil by default, after the other Asian qualifying nations dropped out.  However, the fledgling nation, barely three years removed from Independence, faced staggering logistical challenges and prohibitive travel costs.  Rather than exhausting its treasury on a distant tournament whose future prestige was not yet understood, the All India Football Federation prioritized its resources for the Olympic games.  A persistent myth claims India backed out because FIFA banned barefoot play, but the reality was simpler: administrative cold feet and a strategic miscalculation that cost the country its best chance to build long-term momentum.

In the modern era, the domestic ecosystem remains heavily fractured. The AIFF has historically struggled to implement a cohesive, nationwide developmental blueprint, leaving true grassroots pathways virtually nonexistent.  To maximize limited resources, the federation hyper-focuses its scouting on a few historic, football-mad strongholds like West Bengal, Kerala, and the Northeast.  While these pockets provide a rare refuge from India’s ubiquitous cricket mania, they represent a fraction of the country.  The Northeast, for instance, holds less than 4% of India’s population yet routinely supplies over a third of its professional soccer players.  By relying almost entirely on these isolated regional pipelines to keep the sport alive, the federation effectively blindfolds itself to talent across the rest of the subcontinent.

Furthermore, unlike cricket – where an unheralded rookie can secure a base salary in the Indian Premier League that exceeds nearly ten times the average annual income in India – soccer lacks the financial incentives to convince risk-averse families to gamble on an athletic future.

While elite American high school athletes often leverage sports to secure university scholarships, India’s meritocracy hinges entirely on hyper-competitive standardized testing.  The gatekeepers to a stable livelihood are the grueling board exams and central engineering and medical entrance tests like the IIT-JEE – an exam where over 1.5 million students compete for roughly 18,000 seats, yielding an acceptance rate under 1.2%, which makes Ivy League admissions look forgiving.  Facing these staggering mathematical odds, intense societal and familial pressure routinely compels the country’s most physically gifted teenagers to completely abandon the pitch by age 15, trading their cleats for full-time tutoring centers.

Compounding this internal talent drain is a strict legal barrier regarding nationality.  In the modern soccer landscape, international success is increasingly defined by tapping into a global diaspora.  India, however, is locked out of this talent pool because it strictly prohibits dual citizenship.  This policy strands overseas talent like Hearts midfielder Yan Dhanda, an English-born professional of Indian heritage who has openly expressed a desire to play for the Blue Tigers but is legally barred unless he renounces his British passport.  By enforcing this legal rigidity, the nation completely isolates its national team from world-class coaching environments overseas, trapping Indian football beneath its own structural shortcomings.

This moving Japanese folk tale about Kaguya-hime, the tiny girl found by a poor woodcutter, is said to explain the creation of Mount Fuji.

Long, long ago, in a quiet village at the edge of a whispering bamboo forest, there lived an old bamboo cutter and his wife.

They were kind people. Their house was small, their meals were simple, and their days were quiet. Every morning, the old man took his little hatchet and basket and went into the green bamboo grove, where the tall stalks swayed and clicked softly in the wind.

Click, click, hush, hush, went the bamboo.

One morning, as sunlight slipped between the leaves, the old man saw something strange.

Deep inside the grove, one bamboo stalk was glowing.

Not bright like the sun. Not sharp like fire. It glowed softly, like moonlight resting in a cup.

“Well now,” whispered the old man, “what could this be?”

He stepped closer. The bamboo shone more warmly, as if it were happy to see him. Very carefully, he cut the stalk open.

And inside, nestled in the hollow of the bamboo, was a tiny little girl.

She was no bigger than his thumb, wrapped in light, with a face as calm and beautiful as the moon.

The old man gasped, then smiled.

“Oh, little one,” he said gently, “you must be a gift from heaven.”

He carried her home in his sleeve, walking slowly so she would not be jostled. When his wife saw the tiny child, her eyes filled with tears.

“We have no child,” she whispered. “Perhaps she has come to be ours.”

So they cared for her tenderly. They made her a soft bed. They warmed her tiny hands. They spoke to her in soft voices.

And soon, as magical children sometimes do in old stories, she began to grow.

By the next day, she was the size of a baby. Soon after, she was a laughing little girl. Before long, she had grown into a young maiden of such grace and beauty that people came from distant villages just to catch a glimpse of her.

Her parents named her Kaguya-hime, the Shining Princess.

But to the old bamboo cutter and his wife, she was not just a princess.

She was their child.

Every day after that, when the old man went into the bamboo grove, he found gold hidden inside the glowing stalks. Not too much all at once, but enough to make their little house comfortable and warm. Soon they had fine robes, soft cushions, good food, and a home where lamps glowed sweetly in the evening.

Still, Kaguya-hime’s favorite place was not among fine things.

She loved to sit by the window at night and look up at the moon.

Sometimes her mother would find her there, quiet and thoughtful.

“Are you cold, my child?” her mother would ask.

“No, Mother,” Kaguya-hime would say softly.

“Are you sad?”

Kaguya-hime would smile, but her eyes would stay on the silver moon.

“I don’t know,” she would answer. “Sometimes the moon feels very far away. And sometimes it feels very near.”

As Kaguya-hime grew more beautiful, five great noblemen came to ask for her hand in marriage. They wore grand robes and spoke grand words. Each one promised to make her happy.

But Kaguya-hime did not wish to marry any of them.

So she gave each nobleman an impossible task.

One was told to bring her a shining stone bowl from the Buddha’s own country. Another was sent to find a jeweled branch from a faraway island. Another had to bring a robe made from the fur of a fire-rat, which could never burn. Another was asked for a jewel from a dragon’s neck. The last was sent to find a magical shell treasured by swallows.

The noblemen bowed and boasted and hurried away.

But impossible things are not easily found.

Some tried to trick her. Some became frightened. Some gave up. And one by one, they all failed.

Kaguya-hime remained at home with her mother and father, where the bamboo whispered outside and the moon rose each night above the roof.

Even the Emperor heard of her beauty and kindness. He sent letters written on fine paper. Then he came himself to see her.

When he saw Kaguya-hime, he understood at once that she was unlike anyone in the world.

“Come to my palace,” he said gently. “You will be honored there.”

But Kaguya-hime lowered her eyes.

“Your Majesty,” she said, “you are gracious. But I cannot go.”

The Emperor was disappointed, but he was not cruel. He admired her heart, and in time they wrote letters to each other, like two friends speaking across a quiet stream.

Then came autumn.

The nights grew cooler. The grasses silvered with dew. The moon became rounder and brighter.

And Kaguya-hime began to weep.

Her mother found her one evening with tears on her cheeks.

“My child,” she cried, gathering her into her arms, “tell me what troubles you.”

The old bamboo cutter hurried in too, his face full of worry.

Kaguya-hime held their hands.

“Dear Father. Dear Mother,” she said. “I have kept a sorrow in my heart. I am not from this world. I came from the Moon Palace, and on the night of the full moon, the people of the moon will come for me. I must return.”

Her mother began to cry.

“No,” said the old man. “You are our daughter. I found you. We raised you. We love you.”

“And I love you,” said Kaguya-hime, and now her tears fell faster. “That is why leaving hurts so much.”

The old man went to the Emperor and told him everything. The Emperor sent guards to surround the house on the night of the full moon. They stood at the gates, on the roof, in the garden, and along the bamboo grove.

“No one shall take our princess,” they said.

But the moon rose.

Round and bright and silent.

A silver path of light poured down from the sky.

Then heavenly beings descended, dressed in robes that shimmered like mist. Their faces were calm, and their steps made no sound.

The guards lifted their bows, but their hands grew soft and heavy. Their eyes closed as if they had suddenly remembered a lullaby. No sword could stop moonlight. No gate could keep out the sky.

The heavenly attendants came to Kaguya-hime.

“It is time,” they said.

Her mother clung to her. Her father trembled.

Kaguya-hime knelt before them.

“Thank you for loving me,” she whispered. “Thank you for every meal, every blanket, every kind word, every ordinary day. Those were the treasures I loved best.”

She gave them a letter, and she gave another letter to the Emperor, along with a small vial of the elixir of everlasting life.

Then the moon people placed a feather robe around her shoulders.

The moment it touched her, her earthly sorrow began to fade, as dreams fade when morning comes. But before it vanished completely, Kaguya-hime turned back one last time.

Her parents saw her face glowing in the moonlight.

And they knew she loved them still.

Up she rose, higher and higher, along the shining path, until she became a small bright figure in the sky. Then a shimmer. Then a memory.

The old bamboo cutter and his wife held each other and wept.

Far away, the Emperor read her letter. He looked at the vial of everlasting life, but he did not drink it.

“What use is living forever,” he said, “if the one I remember has gone beyond my reach?”

So he ordered the letter and the elixir to be carried to the highest mountain in the land, the mountain closest to heaven. There, they burned them, and the smoke rose up, up, up toward the moon.

Some people say that mountain came to be called Fuji, and that the smoke from its peak once carried human longing into the sky.

And some nights, when the moon is full and gentle, parents still point to it and whisper:

“Look carefully. Perhaps Kaguya-hime is there, watching over the bamboo groves, remembering the old man and the old woman who loved her as their own.”

Then the bamboo outside goes click, click, hush, hush.

And the moonlight rests softly on the sleeping world.

Scouts are zeroing in on the unique skill sets of Jarren Advincula, Mulivai Levu and Rintaro Sasaki who have had high-stakes career paths ahead of the 2026 MLB Draft.

As the 2026 MLB Draft approaches, scouts are closely evaluating a talented pool of collegiate prospects hoping to secure their future at the professional level.

Georgia Tech second baseman Jarren Advincula has emerged as a potential “dark horse” for the first round.  After transferring from Cal, the Filipino American standout put together a stellar 2026 campaign, batting .434 with 111 hits and a .494 on-base percentage.  While the Santa Clara native’s power is limited, his elite speed and disciplined plate approach make him a compelling prospect, with some projections pegging him as a high-value selection.

Huntington Beach native and UCLA first baseman Mulivai Levu has made a name for himself during his three collegiate seasons.  After a standout sophomore season that included finishing second in RBIs, a Gold Glove, and Third Team All-American honors, the Samoan and Tongan talent elevated his stock further this spring with a .340 batting average and 18 home runs.  His performance at the Draft Combine highlighted a well-rounded offensive toolkit, proving he can drive the ball to all fields.

The draft also features a uniquely multifaceted situation in Stanford’s Rintaro Sasaki.  A Japanese high school legend who shattered the national record with 140 career home runs, Sasaki has transitioned his power to the collegiate game, hitting 16 homers this past season as a sophomore with an impressive .952 OPS.  The first baseman’s immense raw power was on full display at the Draft Combine, where he recorded a 115.4 mph exit velocity.  However, because he was previously drafted in 2025 by the NPB’s Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks, his path to the majors is at a crossroads; he must choose between entering the MLB Draft, signing in Japan, or returning to Stanford for another season.

She's an independent city girl who doesn't need anyone but will consider a handsome young CEO of a glamorous company.

[Verse 1]

I do not need saving

[Pre-Chorus]

One look, one smile

[Chorus]

You run that empire

K-drama love

[Verse 2]

Your driver was waiting

I’m not usually sweet

[Pre-Chorus]

I rolled my eyes

[Chorus]

You run that empire

K-drama love

[Bridge]

You say my name

[Final Chorus]

You run that empire

K-drama love

After a five-year hiatus, Conor McGregor makes his long-awaited return to the Octagon to face fan favorite Max Holloway in a high-stakes Las Vegas main event.

On July 11th at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, UFC 329 is headlined by a massive rematch between Conor McGregor and Max Holloway.  

This bout marks McGregor’s return after a five-year hiatus, his last appearance being the 2021 trilogy fight against Dustin Poirier.  Conversely, the Hawaiian fan favorite, who recently graced the cover of the Ultimate Edition of EA Sports UFC 6, remains a pillar of the division despite dropping his most recent outing.

Their paths first crossed in 2013 on a preliminary card at UFC Fight Night 26, where a younger McGregor secured a unanimous decision victory despite suffering a knee injury during the fight.  The pay of that fight early in their careers reflected their status as rising prospects, with McGregor taking home $24,000 while Holloway earned just $14,000.  Today, the stakes are exponentially higher. McGregor is estimated to make eight figures – a payday sufficient to draw him out of retirement – while Holloway is projected to earn over $1 million.

The betting landscape reflects the long layoff, with Holloway pegged as the clear favorite at -240.  

Demand is equally intense, with ticket prices starting at $1,200 for upper-level seating.

Holloway’s pathway to victory relies on his relentless, high-volume pressure and superior conditioning, aiming to overwhelm the Irishman in the later rounds.  For McGregor, the path remains his signature precision; he must land his legendary counter-left hand early to secure a knockout before his cardio becomes a liability.

Holloway enters this bout looking to bounce back following a tough decision loss at UFC 326, while providing a rude welcome back to one of the most popular names in UFC history.  McGregor, meanwhile, carries the pressure of a massive payday and the need to prove that his power still translates to the top of the division.  The MMA world waits to see if the “Notorious” icon can recapture his former glory or if the pride of Hawaii will finally secure the redemption he has chased for thirteen years.