Deion Sanders to Donate Half His Salary to Jackson State Football Facility Renovation

Deion Sanders

During his time as a professional athlete, Deion Sanders was known for doing things his way.

Given the choice between a football career and playing baseball after college, he chose to do both and remains the only player to have appeared in both a Super Bowl and a World Series.

His flashy demeanor on and off the field earned him the nickname "Neon Deion," and his penchant for leveling his game up when needed, clenched the star his preferred alias "Prime Time."

So, it comes as no surprise that since joining the college coaching ranks that the man widely considered to be one of the best cornerbacks to ever play in the NFL continues to employ his own unique methodology when it comes to managing a college program.

Much to the delight of Jackson State University fans and alumni, it is one that is paying major dividends for the school on the football field.

Since taking over the head coaching job at the historically Black institution, Sanders, now going by "Coach Prime" at his own request, has led the school to back-to-back winning seasons. In his second season (fall 2021) he coached the Tigers to a program-record 11 wins, the Southwestern Athletic Conference title and was awarded the Eddie Robinson Award as the top Football Championship Subdivision head coach.

Most coaches would let those results speak for them but Sanders — who has encouraged a culture of hard work mixed with some flashes of the over-the-top theatrics that endeared him to some fans and made him a pariah to others in his program —is not most coaches.

He is doubling down on his investment in the program's future.

Monday Sanders, whose personal wealth is estimated to be between $35 and $40 million by various media sources, announced that he will donate half his salary to help finish the school's football operations facility.

"I'll put half on it to get this done," said Sanders, who signed a four-year deal with the school worth an average of $300,000 per year in 2020. "If you don't believe me, check me. I will send you the receipts."

According to Sanders, by making the donation, he hopes to ensure the facility is ready before the season starts. Jackson State will open the season against Florida A&M on Sept. 4 in Miami.

Kanye West Pulls Out of Rolling Loud Festival, Kid Cudi to Replace Him as Headliner

The artist formerly known as Kanye West seems to be doing his Kanye best not to headline a show.

Just a couple of months after pulling out of his headlining performance at Coachella, the 45-year-old rapper, who legally changed his name to Ye last year, has done it again.

Rolling Loud announced that West will not be performing at this year's festival Sunday, tweeting on its official account, "Due to circumstances outside of our control, Ye will no longer be performing at Rolling Loud Miami 2022."

West was set to headline the first day of the festival, which runs July 22 through 24, at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami. The festival announced that his protege, sometimes collaborator and muse, Kid Cudi, would take his place.

"Please welcome @KiDCuDi," continued the tweet.

Cudi's career owes much to West, who signed him as a producer in 2008 to his Good Music label. The imprint released his first three albums, and Cudi remained on good enough terms with his former boss that the duo released an eponymously named collaborative album as Kids See Ghosts in 2018.

Earlier this year, however, West seemed to distance himself from Cudi following the dissolution of his marriage to Kim Kardashian, allegedly due to the latter's friendship with Kardashian's new beau Pete Davidson.

In a since-deleted Instagram post, Ye posted a photograph of a handwritten message that read in part, “Just so everyone knows, [Kid] Cudi will not be on Donda 2′ because he’s friends with you know who.”

Rolling Loud co-founders Tariq Cherif and Matt Zingler said they "were looking forward to Ye headlining Rolling Loud Miami 2022,” but things just did not work out in an official statement about the lineup change.

“We spent months working with him and his team on the performance. Unfortunately, Ye has decided that he will no longer be performing," they said in a statement. "This is the first time a headliner has ever pulled off our show and though we don’t take it lightly, we wish him the best.”

Delfonics Lead Singer, William ‘Poogie’ Hart, Dead at 77

Photo Credit: Julius "Juice" Freeman, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons 

Music fans are in mourning after it was revealed that William “Poogie” Hart, lead singer and songwriter for sixties and seventies R&B powerhouse the Delfonics, died Thursday at the age of 77.

His son Hadi confirmed the death of the Philadelphia icon to Rolling Stone, saying the singer died from complications during surgery after being taken to Temple University Hospital because he was having trouble breathing.

He added, “His body might not be here, but his music will live forever. He was a great man, he loved his family, he loved God, and he just loved people. Great heart, great spirit. That was my dad.”

Hart was a founding member of the Delfonics along with his brother Wilbert, Randy Cain, Ritchie Daniels and Thom Bell. The group was a prominent part of the Philadelphia soul scene in the late ’60s and early ’70s and gained national notoriety in 1968 with their breakthrough hit “La-La (Means I Love You) off their eponymous debut studio album.

R.I.P. William Poogie Hart of The Delfonics.He died today at the age of 77. What Delfonics song was your favorite. I loved ‘Didn’t I Blow Your Mind pic.twitter.com/GXh9xnhgWY

— Patty Jackson (@MsPattyJackson) July 15, 2022

The single reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and sparked a long run of success for the band that saw it release five studio albums — which produced 12 Top 20 songs on the Billboard charts —between 168-1974. They also scored a Grammy for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group, Vocal or Instrumental in 1970 for their hit “Didn’t I (Blow Your Mind This Time),”

In 1975, the Hart brothers split up along with the rest of the group.

William started his own version of the Delfonics. His brother Wilbert and Major Harris (who replaced Cain in 1971) formed another with Frank Washington. In the following decades, the groups continued to tour separately, sometimes with members jumping from one iteration to another, before a 1990s reunion brought about by a surge in the popularity of their original catalog.

Extensive samples of the group's work by hip-hop legends like the Fugees, Missy Elliott and the Notorious B.I.G. on some of the decade's biggest hits, a cover of “La-La (Means I Love You)” by pop superstar Prince on his 1996 album Emancipation and having their music featured prominently in Quentin Tarantino’s 1997 movie "Jackie Brown" renewed interest in the Delfonics.