The 146th "Run for the Roses" is set for tomorrow (7:01pm ET, NBC), with Churchill Downs hosting 18 hopeful steeds โ and zero fans.
The state of play: The Derby hasn't been run outside of May since 1945, and the last time it wasn't the opening Triple Crown race was all the way back in 1931.
Women's soccer will get major U.S. exposure this weekend, with the NWSL kicking off its seven-week "Fall Series" on CBS and the FA Women's Super League (England) beginning its season on NBCSN.
Why it matters: It's an exciting time for the sport, which has grown from four million players worldwide in 2006 to roughly 30 million today, and is still riding the momentum of the 2019 Women's World Cup.
Mike Greenberg's new show, "Bettor Days," debuts on ESPN+ Thursday.
The big picture: The 15-minute show, which tells the stories behind sports betting's craziest wins and losses, is part of a larger sports betting push by ESPN. The company just debuted its new Las Vegas studio, which will host the network's one-hour weekday sports betting show, "Daily Wager," and other related programming.
Sports participation has been linked to higher self-esteem, better grades and lower depressive symptoms among LGBTQ youth, according to The Trevor Project's second-annual mental health survey โ the largest of its kind ever conducted.
By the numbers: One in three LGBTQ youth who play sports said they got mostly A's in school, compared to just one in four of those who don't play sports.
The state of play: The boom was aided by the emergence of grading agencies, which fundamentally changed the art of card collecting, while attracting a new type of clientele and, in some cases, incentivizing fraud.
