Shohei Ohtani's trading card value has risen 781% since the start of 2021, the highest year-to-date return of any athlete on Alt, a sports card exchange that aims to bring more liquidity to alternative assets.

Why it matters: The trading card market is the closest thing we have to a stock market for sports.

Baseball Reference, the stat-checking holy grail that's part of the Sports Reference ecosystem, launched its expanded Negro League coverage on Tuesday.

The backdrop: Last December, MLB granted major league status to the seven, distinct Negro Leagues, with stats from 1920 to 1948 becoming an official part of major league history.

22 of 30 MLB stadiums will increase to 100% capacity by the end of the month, and all but five stadiums will fill up by the end of the Fourth of July weekend.

By the numbers: On Opening Day (April 1), only the Astros (50%) and Rangers (100%) filled their stadiums at least halfway.

A Navy football star who was set to play for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers is no longer allowed to join, per The Capital's Bill Wagner.

The backdrop: Cameron Kinley signed with Tampa Bay on May 1, as a Trump-era policy enabled service academy graduates to pursue professional sports.

Here's yet another sign that Tampa Bay is rounding the bases to a new beginning.

What's happening: The Ray Tank returns to Tropicana Field's outfield Wednesday, with the touch experience coming back on June 22.

MLB and the Action Network, a sports betting data and analysis site, have entered into a multi-platform content partnership, Axios has learned.

Why it matters: As sports betting continues to expand and evolve, leagues are looking for ways to provide unique content for their fans, and no sport has as many betting opportunities as baseball, with its 162-game slate.

The NFL on Wednesday pledged to halt its decades-old use of "race-norming" — a practice that assumes Black players have a lower baseline level of cognition — in its near-billion-dollar concussion settlement, AP reports.

Why it matters: The use of  "race-norming" meant that Black players had to show a larger cognitive decline to qualify for the settlement. The NFL said Wednesday that it will also review previous scores for potential race bias.

The New York Knicks will only sell playoff tickets to vaccinated fans if they advance past round one, the team announced Friday, though it did not say how it would verify if a fan has been vaccinated.

Why it matters: The team hosted the Atlanta Hawks at Madison Square Garden for games one and two and welcomed more than 15,000 fans each game, making them the largest indoor events in New York City since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, the team said.

Donald Trump reportedly offered money to a U.S. senator to drop his investigation into the Patriots' Spygate scandal in 2008, according to a new ESPN report.

Catch up quick: In 2007, Patriots staffers were caught illegally videotaping Jets defensive signals, sparking an NFL investigation.

Elite high school basketball players have more options than ever when it comes to choosing the path that's right for their career.

Driving the news: Six of the nation's best high school basketball programs are forming a new league called the National Interscholastic Basketball Conference (NIBC), which will begin play this fall.