Sports

10:20 PM ET ESPN staff The early schedule for the wild-card round of the 2021 NFL playoffs is out, and the Green Bay Packers (NFC) and Tennessee Titans (AFC) are the teams that get byes. Among the interesting matchups for the first round: Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers taking on the Philadelphia Eagles,

8:00 AM ET INDIANAPOLIS — As Alabama and Georgia prepare to play each other again (8 p.m. ET Monday on ESPN/ESPN App), it is hard to forget what happened the last time they met in the national championship game. Because what happened was so unforgettable. Second-and-26 will always live in college football history, but especially

8:43 PM ET Associated Press ARCADIA, Calif. — Under the Stars won the $200,000 Santa Ynez Stakes by three-quarters of a length Saturday at Santa Anita. Trained by Bob Baffert and ridden by Flavien Prat, Under the Stars ran seven furlongs in 1:22.51. Sent off as the 4-5 favorite in a field of six 3-year-old

7:00 AM ET Since our last NHL Awards Watch, a pesky little bug named the omicron variant has significantly impacted the 2021-22 season. Players are entering the COVID-19 protocol on a nightly basis, forcing the postponement of over 100 games. The NHL pulled its players out of the Beijing Games and scuttled the Olympic break

1:42 PM ET Caitlin Murray FIFA and its president, Gianni Infantino, insist that their brewing plan for a biennial World Cup will be a good thing for soccer. The problem is that when they say that, they seem to be talking about the men’s side of the sport. As usual with FIFA, the women’s game

8:16 AM ET SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Max Homa was sitting on a plane, flying back to Arizona from the RSM Classic in Sea Island, Georgia, on Nov. 19, when he started to think about how to get better. It was his 31st birthday, and earlier in the day, he missed the cut by 3 strokes.

7:00 AM ET At its conception, the Baseball Hall of Fame was meant to be a shrine to former players and their achievements. But over time, the Hall’s election process has become one sport’s most reliable sources of vitriol, with the tabulation and dissection of individual ballots dragging on for almost two months, an often-angry

4:20 PM ET Associated Press NEW YORK — The Belmont Stakes is moving to Fox Sports as part of an eight-year deal beginning in 2023. The deal announced Wednesday between Fox and the New York Racing Association includes NYRA Bets as the title sponsor of the third leg of horse racing’s Triple Crown series. NYRA

7:53 AM ET Mike CoppingerESPN We kick off 2022 waiting and wishing for the marquee fights — the ones that can make boxing the focal point of the sports world, if only for a day, and the kind of fights that were in short supply in 2021. The anticipated undisputed heavyweight championship bout between Tyson

8:04 AM ET If 2022 has the same drama, excitement and confused chaos as 2021, I’m going to need to book an AirBnB in the mountains of Tibet to decompress. OOOOOOHHHHMMMMMM. The 12 months that was 2021 was the wildest of golf cart rides. But before I save my Tibetan trip SuperHost search preferences and

5:45 AM ET World No. 1 Novak Djokovic said on Tuesday he would defend his Australian Open title at Melbourne Park this month after receiving a medical exemption from getting vaccinated against COVID-19. Djokovic, who had declined to reveal his COVID-19 vaccination status, said previously that he was unsure whether he would compete at the

7:46 AM ET The next 12 months could be some of the most interesting in MMA history. Conor McGregor is set to return from a broken leg. Jon Jones, who hasn’t fought since February 2020, could finally get a heavyweight title shot. Kamaru Usman is closing in on Anderson Silva‘s record of 16 straight UFC

12:27 AM ET Tim BontempsESPN NEW YORK — Memphis Grizzlies guard Desmond Bane has heard the chatter about whether his backcourt mate, Ja Morant, should make his first All-Star Game this season. But after Morant’s latest dominant performance — 36 points, 6 rebounds, 8 assists and a game-high plus-24 in 33 minutes of a 118-104

4:35 PM ET NFL NationESPN Week 17 of the 2021 NFL season featured blowouts by the Bears and Patriots, a three-touchdown game by Bengals rookie Ja’Marr Chase that fueled an AFC North-clinching win over the Chiefs and a comeback by the Bucs during which Antonio Brown took off his uniform and left the field during

4:00 PM ET SALT LAKE CITY — Donna Lowe-Stern didn’t know exactly what she would say. The day before, Sept. 26, her son Aaron Lowe had been killed. Now she was looking out at a room full of his mourning Utah football teammates. Coach Kyle Whittingham had asked her whether she would like to speak

8:25 PM ET The St. Louis Blues face the Minnesota Wild on Saturday night in the Winter Classic, the NHL’s annual New Year’s Day game played outdoors. Target Field, usually the home of the Minnesota Twins, is where the two teams will play. 1 Related Per the Weather Channel website, Saturday’s high in Minneapolis is

9:47 PM ET Associated Press REDDICK, Fla. — Billy Turner, who trained Seattle Slew to a Triple Crown sweep of the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont stakes in 1977, has died. He was 81. Turner died Friday at his home here where he had been in hospice care after battling prostate cancer for two years,

4:00 AM ET Real Madrid want to pair Kylian Mbappe with Erling Haaland in a forward line that would be the envy of world football — ESPN’s Insider Notebook has the latest. PLUS: Arsenal have plans to replace Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. Jump to: Arsenal’s list of Auba replacements | City goodwill towards Barca in Torres deal

2:55 PM GMT England trio Owen Farrell, Jamie George and Manu Tuilagi are expected to be fit for selection for the Six Nations which starts on Feb. 5. Both Farrell and George were injured in England’s 32-15 win over Australia on Nov. 13, with the fly-half requiring surgery on his ankle. Tuilagi was forced off

7:15 AM ET It was, in the final quarter of the horrible 2020, when it seemed as though society had finally succumbed to its own appetites and irresponsibility, that baseball was somehow being made an example of. So much loss could not be happenstance. Six Hall of Famers — signatures to their time and instrumental