The National Pastime, the Sport of Kings and the Sweet Science

After spending the weekend at the Breeders' Cup, Charles Pierce weighs in on why of the most popular sports of the early 20th century, only baseball maintains much of its prestige:

I wondered at the beginning of the day, as I walked from the parking lot up toward the baroque façade of the old racetrack, Philip Marlowe in my own mind, looking both ways for a blonde in a Packard, why horse racing hasn't been able to weaponize and monetize nostalgia the way baseball has. Back in the day — back when J. Edgar Hoover and Clyde Tolson used to (allegedly) whisper sweet nothings to each other in a box at Santa Anita — baseball, boxing, and horse racing were the three major sports in the country, Pete Rozelle having not yet created the universe. Only one of them truly survives today, and I think it's because the other two have the element of mortality. Every boxer can theoretically become Sugar Ray Leonard or Duk Koo Kim. Every thoroughbred can become New Year's Day (who won the Juvenile) or Secret Compass (who broke down and had to be euthanized on the track in the Juvenile Fillies). The people who train them know that. The people who watch them know that. You send a fighter or a thoroughbred out there, in every competition, knowing that you can be sending them out to die. We are far too civilized today for the mortal stakes in our games to be that obvious.

While there is something to that point, what about auto racing?  And what about the risks of football.  We know now that guys are suffering traumatic brain injury, and I think it is only a matter of time before a college or pro player dies on the field.  Anyway, it does take a lot out of a day of horse racing when a horse has to be put down.  It is especially tough when it is the biggest showcase of racing of the year.