Sportly

Daniel Sandoval has spent two decades near the top of action sports, and this year he helped deliver one of the wildest finishes in X Games League history, riding through injuries doctors told him to sit out and sealing his team's championship in the final minutes. In this conversation he talks about growing up in Corona, California, discovering BMX at ten years old, and building a career that too...

This week, Kavitha Davidson traces how ESPN's X Games built the stage that made Tony Hawk, Dave Mirra, Travis Pastrana, and Shaun White into household names - and how it's evolved into the X Games League, the team-based reboot that just posted a 78.5% ratings jump in its first summer season, and whether the novelty can hold. Host: Kavitha A. Davison | Producer & Writer: Paroma Chakravarty I Execut...

Step into the bleachers of Comiskey Park, where the Boston Red Sox face off against the Chicago Cubs in the 1918 World Series. With America deep in the throes of World War I, baseball offers a brief escape from the harsh realities of war and loss. This pivotal game, featuring Babe Ruth as the Red Sox’s starting pitcher, also marks the moment when the Star-Spangled Banner begins its journey to beco...

Sportly is handing over the feed to our friends at Burn It All Down today. Listen to our previous episode with Amira and Jessica on Heated Rivalry here. Amira, Brenda, and Lindsay review how sports betting has seeped into politics and provided the stuff of fantasies for people in dire economic need. Women represent the final frontier for exploitative betting companies, and BIAD asks how we can sav...

For decades, Pakistan's women football had no federation support, no funding, and no path to international competition. They built their own anyway, starting with a single club founded in a Karachi backyard and growing into a movement that survived internal warfare, government interference, and several takeovers of federation headquarters that got the banned by FIFA. In this episode, Kavitha David...

This episode is a rerun of "Courtside Stories: Rivalries, Redemption, and Prison Reform?" Prison sports are about to become California law. Before the policy fight, hear from the men inside San Quentin on what the game has meant to them - and from the critics who say programs like these teach the wrong lesson. What if a basketball game could offer more than just a win? This week on Sportly, we hea...

In the final episode of our FIFA series, host Kavitha Davidson sits down with Jeff Rueter, soccer correspondent for The Guardian US and formerly a staff writer at The Athletic, to unpack how this World Cup actually ended. Jeff, who spent the tournament embedded with the U.S. men's national team, walks Kavitha through the strangest week of his career: the eve-of-match red card reversal that turned...

Part wrestling, part tag, part martial arts, and all breath control. In this episode, Kavitha dives into the world of kabaddi, the high-octane South Asian sport that's quietly going global. You'll meet fearless raiders, strategic defenders, and women breaking barriers through the sport. With teams from India, Pakistan, Iran, Bangladesh and beyond gearing up for the Asian Games this fall — and Euro...

World Cup 2026 fan culture takes center stage as Kavitha Davidson explores the viral moments defining this tournament - from Scottish fans turning Boston into "New Scotland" to Dutch, Norwegian, and Japanese supporters going viral worldwide. But beneath the wholesome clips lies a deeper story of visa denials, price barriers, and fandom's darker history, from Andrés Escobar's 1994 murder to Iceland...

Sportly was recently featured in Forbes, where Kavitha spoke about what makes this show's approach to sports storytelling different. Read it here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/frankracioppi/2026/06/15/sports-podcasts-are-looking-to-score-that-golden-goooaalll/ What do you get when two friends, a wiffle ball, and a summer day collide? The answer is Pickleball. Pickleball is a sport born from a mome...

Why does Wimbledon still require all-white outfits? Why do fans queue overnight just for a chance to buy tickets? And what do strawberries and cream have to do with elite tennis? In this episode of Sportly, host Kavitha Davidson serves up the fascinating traditions that make Wimbledon unlike any other Grand Slam. From Roger Federer’s orange soles to Serena Williams’ red shorts, this episode dives...

The Knicks won the NBA championship for the first time since 1973, and so Kavitha Davidson threw out our production schedule. In this special episode, she recaps her chaotic week: attending games, doing live broadcast commentary for New York Post Sports, flying to LA on no sleep, and surviving two straight months of playoff emotions. But beyond the exhaustion and euphoria, she makes a bigger point...

The FIFA World Cup 2026 is here, and with it comes the familiar promise: billions in economic activity, a tourism boom, and a windfall for host cities across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. But according to Jules Boykoff, professor of politics at Pacific University, former U.S. U-23 national team player, and one of the leading scholars on the politics of mega events, those promises have alm...

This week on Sportly, Kavitha Davidson sits down with acclaimed political sports writer Dave Zirin for a no-holds-barred conversation about the intersection of sports, politics, and society. They discuss the idea of “dual realities” in media and how race, gender, and representation are often portrayed in sports narratives. The episode takes a closer look at the controversial trend of “sportswashin...

What happens when national pride meets global identity? Morocco’s epic World Cup run in 2022 wasn’t just a Cinderella story; it was a masterclass in building a team from abroad. In this episode of Sportly, host Kavitha Davidson unpacks how foreign-born players are transforming international soccer. From FIFA’s game-changing rule tweaks to Qatar and the UAE’s controversial recruiting strategies, we...

Jason Belmonte or "Belmo" is widely considered one of the greatest bowlers in the history of the sport. However, if you ask him, he's not done yet. With 15 major championships and records that may never be broken, he is methodically chasing a legacy that would put the debate to rest once and for all. In this conversation, Kavitha talks to Belmo about the invisible playing field that makes professi...

What happens when a Black icon refuses to make white audiences comfortable? Today, we’re sharing a preview of a new podcast, Big Lives, and a special episode about Muhammad Ali. Every week, hosts Kai Wright and Emmanuel Dzotsi dig into the BBC archive to explore the story behind the icons who shape our culture—trailblazers like David Bowie, Amy Winehouse, and Tina Turner—and better understand how...

The creator of "Art But Make It Sports", LJ Rader, is a lifelong sports professional who has worked for NBC Sports, won an Emmy, and spent nearly a decade at Sportradar, all while quietly teaching himself art history through museum visits, auction houses, and gallery trips. What started as a personal joke on his Instagram - pairing sports photos with fine art - became Art But Make It Sports, an ac...

This is a re-run of Sportly's April 2025 episode: "Pilates Wasn't Always White - Here's What Changed " Pilates may be marketed as a path to wellness and elegance, but who is it really for? In this episode of Sportly, host Kavitha Davidson explores the complicated racial and cultural history of Pilates, from its roots in an internment camp to its modern-day status as the go-to fitness trend for aff...

What does faith have to do with baseball? More than you might think. "Baseball Beyond Belief" is a new documentary that explores the deep and often surprising connections between spirituality and America's favorite pastime. In this episode, Kavitha Davidson sits down with two of the people behind the film: director John Scheinfeld and Father Tom Gibbons. Together, they talk about what inspired the...

WrestleMania 42 promises all the spectacle fans have come to expect, with headline matches like Cody Rhodes vs. Randy Orton and CM Punk vs. Roman Reigns carrying deep personal stakes and years of history. On the surface, the event has all the ingredients of a classic. Larger-than-life personalities, emotional storytelling, and career-defining moments. But as anticipation builds, so does a growing...

This week Kavitha interviews journalist and author A.M. Gittlitz about his new book Metropolitans: New York Baseball, Class Struggle, and the People’s Team. Kavitha and Gittlitz unpack the long history behind the New York Mets, from their 19th-century roots tied to political machines like Tammany Hall to their modern identity as an underdog franchise in a city dominated by the New York Yankees. Th...

Sportly brings you an episode from Hysteria: A Basketball Podcast, which explores why Indiana sits at the heart of the sport, and how the women’s game has finally reached a long-awaited breakthrough. Women’s basketball is having a moment, but the rise of the game has been decades in the making. In this episode of Hysteria, host Julie Roe Lach (Executive Vice President External Relations and Commun...

StreamEast is gone. Or at least, it was. In 2025, one of the largest illegal sports streaming networks in the world was taken down in a coordinated international operation involving law enforcement across multiple countries. Domains were seized. Arrests were made. For a moment, it looked like the system worked. But then, almost immediately, the streams came back. In this episode, Kavitha tells the...

The World Baseball Classic has been electric - packed stadiums, global stars, and teams playing with a level of joy that Major League Baseball doesn’t always capture. So why does Team USA feel like the only team not having any fun? In this episode, Kavitha Davidson breaks down what the WBC is revealing about baseball right now: from questions around leadership and “vibes” on the U.S. roster to the...