Doing Gymnastics To Pay Health Bills: There’s definitely a broader metaphor in the fact that celebrated American gymnast Mary Lou Retton, who once raised her arms on the cover of the Wheaties Box, was reduced to crowd-funding to pay for her medical bills. Unlike the average American, she was able to beat her goal. NYT (Gift Article): Mary Lou Retton Crowdfunded Her Medical Debt, Like Many Thousands of Others.

+ Smell Test: “The resulting program can, given a molecule’s structure, predict how it will smell as a combination of the existing odor labels.” Computers Are Learning to Smell. (It’s only a matter of time before your new AI companion suggests that you take a shower.)

+ Turf Toehold: “After New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers tore his left Achilles on the turf at MetLife Stadium on Sept. 11, NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell called on owners to convert all 30 stadiums to grass. In subsequent interviews with players, league and union officials, along with unaffiliated experts, ESPN worked to understand whether Howell’s request is a possibility, why the two sides are interpreting their shared data so differently and whether plans for the 2026 World Cup will provide a more agreeable way forward.” Inside the NFL turf debate. (As any longtime reader of NextDraft knows, I’m pro grass.)

+ Solving for Hup, Two, Three, Four: “‘If the Department of Defense schools were a state, we would all be traveling there to figure out what’s going on,’ said Martin West, an education professor at Harvard.” NYT: Who Runs the Best U.S. Schools? It May Be the Defense Department.

+ Flip Off: “A large team of researchers affiliated with multiple institutions across Europe, has found evidence backing up work by Persi Diaconis in 2007 in which he suggested tossed coins are more likely to land on the same side they started on, rather than on the reverse.” Flipped coins found not to be as fair as thought.