The way I see it...

[Go Budaw]

Is that the decision for whether or not (and how) college football and the NFL happen this fall is, more or less, going to be made by MLB in the coming weeks with how they handle things.

If they decide to completely shut down the season for a limited-interaction sport that is played in warm to downright hot weather for 80% of its season, its going to be very difficult for a cold weather sport that will take place in front of way more spectators per game to move forward with a season with fans. And it probably wouldn’t move forward at all, considering that football features 4 times as many athletes and personnel that occupy a closer proximity to one another both on and off the field.

If MLB does decide to move forward with an abbreviated season in Arizona (which seems to be their only option at this point), it seems that it will be with no fans and involve a quarantine of all players for the duration of the season. The quarantine part would be very difficult to replicate for NCAA football, a little less so for the NFL but still quite a chore. Football still may not happen even if MLB decides to move forward, but there may be a small sliver of hope if they do have a baseball season.

In any case, its going to be very much worth paying attention to the final decision about the MLB season, because it is very likely going to have far reaching ramifications for other sports.

 

[57stratdawg]

IMO, the NCAA and the NFL aren’t very comparable. The NFL has 32 owners and a players association. They can get pretty much every decision maker on a single call if required.

The NCAA has hundreds of University Presidents, Athletic Directors, Governors and Commissioners all with input. That is going to be incredibly challenging. What is the PAC12 Commissioner suppose to do if Gavin Newsome says California isn’t hosting football games this fall. What happens if two LSU players test positive the week before we play them?

NFL seems more likely to me than college this fall. Neither seems likely to have packed stadiums unless a vaccine rolls out this summer.

 

[ronpolk]

IMO, the NCAA and the NFL aren’t very comparable. The NFL has 32 owners and a players association. They can get pretty much every decision maker on a single call if required.

The NCAA has hundreds of University Presidents, Athletic Directors, Governors and Commissioners all with input. That is going to be incredibly challenging. What is the PAC12 Commissioner suppose to do if Gavin Newsome says California isn’t hosting football games this fall. What happens if two LSU players test positive the week before we play them?

NFL seems more likely to me than college this fall. Neither seems likely to have packed stadiums unless a vaccine rolls out this summer.

I agree with this. Could easily see NFL this fall but no college.

 

[fishwater99]

I agree with this. Could easily see NFL this fall but no college.

And the NFL would be with no fans, too. I don’t see CFB happening this fall.

 

[Seinfeld]

I agree with a lot of your premise in that if baseball can’t figure it out, good luck with the other leagues that have more players, more fans, more personnel to run a game, and infinitely more direct contact between players.

This is just me, but it’s just hard for me to envision a scenario come Sept where the global economy’s more or less in the tank, people are still out of work at an alarming rate, and people are still dying from this virus, yet we decide to go ahead and play some football. Not being judgmental or even expressing a view one way or another. It’s just hard for me to see it happening

 

[patdog]

It's not the economy that's going to keep us from playing football, although we're going to be in a recession then. It's the virus. You just can't throw 60,000 people into a tight space for 4 hours in multiple locations all over the country and not expect some major virus outbreaks to happen.

 

[57stratdawg]

I agree. Even if we’re testing everyone that enters the stadium, that’s several million test each weekend. That seems unreasonable to me.

Also, they want to really ramp up contact tracing. I don’t see how that will work at a football game. If 1 person at DWS tests positive, is that going to be 10,000 people that suddenly are asked to self quarantine for 2 weeks?