Will the 2020 NFL season be canceled due to COVID19?

Originally posted by Niners_D:

On another note here's an idea if the season gets dramatically cut, making it wild because, what the hell nothing is normal this year...

-All teams play 3 games, one against each division opponent
-All 32 teams make the playoffs with seeding determined by total wins followed by point differential
-Seeding is done regardless of conference or division, #1 plays #32, #2 plays #31 etc, with a single elimination format. 32 teams down to 16, 8, 4, 2

Damn that's the worst thing I have heard to date

The only realistic way I see it happening during what could be the most intense time of Covid to date...

Kraft/insert NFL owner here... uses his connections to secure weekly testing for NFL players and coaches. Games will be without fans but televised so they can make up revenue that way. Maybe there are mid season breaks or an abrieviated season so that players only have to quarantine for so long. If a quarter/mid season break then everyone has to be tested and do a two week quarantine to come back and be eligible to play again.

For the amount of money on the line for both Owners and Players, I could see teams treated like faberge eggs for the entire season. As a player, would you rather give up half or an entire season of money making potential and grow a year older or make the money now with strict limits on social interaction including family. We are gonna be quarantined regardless come the fall, unless drastically different measures are taken there will be another wave... might as well make money off it since the viewing audience will be as large as its ever been.

But unless bootcamp like measures are taken to isolate players and keep the NFL out of any lawsuits related to negligence in allowing players to play... an un-abbreviated season will be almost impossible. All it takes is one infected locker room and the NFL will be forced to shut down, so how much money does it take for players to go live on a metaphorical island in order to carry out a semblance of a season. Thats a question for the NFLPA and NFL to figure out and probably wont have an answer in time for the season.

It's a bummer to say but I just don't see any possibility (short of a miracle vaccine) that there will be games played this year. This sucks

Having fans on the cam @ the draft may be a preview of what's to come when it's time for kickoff.

Been thinking of a reasonable way they would be able to induce crowd noise in a realistic way. They're minds are churning for sure.

Keep in mind that in this league,...billionaires are the ones calling all the shots.

I don't think it's the players and coaching staff that are the issue... It's the fans

It will be a balance of what makes them more money and I really only see it two ways...

A. Empty stadiums. players and coaching staff are tested before each game and extensive sanitation, etc. This is difficult because they will have to refund season ticket holders and lots of revenue lost from stadium concessions. However, maybe TV ad revenue goes up...

B. Delay season for a month or two. Football can be played in any season,no reason it has to start in August.

There is new antibody testing, test kits, and sanitation methods coming out practically daily. I find it hard to believe that there is not a practical solution by August/September.

Originally posted by CatchMaster80:

Originally posted by Goatie:
Yeah, they will have to isolate all players and coaches etc from the rest of the world in their stadiums, gyms, practice fields and fly them on private jets too and from games and keep them isolated at games with no fans or people who have not been isolated in a football bubble.

If even one player tests positive on a team then all the players would need to be isolated for about 2 weeks. That could mean suspending all games for 2 weeks. I don't see how the can think about playing until there is a vaccine or at least a very effective treatment that lessens the severity of the virus. A fairly realistic timeline for a vaccine if they developed one next month (optimistic)
- small sample size tests on humans (1-2 months)
- large sample size tests (4-6 months)
- drug companies ramp up manufacturing in large quantities (1-2 months) Not sure how long it would take to do this since some drugs are harder to mfgr. Remember we had a shortage of the shingles vaccine for over a year because it was hard to make.
- last step is getting it distributed to all the pharmacies and doctors so it can be administered. (probably at least a month but it could take longer ) Look how long it's taking to get test kits shipped.

These time lines for testing were given out by Fauci and other health experts. If you take the best case scenario we are looking at January or February for adequate amounts of vaccine to be made and distributed. That's assuming they develop a vaccine next month. Add a month for every month delay.

I agree with what you say.

There is also no guarantees of a viable vaccine nor cure any time soon and there are plenty in America that dont want to be locked down so I am not optimistic for the season to start and run through to the superbowl,

It'll get cancelled, and then we'll have to do another virtual draft. Two draft classes and no football

Originally posted by DonnieDarko:
It'll get cancelled, and then we'll have to do another virtual draft. Two draft classes and no football

Well at least it will make up us getting only 5 or so players this year. Now we can work on the OLine and CBs.

But you are right the US isnt going to be clear of the virus by August because too many are too soft to be locked down for a couple of months and there wont be no vaccine or cure or Jesus Christ popping up anytime soon

The NFL will cancel out Covid-19 as a reason to end the 2020 season #BookIt

I plan to be tailgating at Levi's come week 1

I think it could work if no fans are in the stadium for the first part of the season. It'll be weird but that's the best option for the season to happen.

Originally posted by gold49digger:
I think it could work if no fans are in the stadium for the first part of the season. It'll be weird but that's the best option for the season to happen.

The NFL will not risk it nor should they

I think it will end up being a shortened season. But if idiots keep extending it by going out to beaches it will only stay longer

Originally posted by SanDiego49er:

Originally posted by NickMullensBDN:
All I know is that know one knows anything (did I use the corrects knows).

I have always lived my life believing that the truth lies somewhere in the middle of over reaction to under reaction. Unfortunately in today's media/world the over reaction is what gets reported.

That being said I keep hearing people say no sports or concerts or big events until a vaccine. Why is everyone so sure we will develop a vaccine? Heck we don't have a vaccine for the common cold. Most diseases we don't have a vaccine/cure for.

Everyone just assuming in two years we will have a vaccine are dreaming. What happens if in two years we don't. Do we just continue to cancel stuff.

At some point we have to accept the reality of the situation we have put ourselves in. And I say we cause everyone in the world has a hand in this. We have f**ked this world up for years and have to live with whatever comes our way.

There is a lot of truth in there.

They will be a cure/vaccine for COVID-19 because it has a stable genome. They are minimal/low mutation rate for the virus so a vaccine will be effective once developed (ie Polio).

The cold has no vaccines because they are hundreds of different viruses that give you the common cold a vaccine would need to be developed for each one not to mention cold has such mild symptoms which can be cured with prescription and OTC drugs

If no vaccine if we practice enough social distancing it will die out like the 1918 flu pandemic.

Originally posted by DonnieDarko:
It'll get cancelled, and then we'll have to do another virtual draft. Two draft classes and no football

If the NFL season gets cancelled, it likely means that there wouldn't be an NCAA season either. May not be a draft to hold next year if all that went down.

Originally posted by ritz126:
They will be a cure/vaccine for COVID-19 because it has a stable genome. They are minimal/low mutation rate for the virus so a vaccine will be effective once developed (ie Polio).

The cold has no vaccines because they are hundreds of different viruses that give you the common cold a vaccine would need to be developed for each one not to mention cold has such mild symptoms which can be cured with prescription and OTC drugs

If no vaccine if we practice enough social distancing it will die out like the 1918 flu pandemic.

Don't you mean it is possible there will be a cure for SARS-Cov-2 because it has a stable genome? There has been no vaccine ever made for a corona type virus. The difficult is that there has been no pathfinder vaccine developed that scientists can piggy back on and hence reduce the time to create the vaccine.

You are right the only known to remove the virus from society is to practice enough social distancing like the 1918 flu pandemic. To remove the virus in the shortest possible time you require to strictly lock society down. However, it appears that there are two many Americans who do not want to cooperate with lockdowns for a couple of months and the government is not supporting people who have become unemployed by lockdown measures so you will not have a significant drop in new infections to make the virus go away for this football season.

As of today the US had close to 2,500 deaths and 30,000 new cases in the past 24 hours but your federal and many state politicians want to just start opening things back up. The problem is if you open up too soon all you do is get greater new infection spikes and then deaths follow, then increase as the health care systems become overwhelmed and then you have to lockdown again with the cycle continuing over and over until you bite the bullet and have a long lockdown. You cannot avoid the inevitable no matter what people think their rights might be.

Right this football season off. No way there will be a cure by July for the camp and same for August for the beginning of the season. The new infection rate will still be too high for it to start.

Can you imagine one player getting infected if the NFL says it is ok to start the season and then he sues? Imagine multiple players following suit? That is a huge potentiality and I can guarantee each team's lawyers will be providing advice only those lines to each team with the NFL's lawyers doing the same.

So do you think the insurance companies will sell policies to cover the teams and NFL for this? No Effing way!

No insurance No NFL! The teams and NFL wont take it on themselves to pay their own money to compensate players who get infected while playing football especially if they get severe symptoms and then imagine if there was permanent damage to a player who contracted the disease? $$$$$$$$$. Who is going to pay?

No chance of a season this year. If only Americans had the fortitude to stay at home for a couple of months and cooperate with what the top experts have been saying then thing might well be different.