NHL GETS PROPS FOR PLAN TO PLAY DURING PANDEMIC
The rules are extreme — if not excessive.
Handshakes and high-fives are prohibited. The same goes for fist bumps. During games, you can’t reuse towels. After games, you can’t use the spa, sauna or steam room to soak those sore muscles. Want to take the elevator to your hotel room? Make sure to use your knuckle or elbow — not your finger — to push the buttons. And remember that talking is strictly off limits once the doors close.
This is what life inside the “bubble” could look like when the NHL moves toward Phase
4 of its plan to conclude the season.
The 47-page return-to-play document, which covers everything from daily tests and disinfecting dressing rooms to preparing team meals and the proper way of behaving in the hotel, still has to be agreed upon by the NHL Players’ Association and the league board of governors. And with a failure-to-comply penalty of a lost draft choice, it might sound a tad draconian.
But according to an infectious disease physician, the strict guidelines are what separate the NHL from the NBA and Major League Baseball in being able to safely crown a champion sometime this year.
“I’m impressed. I think they’ve thought long and hard about this,” said Dr. Sumon Chakrabarti, who is based out of Trillium Health Partners in Mississauga, Ont. “This plan could work. It is certainly a possibility. I think the chance of the NBA or MLB (returning) right now is very, very unlikely. But I think this is a good idea.”
Chakrabarti adds that he’s a hockey fan. A Habs fan, to be specific. He wants hockey back. But he wants it done safely. While the three North American major sports have been in a race to see who will be the first to resume its season, there is a concern that safety hasn’t been the No. 1 priority.
Teams, whether it’s the Tampa Bay Lightning or St. Louis Blues, keep shutting down their training facilities because of positive coronavirus tests. In the past week, nine NBA players tested positive. The Blue Jays moved their training camp to Toronto after an outbreak of cases at their training facility in Dunedin, Fla.
With each step forward, the coronavirus keeps pushing the leagues back two or three steps. Chakrabarti understands the skepticism in returning, in moving too fast when the virus is still spreading at an uncontrollable level in the United States. Most of his colleagues, he said, are against the NHL returning at this time.
Why not wait? Why bring so many players to Canada? Why endanger Toronto and Edmonton, believed to be the hub cities? According to Chakrabarti, there is no danger. If anything, the bubble might be the safest place to be in the country.
Once you’re in, there’s no getting out. But once you’re in, there’s also less chance of the virus coming in and starting an outbreak.
“The daily testing seems excessive to me,” said Chakrabarti. “We don’t even do that in outbreak settings. But that said, once people fly to the bubble and they are without symptoms for 10 or 14 days, they are now at the risk of acquisition of infection — if not lower — than the rest of the Toronto or Edmonton community, which is right now quite low.”
The NHL reported that as of Monday, more than 2,900 COVID-19 tests have been administered with only 23 returning confirmed positive. That’s a relatively low number. And that’s with most of the cases coming out of Florida, Arizona and other hot spots where players are currently training.
Unlike the NBA, which based its hub in Orlando, Fla., where cases of COVID-19 keep spiking, or MLB, which is playing games all over the U.S., the NHL could not have found two safer cities than Toronto and Edmonton.
“Yes, there are COVID cases in Toronto, but compared to what it was before, we are in a much better situation,” said Chakrabarti. “Compared to every other place that was looked at — L.A., Vegas, Dallas — even if they were in a bubble there, it would be very, very difficult for the support staff not to be infected.
“With the MLB, there’s too much movement. And with the NHL, they’ve at least been able to decrease the amount of movement. The NBA is playing in Florida and yes, you’re playing in a bubble. But what happens if someone breaks their ankle and has to be sent to the hospital? They’re going to be sent somewhere where they’re already overloaded with COVID patients.
“And you have the optics of these players playing in an area where you’re using resources to test them — and right outside of them is suffering. There’s nothing in Canada that is anywhere close to that.”
And yet, there’s no guarantee the NHL will pull this off. Chakrabarti understands that better than anyone. But he also believes that if you’re going to give it a try, the NHL has found the best way to do it.
“You have certain situations where you have a reasonable chance of being successful. And I think with the NHL plan, there is a reasonable chance,” he said.