Delay of game

Sports will have to wait for now

In athletics, we push on. Through pain and injury. Through loss and grief. Through the worst conditions, the most uneven playing fields. Through failure. Through politics. Through critics. Through disagreements.

As athletes, we train. We rise before the sun, run another mile, lift another set, shoot another 100, prepare once again. We come back from injury. We embrace resilience. We work, we don’t whine. We fear nothing.

As competitors, we sacrifice. And adapt. We know that toughness starts not with the might of our muscle, but with the mastery of our mindsets. We don’t just play by the rules, we recite them. We don’t just follow the discipline, we respect it. We don’t just trudge along blindly, we have a mission. That’s why this is so agonizing. Staying at home, and standing down, goes against everything we have conditioned our brains to do since we accepted our identities as competitors, fighters and survivors.

I understand the cancellations because of the coronavirus. I respect the medical professionals who have studied diseases and viruses, pandemics and precautions. I feel empathy for the leaders making impossible, unprecedented decisions.

I am also lost at sea, rudderless. My life revolves around sports. I start every day by going to the gym. What should I do now?

To stay away (if I so choose) feels as

unhealthy as life can possibly get. One of my fun runs has been canceled; what about the other three I have planned for April?

I have kids who play sports. What should we do now?

I also work in sports, covering star athletes and their games. I had cleared my entire personal calendar from April 18 to June 21, anticipating a Milwaukee Bucks playoff run for the ages. And I wondered about a dream Green Bay Packers' draft for former Wisconsin players Jonathan Taylor and maybe Chris Orr. I was in Madison on Wednesday working on a story on the hardscrabble basketball Badgers.

In my most sacred of sporting months, March, the calendar ahead is full of question marks.

And why? For something a lot of us haven't personally seen yet.

That's also why this is so agonizing. In sports there is always an enemy.

The favorite. The coddled. The spoiled. The reigning champion. The arrogant. The entitled. The cheater.

And then every athlete has the enemy within: Doubt. Insecurity. Aging. Fading. Complacency.

There is always someone to fight. Or something to fight for.

We can see these enemies. We can name them. We can plaster them on a punching bag or a baseball and swing as hard as we can.

Now we have absolutely no control over the coronavirus and no picture of what we are fighting for. We take a seat, where none of us belong and few of us have ever been. And it feels not just uncomfortable. It feels *wrong*.

In athletics, we are used to uniting the world beyond the sidelines. After terrorist attacks on our country, after devastating weather disasters, after our own divisions. We find common ground to conquer the enemy and then we are Boston Strong. We don't just … sit down. We stand together.

This is not just the mindset of the athlete but all those who love athletics – the sports fans, who come out and support, with their presence, with their pocketbooks.

There is no sports unity now with everyone on the disabled list.

I can't believe it.

Have we been robbed of one last chance to see Markus Howard in a Marquette uniform? After the run the Badgers had, is this really how this is going to end? How are we supposed to celebrate the end of winter with no scheduled Brewers opening day? And can we event tailgate – with six feet of distance between all of us?

I can't even think about the Tokyo Olympics.

And yet – none of this worries me as much as the concern for all our doctors and nurses, nurse practitioners and pharmacists. They could be overwhelmed if this turns in to a national crisis.

I am really worried about my neighbors and friends and family, who have to go to doctor's offices and hospital professional buildings, for treatment and follow up care, where they could be exposed to something else that could hurt them more.

I am heartbroken for the nearly 5,000 lives lost worldwide, and how that has affected families.

While I am eager to see if Giannis Antetokounmpo will lead the smallmarket Bucks to a glorious championship moment, I have to remember that what we are all dealing with is no game, and not something we can just push through.

The mentality for this is different. What's best for everyone is that the games can wait.

RICK WOOD / MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL Attendance was restricted at the WIAA boys and girls playoffs, including a sparse crowd at Thursday's game between Milwaukee Academy of Sciences and Racine Prairie at West Allis Hale.

AP A Platteville fan had his pick of seats Thursday at a WIAA Division 3 girls semifinal game against Arcadia at the Resch Center.