IN JEOPARDY! football needs bubble . . . or else
require a bubble for the players, and that even then, it may be impossible to put on the sport at all this year.
“Unless players are essentially in a bubble — insulated from the community and they are tested nearly every day — it would be very hard to see how football is able to be played this fall,” Fauci told CNN.
“If there is a second wave, which is certainly a possibility and which would be complicated by the predictable flu season, football may not happen this year,” he said.
At this point, predictions about a second wave are just educated guesses, although the United States is still in the middle of its first wave. Daily cases are increasing. But Fauci’s comments mean a radically reimagined NFL, and a death knell for the 2020 college football season.
While it would obviously be a challenge, the NFL could put 32 teams with 50 players each in a bubble. There are nearly five times that many college teams in FBS alone, with far more players on each team. And the NFL has already ruled out a bubble anyway, with the league’s chief medical officer calling the concept not “practical or appropriate.” On Thursday, that doctor, Allen Sills, responded to Fauci.
“Dr. Fauci has identified the important health and safety issues,” Sills said in a statement to ESPN. “We will be flexible and adaptable in this environment to adjust to the virus as needed.”
Several NFL players have already tested positive for the coronavirus, including stars Von Miller and Ezekiel Elliott. Miller told the Washington Post that his lungs still haven’t recovered from the virus.