Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Hyde: Time to consider canceling games.
With coronavirus scare, this seems like one of those times
MIAMI — The first questions on the Tuesday our sports world started to change were common, bookkeeping ones about Miami Heat players injuries. Tyler Herro and Jae Crowder are back, coach Erik Spoelstra said. And Meyers Leonard?
“No update on him,’’ Spoelstra said.
It was all so normal in the daily coverage of a team, you could almost ignore Spoelstra wasn’t on the practice court as usual but at a table 6 feet from reporters. That’s the distance all American sports leagues put into effect Tuesday at the suggestion of the Center for Disease Control.
These are odd times. The questions soon came to Spoelstra and then Heat players about the coronavirus and how to balance work and play for those whose public play is their work.
The issue isn’t this simple separation of players and press. That’s fine. Teams should protect their players however deemed necessary.
But if every pro sports league in America is so understandably worried about the health of players mixing with media, shouldn’t it be equally concerned about the thousands of fans who attend games mixing with each other?
Are leagues putting the greater public at risk having games?
Have we reached the point where the only way games can go on is in empty arenas — if at all?
Sometimes sports are just sports. This seems one of those times. Serie A in Italy was holding soccer games in empty stadiums, before the government halted all games on Monday through April 3. The Indian Wells tennis tournament was canceled. The Ivy League canceled its basketball tournament. The Ohio governor suggested indoor sports games go on without fans.
The drumbeat of common safety is playing against our desire to lead normal lives. Spoelstra talked of attending a third meeting about the virus among Heat officials after this media session.
Guard Goran Dragic said the team passes out hand sanitizer and wipes to players. His native Slovenia has just 15 cases, he said, but its borders are closed to Italy, where the virus is a more common problem.
Everyone talked of washing their hands over and over.
“You wash your hands so much it’s kind of hard to grip the ball,’’ Crowder said.
But a game without fans? You can chuckle at the idea — the sparse fans at Marlins games would be able to sit a safe 6 feet from each other. But no fans would change the fabric of games themselves.
“It’d be weird, probably like practice,’’ Dragic said.
Crowder went a step further.
“I think it’d be tough to get the players to play,’’ he said.
Asked if that was from a health or motivational concern, Crowder said: “You play for the love of it, and you play the game for the fans at a certain level. And you have family. Who am I to tell family they can’t come to the game and watch me play? That’s a weird type of deal for the fans and family.”
It’s a weird time for all of us in sports. Some like to say it puts sports in perspective. But who needs a hurricane, terrorist act or worldwide health issue to put sports in perspective? We’ve dealt with them all in recent years. Sports only matter when all is well around us.
“It’s a little bit scary,’’ Dragic said, noting he has children in school. “But we have enough information that we know how to protect ourselves and lower our risk.”
In some form, the coaches and players are like all of us in waiting to hear what’s next. The professional baseball, hockey, basketball and soccer leagues in America moved in sync to close their locker rooms from media and institute this cone of safety for interviews.
That’s an easy step. The next one would be playing in empty arenas — or not playing games at all for a while.
“This is a tough balance for all of us to manage,’’ Spoelstra said. “We are immersed in the present moment of our work, but we are extremely mindful like everyone around the league and our families of the very serious matter right now.”
Sometimes sports are just sports. Sometimes athletes are just people. To that point, as he left his media interview, Heat center Bam Adebayo advised reporters from a proper distance of at least 6 feet: “You go wash your hands, man.”