COVID Conundrum
Eagles upset at postponement vs COVID-riddled Football Team
The NFL buckled to pressure about player safety Friday and rescheduled three games due to COVID-19 outbreaks, including the Eagles’ weekend date with the virusravaged Washington Football Team.
They are the first COVID-related postponements of the season.
The Eagles now take on WFT Tuesday at 7 p.m. instead of 1 p.m. on Sunday. The game has postseason ramifications for both are 6-7 this season, the WFT in the seventh and final playoff spot due to tiebreakers.
Though the Eagles aren’t happy about the change they can benefit from it. Quarterback Jalen Hurts will have a couple more days to heal from an ankle sprain and the chances of the Eagles catching the virus from the WFT almost certainly will be diminished. Twenty-two players were on Washington’s COVID list Friday including five defensive starters and quarterback Taylor Heinicke. At this point, the Eagles don’t need to get close to a potential super spreader event.
“The NFL has informed our team that Sunday’s game against the Washington Football Team at Lincoln Financial Field has been postponed to Tuesday,” read a statement furnished by the Eagles. “We will communicate with our fans in the coming days regarding pertinent gameday adjustments.”
The Eagles are furious about having their schedule disrupted at the last second. And not just this weekend. They still host the New York Giants the following Sunday. That means preparing for two games in six days. In three weekends the Eagles oppose the WFT at FedEx Field.
Publicly and privately the Eagles are unhappy with the schedule changes partly because they’ve adhered closely to the league’s COVID protocols beginning with vaccinations. Almost all of the players, coaches and staff are vaccinated. The reward for voluntarily shifting into enhanced protocols to stay safe this week to get ahead of the outbreak is less recovery time to take on a fully rested Giants club.
“So, we have to suffer, and compromise our schedule because of another team’s mistake?” Eagles defensive captain Rodney McLeod tweeted. “Make it make sense! Smh. At the end of the day, it is what it is. The stage is set, let’s fill the LINC come Tuesday Night.”
Defensive end Ryan Kerrigan, who played the previous 10 seasons with Washington was unable to hide his concern for some of the guys he’s been close with.
“My first thought is I just hope all the guys are OK,” Kerrigan said. “And I hope whatever they’re feeling hopefully their symptoms aren’t bad and they’re healthy. And I hope that’s the end of it. You don’t want to see any team going through this especially with these important games coming up. You want to see each team at their full capacity.”
Players must test negative twice with at least 24 hours between tests to be come off the COVID list.
In addition to the Eagles game, the NFL changed two other starting dates. The COVID-infested Cleveland Browns (7-6) host the Las Vegas Raiders (6-7) Monday at 5 p.m. instead of Sunday. The Seattle Seahawks (5-8) hit the road to play the Los Angeles Rams (9-4) Tuesday at 7 p.m., not Sunday.
The Browns had 25 players or coaches on their COVID reserve list Friday, including head coach Kevin Stefanski and quarterbacks Baker Mayfield and Case Keenum. Eleven starters were on the list at some point this week. Before the rescheduling, Mayfield blasted the league for being hypocritical in statements about putting player safety first. The Rams had about 16 players on the COVID list.
Before the change in playing dates, Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni shot down questions at his Friday presser about the impact a scheduling change might have.
“Obviously, we have plans and everything like that, but we’re not going to get into that,” Sirianni said. “We’ll be ready.”