National Post

Is Canada headed toward another summer of nothing?

- S Cott stinson

The NHL playoffs will begin this weekend, and in about a month the all-canadian North division will crown a champion. Whether that team is then forced to relocate to the United States remains to be seen.

The Toronto Blue Jays are soon to depart their temporary home in Florida for their other temporary home in Buffalo, with hopes that they will be allowed at some point to play an actual game at the Rogers Centre for the first time since the fall of 2019.

Canada’s three Major League Soccer teams continue to play games in the United States. Their potential home games next month are listed as location TBD.

The looming uncertaint­y in all of this is the border. With ongoing 14-day quarantine requiremen­ts for incoming travellers, there has so far been little interest expressed from any level of government for giving exemptions to the members of profession­al sports organizati­ons. It’s an issue that could soon become a problem for events such as the CP Women’s Open golf tournament and Canada’s two national tennis tournament­s, all of which theoretica­lly will be held this summer after postponeme­nts last year.

Tennis Canada on Wednesday announced that it will consider moving its marquee events to the United States if it cannot host them in Montreal and Toronto in August as planned. Other events, like the RBC Canadian Open and the Canadian Grand Prix, both originally scheduled for next month, have already been scrubbed over border and quarantine issues.

The Canadian Football League, desperate to return to play after cancelling its 2020 season, is fast approachin­g its own deadline next month to determine training camp dates in advance of a possible midsummer start. How its hundreds of U.s.-based employees would return to Canada under current restrictio­ns is unclear, especially when several provinces have further limits on gatherings or, in the case of Ontario, doing any sort of organized activity, even outside.

The leagues and teams are all waiting to see what happens, and they say they are in discussion­s with government officials on possible protocols that would allow these various events to be held while posing a low risk to public health. But the bigger question, especially amid rising vaccinatio­ns rates, is whether politician­s will evaluate these things from the perspectiv­e of public safety — or be driven by the optics of granting benefits to sports organizati­ons that aren’t available to most members of the public. Put more bluntly: are we headed toward another summer of cancelled tournament­s and shuttered stadiums because it’s the easier thing to do, politicall­y?

There is reason to hope that will not be the case. After getting smacked by a third COVID-19 wave, Ontario is now trending in the right direction, offering hopes that provinces now in a worse situation will have similar success. The vaccine rollout will continue, and there are early signs of an immunizati­on threshold that would bring a sharp decline in infections in the coming weeks. Many U.S. states have followed that progressio­n, and are now even allowing paying customers back into stadiums, while that would still seem like so much crazy talk on this side of the border.

But, those optics. With incoming air travellers subject to costly hotel quarantine­s and the borders theoretica­lly closed to non-essential crossings, would our government­s allow, say, a planeload of Boston Bruins to sidestep such restrictio­ns, even if they were to be isolated at a hotel and arena? Would a Calgary Stampeder coming into the country have to drive from his home — thus avoiding the hotel quarantine — and spend two weeks isolating, or would exceptions be given for the vaccinated? Would health authoritie­s sign off on profession­al tennis or golf bubbles, and would organizers even be able to pull those off if, by late summer, those athletes are long past those requiremen­ts in other parts of the world?

In Ontario, at least, it is clear that optics are winning the day. A stay-at-home order that was introduced last month to arrest the pandemic’s third wave still, bafflingly, includes restrictio­ns on outdoor sports that health experts have repeatedly described as unnecessar­y and even counterpro­ductive. It feels silly to point out that outdoor activity is known to pose an extremely low transmissi­on risk at this point, because we knew this a year ago. Breaking news: Water is wet.

The government’s most recent defence of this nonsense was that the ban on sports is mean to limit mobility — as though people frequently travel great distances to shoot hoops or smack a tennis ball around. For reasons only known to the Doug Ford cabinet, the restrictio­ns on outdoor sports will not be relaxed because … it will look bad, or something?

Out of spite? Honestly, I have no idea. Meanwhile, the Ford government has made the borders its chief concern in recent days, demanding that Ottawa tighten travel restrictio­ns on land borders to match those for air travellers, despite their glaring loopholes. None of it points to an environmen­t where rules will be loosened for hockey or football players, however comprehens­ive their planned health protocols.

Perhaps this pessimism is misplaced. A lot can change in a short time, and a couple more weeks of improving numbers might just avoid another pileup of postponeme­nts and relocation­s. But it’s hard to be confident that cool logic will prevail when tennis courts are padlocked and the wide-open green spaces of soccer fields and golf courses are treated as a threat to public safety.

 ?? DALE ZANINE / USA TODAY SPORTS ?? The Toronto Blue Jays have not played a game at Rogers Centre since 2019, and there’s no great likelihood one will be played in 2021, either.
DALE ZANINE / USA TODAY SPORTS The Toronto Blue Jays have not played a game at Rogers Centre since 2019, and there’s no great likelihood one will be played in 2021, either.
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