It wasn't quite 'Play ball!' but I'll happily hear it that way.
When Dr. Anthony Fauci, the suddenly famous director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, spoke Wednesday on the Snapchat show “Good Luck America” that there's a path for sports to return sooner rather than later, he did so unambiguously and unapologetically.
“There’s a way of doing that,” Dr. Fauci opened. “Nobody comes to the stadiums. Put them in big hotels, wherever you want to play. Keep them very well-surveilled, but have them tested like every week, and make sure they don’t wind up infecting each other or their families, and just let them play the season out.”
There it is. Just like that. And now, all that's missing is the big PNC Park cannon-blast. Or Sid stickhandling across a McDonald's arch. Or Styx piping up with, 'Oh, mama ...'
OK, maybe not. But it's unmistakably the beginning of the end of wondering if we'll have professional sports play out in 2020, and I mean as soon as this summer.
Wait. At least hear me out.
The two greatest obstacles in sports returning through the coronavirus pandemic are, as I see them:
1. Reality.
People are still dying. People are still getting sick. While progress is being made, it's not at the point yet where we can be sure medical facilities won't be overwhelmed by even a localized outbreak. This is why we're still staying home, why there's still uncertainty.
2. Perception.
These two concepts actually can coexist. Heck, this one often has the most influential impact.
And the perception to which I refer is the one rooted in little more than fatalism. Meaning that it'd be unconscionable for sports to return in any form because -- gasp -- how dare anyone get on with any facet of life. Or that it'd be insensitive or impractical to make any arrangements for sports that might appear to be favoritism toward the million-dollar athletes.
This was blown to bits by Dr. Fauci. Right on the spot. He offered in those few words up there a get-out-of-jail-free card to the NFL, NHL, Major League Baseball and all of the top sports organizations. Again, he didn't do so in the medical sense, but he most assuredly did in the perception sense. But that matters so very much in this circumstance.
Now, from there, this comes next:
Can you believe it? Chu, Yu-Hsien's 3 homer game, including a walk off homer in the 12th inning.
What a night!
Get an account and watch #TAIWAN baseball on #CPBLTV ⚾https://t.co/MhisEVKoPa⚾#StayHome and watch #CPBL#Unilions #RakutenMonkeys pic.twitter.com/rsbYIGGJhn
— CPBL 中華職棒 (@CPBL) April 15, 2020
That, my friends, occurred just yesterday. In Taiwan. In front of no fans except those constructed of cardboard, plus a single mannequin to make it all the funnier. Otherwise, it's just another walkoff blast, just another announcer freaking out, just another mob scene at home plate.
Did anyone get ill?
We'll find out. In Taiwan, unlike China, there's an excellent chance of real transparency.
Will it work?
We'll find that out, too. Not just there, either. South Korea's top baseball league will get going in five days with preseason games, another couple weeks till the real thing. Others will soon follow.
As I've been writing for a couple weeks now, and as Dr. Fauci spoke, it's all about the controlled setting. Frequent testing. Observed isolation. With MLB's Arizona plan, it'll basically be a baseball biosphere. Same goes for the NHL's North Dakota/New Hampshire/Saskatoon plan. If there's a firm, fully endorsed plan put together, one specific to each sport, there's no reason whatsoever that a success overseas can't be a success here on our own continent.
Man, what a boost that'd be, too. Let's not leave that out.
The reason they're playing ball overseas, so close to the origin of the coronavirus, is the same reason we'd want to play it here: We love sports. They're part of who we are. They'd be a distraction, as some have described, but they'd represent that much more with the resumption of some degree of normalcy.
Stay healthy, you Rakuten Monkeys. We're all counting on you.
• Thumb back up and watch that Rakuten video to the end. You'll see our heroes line up at the baseline once the game's done and do the traditional bow to both sides of the stadium ... the empty stadium.
• Can our sports handle empty stadiums and arenas?
Not for any sustained period, of course. In MLB, for example, anywhere from a quarter to a third of a team's revenues are stadium-based, meaning tickets, concessions, parking, etc. Take away that percentage of any team's budget, and it'll do massive damage. And that's to say nothing of lost sponsorships and other streams that get hit hard by an economic collapse.
This is where it'll be paramount that owners and players cooperate with a full understanding that the perennial 10-digit pie is half-eaten right out of the refrigerator. That won't be an issue in the NHL, where players don't collect salary into the Stanley Cup playoffs, but it will in baseball, where I've been told players will be presented with pay cuts as steep as 40 percent.
No one will like that, but what are the alternatives?
Rocket up to Mars and try a season there?
• The Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw apparently is ready to launch that rocket.
"I just don't see that happening," he told SportsNet LA this week, referring to MLB's Arizona plan. "I'm not going to be away from my family and not see them for four-and-a-half months. I just talked about how much Cooper changes, you know, over one week, so to miss four months of his life right now, I'm just not going to do it."
Cooper's his infant son, born in January.
"And there's a lot of other things that are just wrong with that proposal. But it's not to say that we can't go somewhere with it. It's just that there's a lot of things that have to be figured out before I go quarantine myself with my team for four months."
Kershaw's salary for 2020 is $31 million. He'll walk away from that right after Vin Scully runs out of awesome anecdotes.
• As a reminder, the earliest sports can return is mid-May, per existing CDC guidelines. Plus, in every case, a period of two, probably three weeks will be required for the athletes to prepare. Just so there aren't any crazy ideas.
• As for the NFL, the 2020 schedule's still set to emerge May 9, though the Washington Post reported yesterday alternative plans are already being weighed, including a shortened schedule and the possibility of no crowds or partial crowds.
The latter's seldom mentioned by anyone, but it could become big. Epidemiologists often warn against the 'bomb' effect of having a virus spread massively through a single wave, so picturing 100,000-plus jamming into Jerry World down in Dallas seems hopeful, at least at this stage. The easiest mitigation against that, shy of a total ban, is limiting the numbers and spreading out through the seats.
• Colleges and scholastic sports ... that's different. I wonder about these.
Not that they come with greater or lesser risks but, rather, that we're in unknown territory when it comes to legalities. In the pros, all the technicalities are washed out in the collective bargaining. No one can sue anyone for anything, really. But in the NCAA and below, the athletes aren't paid, aren't part of any union and ... ugh, we'll see.
• Sorry for the lack of sports this morning. Got my hopes up a bit here.
We'll get there. We will.