I Received the Dreaded Text - No Football, Hope he's wrong
I never wanted to post as I am getting this info 3rd hand - a mid level guy at the AD. Anyways, it's the most important developments I have some limited access to regarding football.
Go ahead and shoot the messenger. I hope it doesn't go this route.
Per a contact at the AD, I was texted - "It's a no go."
I asked him to clarify - He said, "As of right now, there is no path to the fall season happening."
I asked for details and if it was still a possibility - He said, "Expect a statement next week from the B1G that everything is on hold, but the fall season is [as of right now] not happening.
I asked about the spring season - "Maybe, not discussed yet, still trying to pull off a miracle for the fall"
That's all I got. Sorry guys, it's shitty news. I don't think it's definitive, but he has seems really bummed, and actually thinks he might lose his job too and there will be some cuts.
Downvote me to hell, I don't care, it all sucks anyways.
What's fascinating about this is how absolute moronic dickheads just assume that because they are in possession of some "facts" that they know as much about it as the experts. This is a unique and amazing American trait. A kind of weird-ass populism that borders on delusion. Trump denouncing the CDC when he didn't like their take on a return to school the other day bordered on outright madness--the emperor declaring that the moon was cheese or the earth flat in the face of the evidence. Any other country, especially a parliamentary democracy, might have seen him out looking for new work a day or so later. . . I've given talks on climate change (I'm an ecologist) and had people come up and argue with me that I was wrong because (for example) there were cycles of warm weather in other periods, etc. These people aren't necessarily stupid--they can quote their little facts. But the lack of respect for people who have studied something, anything closely is breathtaking.
At one time these attitudes bolstered a kind of radical democracy--people believed, rightly, in their ability to reason for themselves. Now they fuel tyranny and psychosis.
What's the difference between a "little fact" and a big one? Asking for a friend.
Relevant example.
“Warming and cooling periods have happened numerous times throughout earths history” is a little fact.
Why? Bcause, although technically true, it’s said to give reason to ignore hundreds of other, just as sound facts that point to the larger and more important truth (big fact, the thing actually being discussed) .... that humans are dumping so much CO2 in the air that the earths temps are rising at an astounding rate that is faster than their little truth.
Summation: little truth is a technically true statement, typically on that doesn’t really apply to the discussion at hand, and is meant to provide a solid footing one can use to ignore the other bigger truth being discussed
Classic tactic of those who have no critical thinking skills.
there has been alot of non-scientific (anecdotal and made up) bullshit posted on this board over the past 4 months, but this one is a doozy.
This is not surprising if true, and to some extent better to make a decision now vs playing this out every week until the sht hits the fan (which seems more like “when” than “if”).
This sucks.
Jives with what I heard from a contact at a Pac12 school last weekend. He says there hasn't been an official declaration from his school on the season yet, but that's because no one wants to be the one to pull the trigger.
Jive Turkey?
It's jibe -- to sail with the wind.
I get that sense from Adam Silver, Gary Bettman and Rob Manfred as well.
Despite all their talk of resuming play, none of them sound particularly convincing that they believe it’s going to happen and are just delaying having to pull the trigger on cancelling the season.
This sucks and I want football, but this would be the correct decision. 1 kid getting sick and dying is way too many.
”If it saves one kid” is a dangerous mindset. I know your heart is in the right place, however. Driving a car is a risk. This virus is a new risk. I know we probably are there yet for this season, but we are going to have to calibrate our lives to compensate for this new risk.
it’s still new and I have no answers - I am deeply sad about the season of 2020 being over before it starts.
we did come up with seatbelts and airbags though didn't we. Don't think many people are talking about eliminating public gatherings and sports forever.
Wear a mask, social distance, small gatherings and we would be were Europe is now. Playing sports.
And let's not forget the inherent dangers of football. The damage concussions do to most players, let alone all the ligament damage, are almost guaranteed. If we're not concerned enough about what those do to the players, the virus is not likely to come close for a young person.
The threat of debilitating injury hasn't stopped the game yet, and that is a possible outcome from every game, virus aside.
If we're being honest.
Another horrible comparison. The game started without pads. At one time they wore no helmets, then leather helmets, then padded helmets, then fuberglass with padding, add face masks, full cage masks, visors, now they are trying to get pressure sensors and better technology for padding...does ANYONE see some form of a pattern here?!? These guys aren’t just playing in shirts and shorts. Seriously, why is this so hard to understand?!
Football players take on a risk to play football, yes. But football on the other hand isn't dangerous to fans, or people 5 miles down the road at the retirement home.
It's not about one kids life. It's about the kids life, the kids future, the kids friends & family's lives and future, it's about the retiree who is being taken care of by a college student who get the virus from a roommate who works with the football players neighbor or some shit like that because this virus spreads!
You wear a mask to protect the community, not yourself. Not playing football is more about protecting the community than it is protecting the players.
You are comparing apples to oranges. Cars are continuously being upgraded with safety features and checks and clearances and testing before they ever hit the road. We are talking about taking a car out and driving without seatbelts or any safety features and going fast with no direction and one eye closed. Not at all the same
Regardless of the safety of the car, driving anywhere has risk. To use your continuously-increasing-in-safety car metaphor, we need continuously increase our understanding of the virus, figure out what acceptable risks are, and let people make informed decisions.
I'm not providing any answers. I will say I'm sad to see a political divide where one should not be. I imagine we are all a little stir crazy, on edge, bored, scared, sad, etc. Hang in there guys!
Looks like for sure, we son't lose a single game this season!
Wish I was more confident that no football will convince people this is serious.
Wear. A. Mask.
"If you want football, wear a mask." Might have been a motivating message for some people. It was for me.
Actually, in fact, it makes me more stubborn the other way. If they are going to cancel sports, which involve the single group least likely to have negative outcomes from the Covid, just to "be safe" when these kids are going to get it anyway sooner or later), then screw the arbitrary stupid rules.
If I was a student athlete in my 5th year I'd sue the university for failing to provide a year worth of competition if I couldn't get another season of eligibility, or not enroll this year to preserve that 5th.
Yeah, well, you're a fucking moron... so, yeah.
I wonder what happened between last week's rumors of a regional season and this? It can't be the number of cases, maybe it's the cost of testing & care? Maybe it's the Ivy League?
With OSU pausing workouts, I’m guessing testing is coming back in a very positive way all over the B1G (just not the positive way we wanted).
Yes, it's the Ivy League. Michigan is the Harvard of the West, so they have to follow suit.
Sorry no. Harvard is Michigan of the East.
I asked him how yesterday things seemed possible with all the different plans and today it's suddenly a no go and he just said that all the schools came back with a lot of questions and concerns and the B1G leadership is overwhelmed.
My guess (not from him) - The Ivy League indeed gave other schools concerns and they started bombarding the conference with questions.
Things I've heard from twitter is that RU and UMary are pressing for $$$ even if they don't play, NW and Minn I think Iowa want a division only schedule. I'm sure there are other schools with speicifc demands that are turning this from 50-75% playing last week to 0-25% this week. Just too many asks that they won't be able to appease everyone suffciciently.
Why can't it be the number of cases? They keep spiking exponentially (at least nationwide). Had they plateau'd or even reversed to a decline in the past week, don't you think their sentiment would have been different?
Add in the fact that a ton of players keep testing positive. It seemed reasonable to think that some kids would test positive when coming to campus but that as they got regular testing and were isolated, they should have quickly been able to stamp this out. Instead, nope.
Last weeks rumors were completely unfounded and untrue. It was a baseless rumor thrown out there to test the viability of a few programs playing in the fall. It was never going to happen.
Anyone surprised by this has been living under a rock. Or in utter denial of reality.
Still sucks though.
We live in one of the few countries where this thing is still spinning wildly out of control and people are still refusing to do the least amount possible to try to slow things down.
So yeah, this may have been avoidable to som extent but this will take a lot of the country by surprise
Astounding, isn’t it?
It’s like their house caught on fire and they decided to not call the fire department because they were upset at the thought of all the water damage the hoses would cause.
Now they’re shocked their whole house is engulfed in flames and angrily demanding to know why didn’t anyone do anything earlier to prevent it from getting this bad.
Only pussies call the fire department.
If you stay in the burning house long enough, you'll become immune to the flames.
Herd immolation immunity.
Double post. For vagina.
And defiantly sitting inside the burning house with a can of gasoline to protest their 'freedom rights'.
All we had to do was lay low for a couple months and morons, one in particular, cocked it up. Now we're all out of the pool.
This sadly is not true and takes a very Western mindset.
Yes, our traditional peers in Europe and certain parts of Asia have COIVD seemingly under control. I am happy to agree that we should be trying to match this standard.
However, there are numerous parts of the World with really bad outbreaks going on. It doesn't make our situation better, it just is an observation.
We had FAR more resources at our disposal than most of the other countries who are also currently having massive spikes.
A lot of people just didn’t want to use these resources if it inconvenienced themselves in the slightest.
Perhaps I should have worded my response better to make my tone less whatever, I totally agree with your response and it does not contradict my intended meaning.
To be clear, the US response considering our resources has been completely shameful. Many, many have died who should not have. Many, many more will. At this point, I think we will be lucky to escape with less than 300K deaths and I do not think 500k is out of the equation. We were never going to have near 0 deaths because we aren't an island, but there is no reason we shouldn't be Germany's equal.
I am incredibly touchy about the "this is only happening to us" only because two of the countries I have lived in outside the US are both having their own very, very bad outbreaks right now. I have multiple heartbreaking discussions with friends in one in particularly that acknowledge that their hospitals basically cannot take anymore people. To hear that fear in friend, shit man. I just feel like the "this is only happening to the US" erases that pain.
TLDR: I feel incredibly helpless, I fear for friends on multiple continents, I should have been clearer in my original response.
America lacks the most critical resource, however: a general population well-suited for critical thinking.
That's a feature, not a bug.
And we shouldn't be surprised given the dozen or so super-spreader personalities on this board -- they're all pretty much idiots.
I hope they're not UM grads.
That's because a lot of the country is unintelligent and/or refusing to accept reality. People are very stupid. Most of those people are Trump supporters. Yes, I said it.
I said there was almost a 0% chance of college football this fall back in May and it was downvote city. It's not that I'm some Nostradamus, it's just that there's a lot of stupid people in this country.
I haven't weighed in on the board during all of this COVID since things are so divisive. The only thing I want to say is that name calling and labeling people doesn't make things any better.
Petty names like "That School Down South" are generally fun and in the nature of a rivalry. We need to keep in mind that many of the other names we've seen bandied around about our rivals cross the line into downright derogatory and aren't helpful. And that's just a football rivalry. Labeling our political opponents with derogatory names will never help us learn to reach out and listen to each other. Remember, every individual is likely to hold some views we agree with and some we disagree with.
approximately 38% are in utter denial
And that is the same 38% who will refuse to take the vaccine.
It needs to stop, or this will go on indefinitely.
Sorry...just frustrated.
I’m torn because in all those threads where people kept saying “the kids want to play! They are young and healthy enough so it’s no big deal”...I tried arguing with those people saying it’s not that simple and 19 year olds don’t decide the fate of nations.
But then again I also have been thinking that some sort of season should have been possible with enough precautions. But I guess the 2 holiday weekends and summer get togethers are causing things to spike again, so I get the universities caution.
It really sucks because we should have been finished with this disease by now.
My brother and I were just discussing how if we had almost anyone else as president, republican democrat, whatever, this wouldn't even be a debate. If Romney or Kasich were president we'd be coming out the other end of this by now. Alas...
That's laughable, Nancy still would've been in Chinatown in January mocking whomever was in office. It takes more than the President. As someone said above, we have citizens who don't care and don't listen.
Maybe, but the whole political climate would be different in that case, probably less OPENLY contentious. And it does take more than a President, but if we had someone in the highest seat showing a good example this would be a lot less of a thing. Many of the citizens that don't care and don't listen are that way because they've been told not to care and not listen.