Goodell said there will be more virtual meetings and less travel because of the pandemicGETTY IMAGES
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell on Friday said there "will be potential competitive inequities that will be required this season because of the virus and because of the circumstances that we wouldn’t do in other years," according to an interview with Peter King of NBC SPORTS. Goodell continued, "That’s going to be a reality of 2020. If we feel like we have an outbreak, that’s going to be driven by medical decisions -- not competitive decisions." King wrote Goodell "sounded temporarily confident ... like a man who’s doing as much as he can do to ensure the season, somehow, gets played in full." Goodell said he thinks the league's best strategy is "trying not to predict what the circumstances are going to be two weeks in advance, or even a week in advance." King wrote despite everything, this has been the "best calendar year of Goodell’s 14-year tenure." King: "You might hate Goodell ... but there’s no denying he and his league deserve a high grade for handling a total unknown with aplomb." King said to Goodell, "You know the president is going to hit you with a two-by-four." But the commissioner "wouldn't bite." He said, “With all due respect, I don’t know those things." Goodell, on long-term lessons learned from the pandemic: "Virtual meetings are going to be here to stay. ... We’re all going to travel less" (NBCSPORTS.com, 9/7).
BRING THE NOISE: In Boston, Ben Volin noted for crowd noise this season, Patriots fans will "still hear Minutemen fire their rifles after a touchdown, and for Jets games you’ll hear fans screaming 'J-E-T-S.'" Teams "will be able to add 'accents' to the crowd noise for sacks, turnovers, etc., and will still be able to play music and blow foghorns." Noise levels "will be closely monitored," as each game "will have an employee from the league’s football operations department on hand." Meanwhile, the league "finalized its 71-page COVID-19 protocols on Saturday," settling on a "cadence for game-day testing." All personnel "will continue to undergo daily testing during the regular season, except on game days." For a 1:00pm ET Sunday game, the "final COVID-19 test will be taken" by 8:30am on Saturday. For all kickoffs 4:00pm or later, the "deadline" is 10:00am the day before the game. If a player tests positive the day before and "believes it is a false reading, he has until two hours before kickoff the next day to subsequently test negative and get cleared to play." Also this season, NFL social justice efforts "will be highly visible" (BOSTON GLOBE, 9/6).
