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SBJ Unpacks: Coronavirus -- NFL Preps For Hit To Regular Season


It was only four days ago that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said his league would wait at least 30 days before continuing its season. President Trump gave a much more sobering assessment this afternoon. “People are talking about July, August. ... Could be longer than that.” The White House released guidelines saying that people should not gather in groups of more than 10.

The message is becoming very clear: Don’t expect a return to any kind of normal routine any time soon.

Leagues greeted the latest news with more high-profile cancellations. The NFL halted the public aspects of its Draft, planned for Las Vegas next month. MLB pushed back Opening Day indefinitely. On a day when the stock market posted its worst performance in 33 years, good news in the sports world was hard to come by. Our best sources were left flattened, with a lot of questions and no good answers about the way to move forward.

 

NFL ACKNOWLEDGES RISK TO 2020 SEASON

  • In the first indication that the coronavirus outbreak could jeopardize part of the NFL’s season, the league distributed talking points to teams about season ticket refunds if games are canceled, SBJ’s Ben Fischer has learned. The memo came to our attention as President Trump gave a revised time frame that would encroach into the NFL preseason.

  • The memo was sent to all 32 clubs on Friday, suggesting teams tell fans: "We have every expectation of playing a full schedule in 2020 and look forward to you joining us at [name of stadium] for an exciting season. But we also understand your concerns and want to be clear about our club’s policies, which will apply to season tickets purchased directly from the [club]."

  • If games are canceled and not rescheduled, or if games are played under “conditions that prohibit fans from attending (for example, if a public authority restricts gatherings to no more than a small number of people),” season ticket holders would get a prorated refund or credit to future purchases.

 

NFL CANCELS PUBLIC DRAFT EVENTS IN VEGAS

  • The NFL canceled all public aspects of the April 23-25 draft, a move that was widely expected. Commissioner Roger Goodell said the event, which had been expected to draw hundreds of thousands to the Las Vegas Strip, will be televised. He did not provide more information on those TV plans. ABC, ESPN and NFL Network had been prepared to televise the draft from Vegas.

  • This afternoon, 49ers CMO Alex Chang told SBJ’s Ben Fischer that he was preparing a letter to fans, to be distributed later today or tomorrow morning, announcing that all live draft watch parties in the Bay Area and Vegas were canceled. Other teams said they were taking similar steps, or simply halting work on planning draft-themed parties that had not yet been announced.

  • Training camp is another fan-facing event that now may be in jeopardy with the extended uncertainty, two sources said. The NFL has embraced camp in recent years as a major opportunity for teams to engage with fans who cannot afford regular-season tickets.

 

 

IOC TO TAKE ON OLYMPIC QUALIFYING CRISIS

  • The IOC will meet Tuesday with every national Olympic committee and the summer sports’ governing federations to discuss the growing Tokyo Games qualifying crisis, SBJ’s Ben Fischer and Chris Smith report. Only about 1/5 to 1/4 of the Team USA has been determined, and event cancellations are throwing future competition in doubt.

  • The situation varies widely by sport. USA Cycling, for instance, has a few Olympians named already, but mostly had been counting on future events to determine slots. The Int'l Cycling Union gives countries until July 6 to submit a final roster. “We’re through the majority of [qualifying], but in a lot of the disciplines the points are so close that the events toward the end of the qualification process are really important,” said USA Cycling CCO Bouker Pool. It’s not known how incomplete results will be handled.

  • Beach volleyball qualifying is also in limbo with no FIVB events scheduled through April. If no more qualifying tournaments occur, insiders expect the FIVB’s provisional Olympic ranking to stand, which would mean a fifth Games for Kerri Walsh Jennings.

  • The three big one-off trials events in the U.S. -- gymnastics (St. Louis), swimming (Omaha) and track & field (Eugene) -- are not slated until late June, and have not been canceled. But athletes are losing chances to meet the standards to participate in trials because lower-level events have been cut. In track & field, the Penn Relays were canceled today. A USATF spokesperson said they will consider all options for athletes who were counting on canceled events to qualify for trials. USA Wrestling continues to look for new dates for its trials, already canceled after being slated or April 4-5.

 

KENTUCKY DERBY ANNOUNCEMENT TO COME ON TUESDAY

  • Media reports suggest that Churchill Downs will postpone the Kentucky Derby by a couple of months. The track said that it will make an announcement tomorrow morning regarding the "timing of the 146th Kentucky Oaks and Derby." In its 145-year history, the race has never been canceled, but has been postponed once, in 1945, notes SBJ’s Liz Mullen.

  • Other companies already have made the decision or cancel their races. Earlier today, Keeneland Race Course canceled its spring meet, which had been scheduled for April 2-24 in Lexington, Ky., due to health and safety concerns related to COVID-19. That meet features the Blue Grass Stakes, a prep race for the Kentucky Derby.

  • Some horse tracks, including Santa Anita Park, held racing this past weekend. The races at the track in the Los Angeles area were carried on TVG, with just jockeys, trainers and grooms allowed at the facility. "These horses, they need to run," Santa Anita Director of Publicity Mike Willman told SBJ's Mullen. "They really do."

 

WINNING STREAK ALTERS LOGO TO PROMOTE SOCIAL DISTANCING

  • Winning Streak Sports, a licensee of nearly every major U.S. sports property, has altered its corporate logo to support social distancing efforts during the coronavirus pandemic, SBJ’s Terry Lefton reports. The licensed pennant and banner manufacturer added “Social Distancing Saves Lives” along with #flattenthecurve to the bottom of its company nameplate.

  • “We’re all trying to figure out what we can do at a time business is stalled, so the idea here is that if everyone in sports sent this kind of message with their own logo, it could make a difference,” said Winning Streak CEO Chris Lencheski. Winning Streak is owned by N.Y.-based private equity firm Granite Bridge Partners.

 

 

NFL ALL OVER THE AIRWAVES

  • Adam Schefter and Chris Mortensen are usually fixtures on ESPN programming from Bristol at this time of year, but the coronavirus threat has them at their homes in Manhattan and Arkansas, respectively. Schefter, talking with Mort on his eponymous podcast, said: "The busiest week of the NFL year in free agency. You’re there, I’m here. That’s weird. ... Our bosses gave me a choice. … They said, 'You can come here and be in Bristol around the clock for all the shows or you can do it from home and just do all the shows from there.’” Mortensen: “I let one of my oncology contacts … make the call for me on this one because I’m over 60. … I would say that because I’m in a highly-susceptible state with the compromised immune system -- of course having gone through cancer and still have cancer -- it didn’t make a whole lot of sense."

  • Denver-based KKFN-AM co-hosts Mark Schlereth and Mike Evans supported the NFL’s decision to stay on schedule with the league calendar. Evans: “I respect the people involved in the NFL that they’re worried about coming across as tone deaf and that they’re worried about the optics looking bad. I respect them for feeling that way. But based on the reaction I’m getting, I’m telling them ‘relax, people are on your side here.’ … The NFL owners and general managers are tone deaf if they think that people don’t want them to conduct business as usual.” Schlereth: “It’s one of those things that we rally around, that we talk about as fans. Don’t underestimate the importance of sports in this country. Don’t underestimate the importance of connectivity that it brings.”

  • ESPN’s Dan Graziano, appearing on Mina Kimes’ podcast, took listeners through the decision to keep the NFL calendar year on schedule: “What I’m getting from people who are familiar with the contents of those talks, the thinking is free agency in the NFL is not an event that requires a whole bunch of people to assemble together. … Deals can be done without players visiting team facilities and in fact are all the time even in normal years. And then the other thought was, ‘We don’t know what’s going to happen.’ There are medical experts out there telling you that in two weeks, three weeks, things could be a lot worse than they are right now. If you postpone free agency by two or three weeks, and now the situation across the country has got even more significant, … then what do you do? Postpone it again?”

 

 

SPEED READS

  • AT DEADLINE: WWE has decided to move WrestleMania 36 up I-4 from Raymond James Stadium in Tampa to the outfit’s training facility in Orlando. The event will be staged on a closed set with only essential personnel present. WWE Network will stream the event, which also will be available on pay-per-view.

  • While the PGA Tour has scuttled the next three tournaments on its schedule, and The Masters has been postponed, a decision has not yet been made yet on the PGA Championship set for May 11-17 at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco, reports SBJ’s John Lombardo. PGA of America execs said they continue to communicate with reps from San Francisco and the state of California as they evaluate plans with the "health and well-being of all involved as the highest priority.”

  • The AHL earlier this afternoon announced that it has advised teams that an indefinite suspension of play won’t be lifted before May. The league -- equivalent to the Triple-A level of hockey -- says it’s recommending that teams help in returning players to their primary residences. Over the weekend, the ECHL, one rung beneath the AHL, said that its Board of Governors approved the cancellation of the remainder of the 2019-20 season.

  • With college sports likely done this year, Arkansas AD Hunter Yurachek is pressing forward with future plans. “I’m going to get ready for the 2020-21 season, because we need to make that really special for our student-athletes,” he told KNWA-Fox. “We’re already in the preparation for our fall sports from next year from a marketing and promotions and ticket sales standpoint and our strategic planning for that. We’ll spend a great deal of time on that.”

  • The Sports Lawyers Association canceled its annual conference, which had been scheduled for Miami in May, SBJ’s Liz Mullen reports. “Unfortunately, the declaration of a pandemic by the WHO forced us to take a long hard look at moving forward,” SLA President Bobby Hacker wrote in an email. “But once there was a declaration in Florida and yesterday the Miami-Dade emergency declaration, the decision, although difficult, had to fall on the side of cancellation.”

  • The NCAA is likely giving spring-sport athletes an extra year of eligibility in the wake of coronavirus canceling the rest of the season, but a similar extension for winter athletes may prove to be trickier. “It sounds great in theory,” TCU AD Jeremiah Donati told the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram. “But I’m not sure how that could be applied across the board to all winter sports and student-athletes. Some seasons were complete and some were still playing.”

  • UConn baseball coach Jim Penders applauded the quick decision on eligibility. “The NCAA sometimes struggles to do what’s right and in this case they got it absolutely right,” Penders told the Middletown Press. “Frankly, I was shocked they were able to get it done that quickly. All the coaches I spoke to were in agreement they’ve got to do something for the seniors at least. They went above and beyond.”

 

SBJ UNPACKS -- WEATHERING COVID-19

  • ICYMI: Check out the most recent editions of our "SBJ Unpacks" podcasts around COVID-19:

    • SBJ's Bill King and Ben Fischer talk about how COVID-19 outbreaks are disrupting Olympic qualification events and what that may mean for the Tokyo Games.
    • Adam Stern discusses NASCAR’s decision to postpone upcoming races.
    • Longtime major league team team exec Andy Dolich takes us inside the minds of his peers, and behind the decisions they face.

 

 

 

 

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