Will There Be a 2020 Football Season?

Chances of a 2020 season?

  • Full 12 Game Schedule

    Votes: 20 36.4%

  • Shortened Season

    Votes: 13 23.6%

  • No Games Played

    Votes: 22 40.0%
  • Total voters
    55
  • Poll closed .
Seems unlikely they would relax social distances in a stadium setting.  Its one thing to pass by someone momentarily but to sit and yell etc for hours close by?  If anything id guess the 6 feet would be a minimum in a crowd / stadium location, especially when u add in all the crowding with restrooms, concessions, entry/exit and emergency and staffing people etc.   

 
As more and more college athletic departments cut sports programs, the financial wreckage due to the coronavirus pandemic is becoming devastatingly clear -- and that's without factoring in a $4 billion loss if the 2020 football season is canceled, a development that would forever alter college-level sports.

...

Dr. Patrick Rishe, director of the sports business program at Washington University in St. Louis, believes the upcoming football season will be played -- even if it's during the spring -- because of "astronomical financial implications" for athletic departments if it is canceled.

Quite simply, college athletics might not have a financial choice.

Rishe estimates that the 65 Power 5 schools would collectively lose more than $4 billion in football revenues, with at least $1.2 billion of that due to lost ticket revenue. Each Power 5 school would see at least an average loss of $62 million in football revenue, including at least $18.6 million in football ticket sales, he said.

...

Public school Power 5 athletic departments on average made nearly half of their total operating revenue from football, with about 14% coming from football ticket sales alone, according to an analysis of 2017-18 financial data provided to ESPN by Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications.
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ESPN

 
84HuskerLaw said:
Seems unlikely they would relax social distances in a stadium setting.  Its one thing to pass by someone momentarily but to sit and yell etc for hours close by?  If anything id guess the 6 feet would be a minimum in a crowd / stadium location, especially when u add in all the crowding with restrooms, concessions, entry/exit and emergency and staffing people etc.   
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Yea I have a hard time imagining a season with fans unless it is pushed back to the spring or we somehow avoid a second wave. All of the news coming out right now about this seems to bank on the idea the worst is behind us. Not an assumption I would be making yet, but then again I don't get paid the big bucks. 

 
The fiscal impacts (devastation is apt description) of the virus and the entire “shutdown response on- going is almost beyond calculation  frankly.  

Pretty much comparable to a nationwide hurricane really.  Ten trillion $ and climbing id guess.  

If we stopped all things shutdown related today, it could be a decade to recover or perhaps a generation in some areas.  

College sports is just a tiny fraction of it.  The ripple effects ( tsunami is closer) is everywhere. 

There has yet to be the trillions in unrecognized losses in the public sector (real and personal property taxes / values; sales taxes; crime and social damages; etc).  

I dont know how to quantify the mental / psychological damage to confidence, loss of liberty and societal structures.  This will be as lasting as the 911 effects.  

The risks of not opening up are worse than the virus as there is real danger of a global depression worse than the FDR era as few people are self sufficient farm focused.  People could make do in the 1930s & 1940s better than today.  Food and other basics were locally produced and not economically dependent on global trade etc. 

 
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knapplc said:
This seems SUPER promising.
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While this is great, I still think the fundamental question is going unanswered. What happens when a player tests positive? How will that impact the season? If players have to sit out until they are negative, the season is on the brink of a stoppage at any time. Some people test positive for a month then test positive again for 3 weeks after being negative for 2 weeks. As contagious as this is, if 4 teams in a conference have a small outbreak, that could put the season on hold right there. Alot of questions that still need to be answered. 

Edit: players may need to take extra precautions outside of football activity so they can stay negative. I wonder if they could set up online classes for all players to limit contact for them.

 
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Nebfanatic said:
While this is great, I still think the fundamental question is going unanswered. What happens when a player tests positive? How will that impact the season? If players have to sit out until they are negative, the season is on the brink of a stoppage at any time. Some people test positive for a month then test positive again for 3 weeks after being negative for 2 weeks. As contagious as this is, if 4 teams in a conference have a small outbreak, that could put the season on hold right there. Alot of questions that still need to be answered. 

Edit: players may need to take extra precautions outside of football activity so they can stay negative. I wonder if they could set up online classes for all players to limit contact for them.
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While they haven't informed the public about their plans, I'm certain they've had discussions and have come up with solutions to this question.

 
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knapplc said:
While they haven't informed the public about their plans, I'm certain they've had discussions and have come up with solutions to this question.
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I understand that but I'm curious to see what that solution is because as far I can see the options are limited. It will be interesting to see how other sports leagues that are starting up do. Soccer in Germany isn't the best comparison because their situation is better than ours but still one to watch. I think MLB has the best chance to do well because there is less close contact in that sport. I'll also be watching to see what the NBA does. I think basketball has the hardest hill to climb as far as this goes. Smaller rosters and more star dependent. 

 
teachercd said:
Yes, I agree.  But most people that get Covid don't have permanent organ damage.
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I understand that it's not the most common outcome, but it can happen. When we're asking some young men to put themselves at risk of it for our entertainment it's an important thing to remember.

 
Branno said:
I understand that it's not the most common outcome, but it can happen. When we're asking some young men to put themselves at risk of it for our entertainment it's an important thing to remember.
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I am not asking them to do that.  If they don't want to play, they should not play.  But every practice and game they are putting themselves at risk of getting hurt (really badly) and they still go play. 

 
Nebfanatic said:
I understand that but I'm curious to see what that solution is because as far I can see the options are limited. It will be interesting to see how other sports leagues that are starting up do. Soccer in Germany isn't the best comparison because their situation is better than ours but still one to watch. I think MLB has the best chance to do well because there is less close contact in that sport. I'll also be watching to see what the NBA does. I think basketball has the hardest hill to climb as far as this goes. Smaller rosters and more star dependent. 
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It's early in all of this for German soccer, but a second tier club has already had issues with it. After practice started they had two players test positive and had to isolate the whole team for two weeks so they didn't start playing. Then they had another player and coaches partner test positive so they are under further quarantine. https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/52759244

So, that's the number one issue in all of this. If you have a single player test positive the entire team is going to have to be isolated most likely and any team they've played within the last week might have to be as well. So a single case could take out a minimum of two teams for two weeks which could theoretically cause issues with 4 games. The ripple effect of it is huge so it's going to be interesting how and if this gets pulled off.

 
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