World News – US – Paste: NFL hopes to avoid answering its toughest questions about COVID

Matthew Coller is a seasoned football writer who covered the Vikings for 1500ESPN and Skor North for four years He now writes a weekly Vikings column for Bring Me The News, and you can find more of his work on Purple Insider

That was the question put to Minnesota Vikings general manager Rick Spielman on Wednesday That’s the question he couldn’t answer It’s the one the NFL hasn’t answered yet This is the one everyone hopes they won’t have to answer at any time

With many Tennessee Titans testing positive for COVID this week, including a player who was on the court Sunday against the Vikings for 51 snaps, the Vikings are holding their breath that they don’t see an outbreak As the Monday and Tuesday tests came back with no positive cases, it can take from several days to two weeks for a positive result to appear if someone has contracted the virus, according to trainer Eric Sugarman

The league said on Wednesday it would postpone the Titans-Steelers game from Sunday to Monday or Tuesday, according to Tennessee’s latest round of testing The Titans building is closed until Saturday while the Vikings plan to reopen the things for training Thursday

But what if more positive tests are in progress? What if the Vikings arrive in Houston and then learn that a group of positions have been decimated by COVID or if both quarterbacks test positive? How many positive tests would it take for the NFL to cancel games? Nobody knows

The follow-up questions are not easy either. Should all of these players miss two weeks, which is the quarantine period prescribed by the Minnesota Department of Health? Would the NFL be okay with some teams having 14 or 15 games and others having 16 or would they force teams to skip weeks?

Another question: if they are determined to get teams to play if a positional squad gets sick, would it be the same if Aaron Rodgers or Tom Brady got it?

The Vikings are already in a difficult position as they have to travel to Houston, play a game at a stadium that supposedly has fans inside and now change their training schedule for the week

« This is what we are dealing with, you have no choice but I also know there are no excuses, » said Spielman « The players know what we owe do to prepare, the coaches know what we need to do to prepare, and we’re going to get ready and go play the game and do our best, but that’s the situation There are things you can’t control during the season, but it’s also our responsibility to prepare our team, and Coach Zim is going to have this team ready to play on Sunday. I have no doubts about it « 

Yes, there are no excuses in football But circumstances affect things in football This set of circumstances could affect the Vikings in a significant and / or subtle way

The Vikings are able to get back into the running with a win or at least assess a group of players for the future as the season progresses Play in an empty US bank stadium without the benefit of a full offseason or pre-season has already proved difficult enough for a squad filled with young talent

Quietly last Sunday, the Titans didn’t have that shaken look we’re used to when they hung out late in the game Tennessee has also taken advantage of poor communications on several games that are atypical of Mike Zimmer’s defenses Missing a midweek practice – perhaps more if positive tests come up – only adds to the hurdles

Sugarman couldn’t say exactly how many positive tests it would take to keep the facility closed for another day

Everyone in the NFL, of course, faces some type of COVID challenge The Vikings, however, could be in a tough spot to answer questions about how this season unfolds relative to expectations Let us leave a lot results because they were in such a bizarre situation or would we still consider a 0-4 start to be a significant failure? Is the answer somewhere in between?

Vikings have a decision to make on day three of the 2021 championship year against quarterback Kirk Cousins ​​If there are stops and starts and players miss games due to COVID, the team Would she take away a season with a grain of salt? The same goes for Mike Zimmer and Spielman. Will they face the pressure in 2021 if they miss the playoffs this year or will everyone raise their hand and call a lost year?

Everyone is hoping we don’t have to find out And the Vikings are taking extreme measures to protect themselves from this situation Sugarman said the team is implementing even stricter guidelines for players and staff this week

« Improved protocols, improved health exams, improved temperature controls and certainly improved PPE with masks at all times, as well as social distancing at all times, » he said. p>

This week’s events have shown us that the NFL is not immune to the impact of COVID and it has walked a tightrope in trying to create individual team bubbles The league has taken extreme measures, going so far as to require players to wear contact tracing devices even when they are on the pitch But COVID has proven that only a real bubble like the WNBA, NBA or NHL can completely prevent the virus to enter

Realizing fully that there are much more important things related to COVID in the world, the other question the NFL hopes not to answer is: whether the next few months see any teams playing games at a disadvantage digital or moving because is the threshold for this season considered fair?

Major League Baseball has managed to make up for lost ground for teams that have battled COVID outbreaks, but the NFL has little wiggle room, especially with the playoffs set to be widened this year Would they win as a percentage if a team played, say, only 14 games? If this team had fewer miles on several of their players and won the Super Bowl (in a bubble where home court advantage was won) would that be the same as other teams that played 16 games?

For the first few weeks of the season, we lived in the bliss of the NFL without COVID It ended this week We are now forced to revisit the worst case scenarios we put in memory from the kick-off first football All the NFL can hope for is that the Titans / Vikings situation is a failure on the radar and we never have to ask ourselves these questions

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the Republicans’ request on Wednesday, a day after the federal court granted an extension to count postal votes

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Matthew Coller writes a weekly Vikings column for BMTN, with more of his work found at Purple Insider

Tennessee Titans, NFL, Minnesota Vikings, Pittsburgh Steelers, Houston Texans, Coronavirus