2020-2021 MAVS NEWS: Archived

[Mavs2019]

Lots of unrealistic expectations in this thread and others.

* You cannot "manage" a virus after it is released and now exists in the natural world. NBA choices are the same as for the rest of us - isolate inside some sort of bubble, 24/7, until the virus has run its course (whether by infection, by vaccine, or both) and has mostly died down, or risk being exposed (with some inevitably going to catch it).

* If the NBA (players and owners alike) want the money, they have to play the games somehow. 1080 of them, that's apparently the magic number. They know that. That's driving the unwillingness to stop games when a team loses a few players to covid.

So what else could the NBA do besides what they are doing?

* There is nothing about the game of basketball that offers any way for players being immune from catching or spreading the virus. Small court, players right on top of each other for the entire game, minimal clothing, it's a recipe for exposure and spreading.

* They could play inside a bubble, isolated from everyone except each other for 6 months, but the response of those who did Orlando for just one month was a desire to never do that again. Everyone despised it, including reporters, coaches, staff.

* So the NBA has players who live in their homes with families or loved ones, have whatever normal life exposure people have, come to work for games, travel from city to city, adding more exposure, and then mix in games with a set of players who all have done the same. A couple days later, they do a mixer with another set of players who all have brought their own risks of exposure. 

With all of that, covid is going to happen. When some player catches covid, they aren't villains who  did bad things and need to be managed better. When the league has teams playing games, they aren't villains by having ignored ways to make basketball a covid-less world.They're all in a frustrating no-win world right now, and trying to make the best of it somehow. Kinda like the rest of us.

 Yeah that´s a nice speech. You should work PR for the NBA.

Fact remains, if somebody at Google or your local hairdresser tested positive for COVID, they´d have to self-isolate at home for 14 days and all their co-workers, who had close contact would be asked to do the same. They would not be allowed to fly across the whole country and continue their job and private life like nothing happened.

The NBA basically got a special exemption from the government to continue their business (which obviously doesn´t work as home office, but also is not system critical that it can´t be shut down), so to me that means you do everything to comply with the general rules. For away games this means airport, hotel, game, hotel, airport, and not some exempt activity like having sleepovers with professional mattresses. The NBA/NBAPA negotiated this without any regard for public safety or the special privilige they have been granted. They just want their money.

Then I´m sure the local business store owner would like to have his money, too. They still shut his ass down, and to me a restaurant and this food thing has a stronger argument to be system critical than a basketball game. Other people have to make a lot harder sacrifices. Millions lost their jobs. People became homeless over this. So if the NBA/NBAPA is then acting very lackadaisical about their covid rules, it just looks bad imho.