| Sports is about to go through some heavy change – that’s pretty clear by now – and it’s going to be a confusing old time. Get ready for a new normal, or should that be a return to the old new normal? Or, in fact, is there just going to be nothing much normal about it at all and everyone just has to figure it out as we go along? Remember last year, when COVID wreaked havoc with scheduling in the National Football League, giving us games at times and on days typically reserved for other activities? Well, Monday afternoon football is back, as is Tuesday night football. And don’t be surprised if Wednesdays, Saturdays, Fridays and pretty much anything short of breakfast gridiron comes into play, as the NFL tries to figure out how to push a fascinating campaign filled with parity, plotlines and unpredictability to the finish line. It has been written before in this column, but it is worth repeating now and will remain so forever more: The fact that the lingering reign of the coronavirus is affecting professional and college sports is a manifestly insignificant problem compared to the overwhelming impact the pandemic has wreaked on humankind. But this has always been a column for an audience that has a deep love for these trivial little games, and it’s natural to see the way COVID hits sports as a kind of microcosm for what’s happening in the wider world. It takes a lot for NFL games to be shifted from their slated start time, so entrenched they are a part of America’s cultural and social spheres. So you know when it happens that something mightily serious is going down. We will leave the scientific stuff to the experts, but this much is obvious, and you know it already by now: The Omicron variant is taking hold with devastating speed. Those thoughts you might have had that this COVID thing was nearly through? Sadly … not so fast. Of course, it is not only football that has had to adapt and adjust rapidly. The NBA brought into place an amended regulation on Sunday night that will allow COVID-impacted teams to sign replacement players. The Brooklyn Nets — favorites to win the championship — have had their next two games postponed, the Chicago Bulls have 10 players in the protocols, and Atlanta Hawks star Trae Young is among a growing number of players to have tested positive. One of Omicron’s hallmarks is its high transmissibility, and some numbers on the worst-hit NFL teams are startling. More than 20 members of the Cleveland Browns were on the COVID list over the weekend, causing the team’s Saturday matchup against the Las Vegas Raiders to be moved to Monday. Across the league, more than 150 players were on the list as of Sunday night. The Browns, with a chance to move into a tie for first in the AFC North with a win on Monday, had to put their trust in third-string quarterback Nick Mullens and a bunch of reserves. The Tuesday slate — Los Angeles Rams at Seattle Seahawks (7 p.m. ET on FOX), and Washington Football Team at Philadelphia Eagles — were both switched because of 20-plus cases for L.A. and Washington. “The emergence of the Omicron variant is precisely the kind of change that warrants a flexible response,” NFL commissioner Roger Goodell wrote in a league-wide memo to teams. The memo added: “From the outset of the coronavirus pandemic, our focus has been to play our games in a safe and responsible way, consistent with the best available medical and public health advice.” In hockey, the Calgary Flames have been struck by at least 30 cases of COVID among players. And in Europe, changes are well underway. The English Premier League waved off nine of its games, to be played at later on a yet-to-be-determined date. As the United Kingdom braces itself for a potential lockdown, several EPL clubs are reportedly in favor of shuttering the league altogether and getting going again at some point in the new year. It is hard to know what to make of it all, and it’s impossible to predict what comes next. It is frustrating and disappointing when games are played with depleted rosters due to COVID, but in sports, nothing quite matches the gloom of postponements, or, even worse, total league shutdowns. It is so galling because of what it represents — each lost game on the schedule indirectly means suffering, difficulty and possible death is taking place on a drastic global scale. It is not much fun to think about nor, honestly, to write about. But it is where we are, it is what we’re dealing with, and it’s what we’re going to have to get our heads around again for a while. One of these days, hopefully, we can say things are back to normal again if we can remember what normal even feels like. But we’re not there yet, and it suddenly feels that much further away again. |
