Are you ready for some Sunday Night, Monday Night er um, Wednesday afternoon football? If you’re a Steelers or Ravens fan, you answer’d better be yes. But really, this shouldn’t be an issue.
As you certainly know by now, the Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore Ravens were scheduled to play in Prime Time on Thanksgiving. Then Ravens players started testing positive for COVID-19. So practices were closed, players sent home and the game was moved to Sunday.
- The NFL assured us, when the game was first moved, that positive tests had run their course.
They’d done generic analysis on the tests, they advised. That sounded logical and sensible. For all of the grousing in Steelers Nation about unfair advantage, postponing the game was absolutely the right thing to do. The plan worked on paper. Close things down, keep testing, and by Sunday we’d have several days of no positive tests.
- Except players kept testing positive.
The positive tests continued through the weekend. They continued on Monday. And, per ESPN’s
Both Stephon Tuitt and Lamarr Jackson are on their teams’ COVID-19 Reserve list todayPhoto Credit: Chaz Palla, Tribune-Review
, they continued yesterday. That’s right, one Ravens player and one Ravens staffer both tested positive yesterday. But the game is still going to go on, because well, “the Ravens ‘operated the last few days acting as though everyone is positive.’ Walk-through workouts were masked, distanced and outdoors to reduce risk, basically eliminating close contacts.”
- Really sounds reassuring after, what 10 consecutive days of positive tests?
I’m not a doctor let alone an infectious disease specialist, but it looks like we’re getting a mini-clinic on how a highly contagious disease like COVID-19 spreads. Patient zero in Owings Mills appears to be Ravens strength and conditioning coach Steve Saunders.
- Steve Saunders apparently didn’t think it important to wear masks or use his contact tracing device.
So it seems like Saunders spread it to several members of the Ravens. Those were likely the first tests that came back positive last week, guys like J.K. Dobbins and Mark Ingram have already been on the COVID-19 for 10 days and are eligible to come off the list (if they play, that would imply that they’d travel with the team while on the list, and presumably still positive.)
But it seems like those players have gone ahead and spread it to other members of the Ravens staff.
The Ravens will be tested today. If those tests come back negative, the game will go on. This shouldn’t be an issue. Not even part of the discussion. The Steelers and Ravens game should be either postponed or canceled with Baltimore forfeiting.
- The NFL only has itself to blame for this.
When they set the schedule, they decided to start after Labor Day and declined to add in an extra buffer week between the regular season and the playoffs. Right now that buffer could come in mighty handy. The NFL could still do that, although it would up end the rest of the playoff structure.
Minkah Fitzpatrick knocks the ball away from Wille Snead as Justin Tucker lays in the wood. Photo Credit: Patrick Smith, Getty Images via Fansided.com
Sure, putting off the game would benefit the Ravens, on paper at least, as it would give them a chance to get Lamarr Jackson back, which would be an easy game changer. (Quick recap – the first Steelers-Ravens game came down to two goaline stops of Jackson by Isaiah Buggs and a pass deflection by Minkah Fitzpatrick.)
But this isn’t about playoff logistics or competitive balance or even what is “fair” or what sets the Steelers up (or not) for a Championship Run.
This is about the health and safety of the players who will suit up, the coaches who’ll coach them and the staff who will support them. In the span of a week, one case of COVID turned resulted in the number of players on the Baltimore COVID-19 list reaching the 20’s.
The same thing cannot happen to Pittsburgh. The healthy and safety of players like Ben Roethlisberger, Benny Snell, Eric Ebron, JuJu Smith-Schuster, Chase Claypool, T.J. Watt, Cam Heyward as well as lesser known guys playing in support roles like Derek Watt, Henry Mondeaux, or Alex Highsmith is too important. The health and safety of their families and all they have the potential to come into contact with is too important.
As argued here earlier this week, the NFL has done a tremendous job to get to this point in the season, but its clear that their current strategy has taken them as far as they’re going to go. Going to in-city COVID Pods won’t help today’s game situation, but the fact that we’re even having this discussion shows the move is necessary.
For the love of God Roger Goodell, either postpone or cancel the Steelers-Ravens game.
