Vikings Avoid Positive Tests, But NFL's COVID-19 Concerns are Mounting
The Vikings ought to be feeling very lucky right about now. Somehow, someway, they seem to have avoided receiving the transmission of COVID-19 from the Titans.
Despite having two positive tests late last week – a practice squad cornerback and a linebackers coach – the Titans traveled to Minnesota and played the Vikings inside U.S. Bank Stadium. Two days later, they had eight more positive tests, including a defensive tackle who played 51 snaps in the game. It's now Saturday, and the Titans are up to well over a dozen cases, including ten players.
Yet, the Vikings have reported zero positive tests every day this week, and they have been cleared to head to Houston to take on the Texans.
Back on Wednesday, Vikings head athletic trainer and infection control officer Eric Sugarman spoke about the unprecedented nature of what happened with the Vikings and Titans – and how interesting it would be to see how the week played out.
"On a football field, you’re not going to have close contact, because the average football play lasts about six seconds," Sugarman said. "However, you do have continual contact for hours during a football game, so that is a consideration. We did have a few moderate-risk contacts that happened pregame, postgame, whatever it might be. You test them, you monitor them, but we get daily testing, so it’s easy for us. That’s what you’re supposed to do, along with monitoring your symptoms. So we’re all clear from that standpoint right now."
"There really are no documented cases of exposure through sport in our country yet. Sports are considered a low-risk activity – now football, being that it’s a contact sport, is certainly probably at the highest risk of all sports. And quite honestly, this is a case study. This is the first time this has happened: we have a known positive case that played in the game, and I think everyone is interested to see what’s going to happen, if anything."
That the Vikings haven't had a positive test all week seems like a stroke of dumb luck rather than any sort of indication that playing a football game is inherently a low-risk activity. With players and coaches greeting each other before and after games, and players – particularly linemen – breathing in each other's faces and sweating on each other during the game, the risks of transmission exist even if the exposure is brief on a play-to-play basis.
The Vikings aren't 100 percent in the clear yet, considering it can take up to 14 days for the virus to incubate. But this seems like great news with what could've potentially become an outbreak within a second team.
Unfortunately, it's about the only good news the NFL has gotten on the COVID front of late.
The Titans' outbreak has continued to grow all week long, resulting in the postponement of their game against the Steelers. Two new positive tests popped up on Saturday with Patriots QB Cam Newton and Chiefs practice squad QB Jordan Ta'amu. The Patriots were supposed to head to Kansas City to play the Chiefs on Sunday, but their flight was cancelled and the league is hoping to play that game on Monday or Tuesday instead.
Given that Newton and Ta'amu were practicing with their teams all week, it's certainly possible that other positive cases will pop up within those organizations. Atlanta put cornerback A.J. Terrell on the COVID list late last week and didn't have any other positive tests, but again, that might be the exception and not the rule. Even if there isn't another major outbreak like the Titans are dealing with, any additional positive tests could mean the Patriots-Chiefs game would become the second to be postponed to later in the season, creating difficult scheduling challenges.
This is starting to feel like the tipping point for the NFL, who is attempting to pull off this season without a bubble. It's gone far enough that SI's Conor Orr thinks the league should pause the season for an entire incubation period.
We saw this happen with Major League Baseball, which was the first league to try to pull of a bubble-less season. The Miami Marlins and St Louis Cardinals had their seasons derailed by outbreaks. The league was able to power through a shortened 60-game season by using a ton of doubleheaders and rescheduled games, but it'll be a lot more difficult to make those on-the-fly adjustments when it comes to football.
The best case scenario for the NFL is that the Patriots and Chiefs don't see any spread of the virus, and that the Titans quarantine all of their infected players and return to action in Week 5 with a roster featuring several practice-squad call-ups.
The worst case scenario is that things begin to spiral out of control.
We're not at that point yet. The NFL had been doing well prior to the Titans outbreak, and 28 of the league's 32 teams will carry on with Week 4 as scheduled. But the NFL's protocols are being put to the test right now, and what the next week or so holds will tell us a lot about whether this season can be completed.
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