Normally, when I get an email from the “reader in Houston”, it contains stats or sports history that augments or corrects something I recently wrote. When I received an email from him yesterday, I was not sure what stat or historical event I had missed in yesterday’s rant; so, I opened the email with heightened curiosity. Instead of a long and detailed email, this one was short and to the point; it dealt with the Fan Controlled Football league I mentioned yesterday. Here is the entirety of its contents:
“Including the playoffs, “Fan Controlled Football” is a supposed six-week long season joke.”
My guess is that the “reader in Houston” will be paying the same amount of attention to FCF as I will…
While I am in the mode of citing emails that have come to me, here is something from a former colleague and it cites a statistical comparison among Tom Brady, Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers that I failed to hear on the telecasts last weekend:
“I’m sure you realize that Brady has now won as many NFC Championship Games in one season as Brees and Rodgers have in their careers.”
To be honest, I had not realized that until the moment I read his email…
Even I, as a person who hob-nobs with folks of a curmudgeonly persuasion, do not know anyone who hopes that 2021 is as bad a year as 2020 was. Even I, as a curmudgeon in good standing within that community, am pulling for a major improvement year over year. Nevertheless, there are two situations this morning that give me pause when I try to let a smidgen of optimism ooze its way into Curmudgeon Central.
The first situation is the feasibility of holding the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo postponed from last year. The problem here is simple and straightforward; the coronavirus is running amok in Japan right now; there are all sorts of restrictions in effect in Japan – and in Tokyo specifically – aimed at containing the viral spread. Obviously, everyone wants those restrictions to be successful. Equally obviously, the Summer Games could be a monstrous super-spreader event if thousands of spectators accompany the thousands of athletes from around the world to Tokyo in the summer.
Indeed, there are mitigation strategies that can be effected. None of those strategies is perfect; authorities must be vigilant to minimize the possibility of a new outbreak. The authorities have another concern; it is an economic one. The facilities for the games are in place; they have been paid for – with some borrowed money to be sure – and they have not yet generated any revenue to offset any of those costs. There is pressure to hold the games and get something back on the investment made because without the Games this summer, the IOC has said they will cancel this set of games and prepare to hold the next ones in Paris in 2024 and then in LA in 2028. If that is the fate of the 2020 Games, it will not be until 2032 that Tokyo might begin to offset the expenditures already encountered.
Staying purely in the economic realm – and leaving aside issues related to epidemiology, public safety and/or morality – there are potentially negative consequences in Japan for any decision regarding the Games scheduled for the summer:
- Postponement will cause a delay of revenue to offset sunk costs and will reduce any influx of foreign money from tourism that was anticipated for 2021. Not good…
- Holding the games and bringing lots of people to Japan this summer when the coronavirus is still “alive and well” in various parts of the world could cause yet another outbreak in Japan that could shut down the economy as a means to confine the virus. Not good…
Meanwhile, the other situation that does not portend peaches and cream for 2021 relates to MLB. If 2021 were destined to be a “normal sports year” teams would be setting up facilities in Florida and Arizona for the onset of Spring Training about now. Instead, there are reports this morning that Arizona officials have sent a letter to MLB asking for a delay in the start of Spring Training there because of the high rate of COVID infections in Maricopa County. The report I read in the Washington Post said that the officials there do not have the authority to order such a delay meaning this could evolve into a negotiation with MLB. Unfortunately, any negotiation with MLB will have to involve the MLBPA as well; history tells us that those two entities have difficulty agreeing on even basic things like Tuesdays always following Mondays.
Already, the union has opposed a proposed delay in starting Spring Training. The union seems to see that step as a slippery slope to a place where MLB will want to shorten the regular season and – once again – reduce player salaries as happened in 2020. Maybe so … but can we concoct a conspiracy theory that links the MLB owners’ nefarious desire to cut players’ pay with a request from Arizona government officials asking for a delay based on epidemiological projections? That could take a lot of arm-waving and rhetorical flourishing…
Folks with rose-colored glasses will look at the two paragraphs above and point out that it is a hurdle that can probably be ironed out in a three-way discussion among adults. Well, there are a couple of other issues simmering in the MLB/MLBPA cauldron of contention:
- MLB offered the union the possibility of a universal DH. That is an issue that has been something the union has wanted in the past because DH players generally command more in salary than would a 25th player at the end of a team’s bench.
- In return, MLB wants the union to agree to an expanded playoff structure at the end of the regular season. More playoff games mean more TV money; evidently, the owners’ proposal does not slip enough of the “new money” in the direction of the players.
- The union has rejected this package. The two sides cannot agree on how to share more revenue…
So, what might seem to be a simple pandemic related set of negotiations where economics and public health are balanced one against the other, [Aside: How does “public health” lose out in that balancing act?] you can see that those conversations will devolve quickly into multidimensional discussions with plenty of room for bickering.
Make no mistake; I recognize that proposals from the owners in MLB are always going to tilt the economic benefits on the table toward the owners’ side of the table. That has been the case in baseball since its beginnings and it continues to this moment. At the same time, the MLBPA is not an organization steeped in virtue. Here is a statement issued by the MLBPA to the possibility of delaying the start of Spring Training – – and therefore the regular season:
“While we, of course, share the goals of a safe Spring Training and regular season, MLB has repeatedly assured us that it has instructed its teams to be prepared for an on time start to Spring Training and the Regular Season and we continue to devote all our efforts to making sure that that takes place as safely as possible.”
“As safely as possible” – – so long as it does not involve any postponement that might be related to increased safety levels as suggested by local officials and epidemiological models…
Finally, having mentioned MLB above, let me close today with George Bernard Shaw’s opinion of baseball:
“Baseball has the great advantage over cricket of being sooner ended.”
But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………