In order to play, sports leagues have had to take precautions to keep COVID at bay. Things like games without fans, weekly and sometimes daily testing, and strict social distancing rules were put in place.
These restrictions sometimes were ineffective in some cases.
For example, 18 players were infected with the coronavirus early in the MLB season after some players broke social distancing rules and traveled to downtown Atlanta while playing a series against the Atlanta Braves, according to NBC Sports Philadelphia.
According to physical education teacher Karin Clark, things could have gotten a lot worse.
“Keeping those players separate and quarantined from everybody else must have been tough,” said Clark. “ I can’t even fathom what is going on behind the scenes.
While the MLB, NBA and NHL did not have fans, the NFL has, and according to Clark, they have handled that well.
“With these huge stadiums, I definitely think you can have fans there. I think they are doing it right by not having everyone there. For example, having a Penn State football game and having the fans all packed together there would have been a disaster,” said Clark.
According to the Souderton Area School District’s secretary to the supervisor of special education, Kathleen Collins, she was skeptical about some leagues having no fans.
“I feel like the players feed off of that. They feed off the fans cheering, so I was skeptical about the whole no fans thing,” said Collins.
Collins says she was very upset when COVID hit and sports leagues had to stop playing for a while.
“The Flyers were doing really well and then I said, well, there’s the “Philly Curse” once again when COVID hit, and then there was no more hockey, and the Eagles had stunk, so we had some exciting hockey and then COVID hit,”said Collins.
The NBA was the first major sports league to shut down. between that league, the NFL, MLB and NHL.
The NBA shutdown took place after Utah Jazz player Rudy Gobert tested positive for COVID. Prior to testing positive, Gobert made light of the situation by intentionally touching the microphones after a press conference on March 9, according to ESPN Sports.
Gobert later tested positive and the league was shut down until the summer, with other leagues delaying or putting their season on hold a few weeks later.
According to junior Nick Duva, Gobert should have been punished.
“I think I would have given him a fine, because he was breaking the rules, and breaking the precautions set in place at the time,”said Duva.