The NFL vs COVID-19: Everything You Need to Know About the 2020 Season

Courtesy of the NFL

Football is on the horizon. Football like we have never seen before.

The NFL's 101st season is scheduled to kick off on Thursday September 10, but it will not be the NFL that we know and love. The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown professional sports into limbo for months, including the 2020 NFL season. Whereas the NBA and NHL have resumed their seasons in bubble formats placed in a concentrated area for the remainder of the playoffs, the NFL has opted not to play in a bubble. The league will play out its season across all 30 NFL venues in 22 states, with more than 5,000 players, coaches, and team personnel living from home.

With the pandemic intensifying by the day, and a vaccine remaining unavailable, fans are wondering how the NFL can feasibly play the season during a public health crisis. Many are questioning the league's testing protocol, fan attendance policies, and the unknown challenges that could face the league once the season is in full swing. I have assembled this guide to answer all the questions you may have, to articulate just how the NFL is battling coronavirus with the season beckoning.

This is your comprehensive fan guide of how the 2020 NFL season will go forth in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Fans or No Fans?

We will not see full NFL stadiums in 2020. However, some teams are allowing modified capacities for fans to attend games. The league has not made an executive decision forbidding fan attendance in 2020, which has left the decision making in the hands of the 32 franchises. Some teams are allowing reduced capacities, while others have stated outright that fans will not be coming to home games at all in 2020.

The Super Bowl Champion Kansas City Chiefs announced their plan to allow 22% capacity in Arrowhead Stadium for the season opener as well as its three home games in September. The Colts, Jaguars, Patriots, Falcons, Texans have also announced plans to allow between 20 to 25 percent of fans to attend their home games this season. 

The Raiders have announced that no fans will be in the stands for their inaugural season in Las Vegas. The Giants and Jets will not have any fans due to New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy's order in July prohibiting fans in the stands for all state sporting events until further notice. The Bills, Bears, Packers, Seahawks, and the Washington Football Team have all announced they will not have fans at any of their home games indefinitely as well. 

Teams are adjusting their fan attendance policies by the day, and this will continue as long as cases increase across the country and within the league. Teams that are currently allowing fans at a reduced capacity may backtrack on their decision if cases surge in their home states, or march forward with their current protocols. Decisions regarding fan attendance is virtually in the hands of the teams, given that the league has not issued an executive ruling.

Testing, Testing, Testing

At the start of training camp, the NFL mandated tests to be conducted daily during the first two weeks of camp. After that, the frequency of tests would be determined according to the positivity rate. If the positivity rate dips below five percent, tests will be spread out to every other day.

The league says that test results are available within 24 hours of nasal swabbing. But they will not be available immediately. Teams have also instituted daily temperature screenings, symptom monitoring, social distancing measures, and have distributed masks in abundance to all personnel.

During training camp, players who test positive are mandated to take two additional tests within 24 hours to verify the positive result. If the two additional tests come back negative, the original test is determined false positive, and the player can return to practice. But in order for a player, coach, or member of team personnel to resume normal activity, they must test negative more than once.

However, the league suffered a setback on August 24 when 77 tests returned positive for COVID-19. Ten teams were affected by the results, each having to send their players home and into quarantine, forcing them to miss practice with weeks before the beginning of the season. All 77 tests were reported to be false positive after the fact, due to processing errors in a BioReference New Jersey lab. There was a mistake that occurred in the gap between the lab receiving the tests and the period of analysis.

No Preseason

The NFL cancelled all preseason games for the 2020 season. Originally, the NFL cut the preseason in half from four games to just two, but the league later decided to cancel the preseason entirely to ensure the safety of the players as efficiently as possible at the expense of meaningless preseason games. The league proposed the Players Association a cancelled preseason, which the NFLPA accepted. On July 27, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell confirmed that there would be no preseason games in 2020.

No International Games

The NFL announced in May that there would be no international games this season. The league plays five games overseas every season, including four in London and one in Mexico City. All games in 2020 will be played in stateside NFL venues. The league expects to play international games once again in the 2021 season.

Players Can Opt Out of the Season

The NFL and NFL Player's Association agreed to an amended collective bargaining agreement on July 24. Among the new terms of the agreement, players have the choice to opt out of the 2020 season. That player's contract would not apply to the season he is opting out, it would roll over to the 2021 season. They would be eligible to receive a $150,000 salary advance. Undrafted players would not be eligible for a salary advance.

Players also have the option of being designated as a higher-risk opt-out. Players with risk factors or pre-existing medical conditions can opt out and claim higher risk from COVID-19. Higher-risk players can opt out and still receive all benefits and minimum salary for a credited season. These players would be paid an additional bonus salary advance worth $350,000.

A number of players have already exercised their right to opt out, including fathers with newborns in the house. Patriots safety Patrick Chung is expecting a baby later in the summer, and Patriots linebacker Dont'a Hightower became a father at the beginning of July. Hightower, who was entering the final year of his contract, will now earn his base salary during the 2021 season should he play.

A total of 67 players have opted out of the 2020 season. Notable players include:

• Bills DL Star Lotulelei
• Eagles WR Marquise Goodwin
  
• Giants OT Nate Solder
• Jets LB CJ Mosley
• Patriots OL Marcus Cannon, S Patrick Chung, LB Dont'a Hightower
• Vikings DL Michael Pierce

The deadline for a player to opt out of the season was August 6, seven days after the signing of the revised CBA. 

Training Camp Modifications

As part of the revised CBA, training camp is seeing a major change of pace. For the entire offseason, teams were forced to hold meetings remotely. All OTAs and minicamps were cancelled entirely. In an effort to avoid injuries and a fast transition back into contact scrimmages after a dormant offseason, the league modified training camp to a format unlike anything the league has ever seen.

Training camps began as scheduled, with players reporting as early as July 28. When players report to the facilities, they are required to wear a mask during all non-football related activities. Facilities have been designed to configure one-way entrances and exits, to sanitize high-touch surfaces such as elevator buttons and vending machines multiple times daily, and maintenance disinfects team meeting rooms after every film session.

Strength and conditioning workouts are widely staggered, with a limit on how many players are permitted in the gym at a time. Locker rooms have seen a major overhaul, separating all lockers so they are all six feet apart. Helmets, shoulder pads, and uniforms are sanitized immediately following every practice. Joint scrimmages between two teams have obviously been cancelled, as were all preseason games.

The league created the following schedule for training camp when teams reported on July 28 for all teams:

• Day 1: Testing and virtual meetings
• Days 2-3: Virtual meetings
• Day 4: Testing and virtual meetings
• Days 5-6: Physicals
• Days 7-15: Strength and conditioning
• Day 16: Begin practice
• Day 21: Begin padded practices

Training camp has largely consisted of mass walkthroughs without any padded player scrimmages. Players were not even permitted to put on a helmet until August 12. They could not wear pads until August 17.

Traditional 90 man rosters are also a thing of the past in the modified CBA. In an effort to minimize team personnel and maximize social distancing across the league, the NFL announced that cuts will now trim down to just 80 roster spots by August 16. By midway through August, 320 players were cut across the NFL, robbing hundreds of hopefuls of an opportunity to prove themselves in camp and preseason games. To accommodate for ten additional roster cuts per team, the league is expanding practice squads from twelve spots to sixteen, to allow more players to remain with the team. 

The Unknown, and the Challenges Ahead

The unavoidable truth is that as long as a vaccine is undeveloped and unavailable, COVID-19 will continue to be an opponent that teams will not have a game plan for. Players and coaches have already tested positive for COVID-19, and the numbers will inevitably increase. 

Major League Baseball has already had to face this problem. When multiple players and coaches on the Miami Marlins tested positive, the league was forced to cancel their upcoming games, and cancel upcoming games for the Marlins' opponents during the period the Marlins tested positive for the virus. What has followed for MLB is streaks of postponed and cancelled games due to player exposure to the virus, and calls for the season to be suspended, which is continuing at this moment.

The virus will inevitably spread throughout the NFL during the season. It is not a matter of if, but when. The league will be tested, and there will be peaks and troughs of positive tests. If COVID-19 spirals out of control and hundreds of players or coaches test positive, it puts everyone they come in contact with at risk, not just on the field, but when they go back home. Players risk spreading the virus to their teammates as well as their significant others, parents, children, and anyone they interact with when they return home. It will be an easy decision to send a player who tests positive into isolation, and it is the sensible protocol to follow. The challenge arises in contact tracing, and determining who has been exposed to an infected person, and who is at risk of contracting it themselves.

The very nature of American football is that of a contact sport, which will make mitigating the virus difficult and practically impossible. An infected player could easily make their way onto the field and go onto the field without even knowing they are carrying the virus and pass it to dozens of teammates, coaches, and opponents just by doing their job of smashing their opponent in the mouth. The line of scrimmage could become a deadly hotspot for the spread of COVID-19, due to the heavy contact that comes into play. During games, it will be impossible to social distance. Face shields and masks ingrained into player helmets can help, but it will not be enough to offset the physical nature of football. 

There may be points during the season where a suspension of play is a considerable option. The season may not see itself out. As much as the league wants to believe that they are immune to coronavirus, and as far as they have come without seeing games or schedules compromised by the pandemic, the NFL is just as vulnerable as everyone. There will be setbacks. How the league will respond to said setbacks is a question that nobody will have the answer to until the NFL crosses those bridges. Nonetheless, the league has faith that they can make it work.

The Show Must Go On

The season is scheduled to kick off on Thursday September 10 in Kansas City, where the Chiefs begin their Super Bowl defense against the Houston Texans. There will be fans in the stands as well, since the Chiefs are allowing 22% of fans attend their September home games. It will mark the beginning of the NFL's official battle versus COVID-19. 

Everyone wants to see football return, and we have all been wondering if that could feasibly happen all summer long. But the league has every intention of kicking the season off on time, and plan to forward playing the season. The direction this tale takes beyond September 10 is anybody's guess.