Sports without Spectators

[Birdjaguar]

Ditto what Arwon said, but I'm holding out for an Australian team called the Dropbears.

Dropbears are an evil deadly monster in Path of Exile that were introduced to the game by an Australian contributor about 4 years ago. Terrible things that can appear from nowhere and you kill quickly.

 

[Birdjaguar]

NCAA says go for the gold Money

March Madness Will Go On, but in a Worst Case, Without Mad Fans

As coronovirus spreads around the U.S., the NCAA’s marquee basketball tournaments are slated to begin in less than two weeks

The NCAA’s worst-case scenario for staging its March Madness tournaments in the time of coronavirus involves barring spectators from games, with players screened for illness before competing, the association’s chief medical officer Brian Hainline said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal.

The men’s and women’s college basketball tournaments are slated to begin in less than two weeks, at a time when event cancellations are piling up in the U.S. and abroad. But the NCAA says it is not contemplating a postponement or cancellation of its lucrative marquee event.

“I think a worst-case scenario is that it’s played behind closed doors,” Hainline said Friday. “It would be very, very difficult to cancel a championship and have it at any other time.”

"It’s very unlikely,” he added of the closed-door scenario, saying the organization had worked out “options A through Z” to choose from.

Hainline also said the NCAA is looking to an advisory panel it has convened to guide it through the coming weeks and translate the shifting data on coronavirus in the U.S. into policies for the association as it heads into its busiest season of championship events.

Carlos Del Rio, head of the global-health department at Emory University and the chairman of the panel, compared the situation to the tracking of a brewing storm that could become a tropical storm—or a Category 4 or 5 event.

“We don’t really know where it’s going to hit,” said Del Rio, who said the panel would have biweekly calls to grapple with the data on their moving target. “We may not know what’s going to happen a week from today."

That panel, to date, hasn’t backed a ban on spectators. But on Friday, Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins University hosted the first game of the first round of the Division III men’s basketball tournament in an empty gymnasium.

Hainline said that spectator bans were “not a rational strategy” for the association at this moment, and that Johns Hopkins had acted on its own initiative. “That decision was made in the school,” he said.

Other options on the table for the NCAA include screening players for illness, screening spectators, or focusing on messaging around “citizen civility” —that people should stay home if they don’t feel good, Del Rio said.

While some schools and stadiums have started to indicate they will make their own decisions regardless of the NCAA, state public health officials have also started to announce orders about events within their jurisdictions.

On Thursday, with no confirmed cases of coronavirus within the state, Ohio leaders barred spectators from attending the Arnold Sports Festival in Columbus this weekend on the grounds that they were coming from more than 80 countries and other parts of the U.S. affected by the virus, and that spectators would be able to attend dozens of events and likely travel between festival locations.

Dayton, Ohio, hosts the Division I men’s basketball tournament ‘First Four’ play-in games at the University of Dayton Arena on March 17 and 18.

Del Rio said that the NCAA’s advisory panel, as a body that is independent from the association, might be better able to negotiate with state officials in those scenarios. He also said that he wasn’t necessarily concerned about the growing number of confirmed cases of coronavirus, as they reflected better efforts to identify sick people, rather than new transmissions of the virus.

 

[Birdjaguar]

The NCAA announced plans Wednesday to limit attendance at upcoming championship events, which includes this month’s March Madness basketball tournaments.

The decision follows guidance from public health officials to limit large public gatherings on account of the coronavirus pandemic.

NCAA President Mark Emmert said in a statement that spectators will be limited to “essential staff and limited family.”

“While I understand how disappointing this is for all fans of our sports, my decision is based on the current understanding of how COVID-19 is progressing in the United States,” he added. “This decision is in the best interest of public health, including that of coaches, administrators, fans and, most importantly, our student-athletes.”


Inside the NCAA

✔@InsidetheNCAA
https://twitter.com/InsidetheNCAA/status/1237838677591511040

NCAA President Mark Emmert statement on limiting attendance at NCAA events: http://on.ncaa.com/gabyq


https://twitter.com/intent/like?tweet_id=1237838677591511040
Emmert told the AP the organization is looking to move some games, including the Final Four, to smaller venues. The men’s Final Four is currently scheduled to be played at Mercedes-Benz stadium in Atlanta, and the women’s at Smoothie King Center in New Orleans.

The decision will carry significant financial repercussions: Attendance at the games has regularly exceeded 650,000 paying spectators per year since 2007.

The National College Players Association has been lobbying for a spectator-free tournament since late February, when it urged the NCAA to take greater precautions in light of the coronavirus outbreak.

The three-week men’s Division I tournament kicks off on Tuesday, March 17, and the women’s Division I tournament on March 20.

 

[Arwon]

The NBA looks like it'll confirm a similar decision tomorrow, two tweets from Woj:

New story filed to ESPN: The NBA’s Board of Governors shared a consensus on Wednesday to continue the season playing games without fans in arenas amid the coronavirus crisis, and Commissioner Adam Silver is expected to move in that direction with a decision on Thursday.

Several teams were willing to put the games on hiatus, but the rest wanted to move toward eliminating fans from arenas to continue playing games, sources tell ESPN. One team wanted to keep status quo until a governmental/public mandate dictated change: The New York Knicks.

Meanwhile the Jazz@Thunder game was delayed just before tip off because Gobert and others are sick, players have been sent back to the locker rooms, and nobody seems to know if the NBA will cancel it.

 

[Arwon]

And it's been postponed

 

[Birdjaguar]

NBA season suspended.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I can't embed the video, but here's a link to a video of the first guy in the NBA to catch the virus touching all the microphones at a press conference for lulz.
https://www.reddit.com/r/instantkar...oronavirus/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

 

[Birdjaguar]

All of our local and state sporting events have now gone spectatorless.

 

[Takhisis]

@Synsensa you were asking earlier in another thread. MLB has just cancelled all spring training games and postponed the season.

https://www.mlb.com/news/mlb-2020-season-delayed

Also Minor League Baseball has suspended its season.

When do World Cup soccer teams begin their season?

Depending on the continental federation it was supposed to be on the next FIFA date (Thursday after next) which at least here in South America (CONMEBOL) has been suspended. Since they're officially a FIFA tournament then FIFA had to give its go-ahead.

Meanwhile CONMEBOL has also just suspended all continental matches from next week on.

Edit: Peru and Colombia have suspended all footy, Argentina's having all matches have no spectators and the contagion's spread to the English Premier League so that should be suspended ASAP.
If you can deal with the language, follow this topic: https://www.ole.com.ar/coronavirus

 

[Arwon]

If I were running a solo non-contact sport like badminton I'd be looking for a way to get content out to the sport hungry masses

 

[Takhisis]

Nah, it's the turn for e-sports to shine. LOL and CS:GO should be sweeping the field.

 

[Birdjaguar]

And March Madness is cancelled!

(CNN)The NCAA announced Thursday it is canceling March Madness, the men's Division I basketball tournament, and other winter and spring NCAA championships, due to concerns about the spread of the novel coronavirus.

"This decision is based on the evolving Covid-19 public health threat, our ability to ensure the events do not contribute to spread of the pandemic, and the impracticality of hosting such events at any time during this academic year given ongoing decisions by other entities," the NCAA said in a statement.
The decision involves men's and women's basketball tournaments in divisions I, II and III.
The men's Division I championship has been played every year since its inception in 1939.


Coronavirus live coverage
The decision appears to include the College World Series, which was scheduled for June.


How major sports leagues in the US are responding to coronavirus
The news comes as many sports leagues are pausing their seasons.
Earlier, five-time national champion Duke University said it would not play in the NCAA men's basketball tournament -- had it be held.
The private university in Durham, North Carolina, is suspending its sports programs for the "foreseeable future," it said in a statement.
Another basketball blue blood, the University of Kansas, said in a statement it was canceling athletic travel indefinitely. and athletics competitions have been suspended indefinitely.
It was unclear whether next week's NCAA basketball tournaments were part of the Kansas halt to athletics.
Mike Krzyzewski, coach of the 10th-ranked Blue Devils, said he emphatically supported Duke's decision.
"The welfare of our student-athletes, and all students at Duke, is paramount, and this decision reflects that institutional priority," he said.
The unranked Duke women's team finished third in the ACC regular season and was expected to be selected for the NCAA tournament.
CNN's David Close contributed to this report.

 

[Arwon]

Gatherings ban in Australia from Monday, for anything organised and non essential of over 500 people.

 

[Takhisis]

Ah, so the rugby's still on then.

 

[EgonSpengler]

The UFC is going ahead with its scheduled events, but they'll be without the full, live crowds. They'll be moved to the UFC facilities in Las Vegas and broadcast as normal, so I guess it'll be like watching the shows like The Ultimate Fighter, where there's a crowd of maybe a few-dozen people. It creates a different atmosphere, compared to a 15,000-seat indoor arena. For people who enjoy the sport as much as the event, if you follow me, it might even be better in some ways. Sometimes when an event like that is stripped of some of the pomp and circumstance, I find that I get a different appreciation for it. Kind of like seeing a pro sport live for the first time after watching it on television a lot, or when I saw Iron Maiden on Live From Abbey Road - a live performance, but stripped of the stage-show theatrics and the crowd and everything. It feels like you're closer to the action. In the case of MMA, the sound is different. You can hear the fighters and the corner men, you can hear the kicks and some of the punches land. If you haven't heard it before, it can be a little eyebrow-raising to hear the impact of something relatively innocuous-seeming, like a double-leg takedown or a knee in the clinch.

 

[Takhisis]

So, today a new football mini-tournament started. River Plate, one of the biggest clubs in the country, unilaterally announced that they wouldn't field a team for tomorrow's home match against Atlético Tucumán. The players of both teams supported the decision.

But today, the football association, headed by Marcelo Tinelli (a Kirchnerist media operative for over a decade, appointed new president of the sport's ruling body 48 hours earlier) just issued this communiqué in which they expressly cite governmental authority (something normally violently rejected by FIFA) as their basis for threatening to dock the club points and other possible punishments for not complying with the government's decision to pretend there's no crisis and keep up the bread and circuses.
So yes, they -during a pneumonia virus pandemic!- want to have a match held with tens of thousands of spectators packed into a stadium in a day with a forecast of heavy rainfall and low temperatures.

EDIT: Actually the crowd was supposed to be absent and it would only have been the teams. Given that one of River Plate's players has been/is under observation for a possible case of the virus, this is still utterly moronic. The outbreak's spread to Paraguay and the North/Northeast region and now they want to risk spreading it Northwest as well.

 

[FredLC]

So there is no professional soccer play this spring? Huh.

Here is the thing with actual football:

National leagues are a permanent thing, and many are being suspended already. The "Libertadores da America" cup is suspended until further notice (which sucks as my Flamengo, the standing champion, is considered favorite to win again this year), and in Brazil, local matches will be played without spectators (suspension is not outside the possibilities yet).

I know other nations took those measures as well. And I think the Champions league and Euro league also stopped.

As for national teams, the world cup is still years away, but this year the qualifying rounds would start. Already two matches of the south American leg, due next week, were suspended. I don't know if Europe is already playing qualifiers, but it is likely.

Also, this year there is the continental tournament, the America Cup, but it is also still months away, so it is not threatened yet. It's in the same limbo as the Olympic Games.

Regards .

 

[FredLC]

EDIT: Actually the crowd was supposed to be absent and it would only have been the teams. Given that one of River Plate's players has been/is under observation for a possible case of the virus, this is still utterly moronic. The outbreak's spread to Paraguay and the North/Northeast region and now they want to risk spreading it Northwest as well.

That sucks. Which player?

One member of Flamengo's administration (a vice president) is confirmed with COVID; there are 3 more suspicions, all in staff, but they had contact with players. The entire team, and staff, are being tested, with results expected today, tomorrow tops.

Which sucks as we have a match scheduled for today!

Regards .

 

[Arwon]

The AFL is apparently planning some extreme measures to get the season played.

Playing behind closed doors per the gathering ban from Monday, they want to cram extra rounds in before the assumed total lockdown of society during the peak pandemic period (which they're advised will be in June/July).

That would mean a quicker turnaround, to a game every 5 days instead of one weekend per round. That burden is going to mean shorter games, larger playing lists with new players being signed, more onfield rotations.

I don't know yet what the NRL (rugby league) is planning, I've seen suggestions they want to pick a location and play every game there. They also need to work out what to do about the New Zealand border closure, there's a team based in Auckland called the NZ Warriors who obviously can't play teams in NZ any more.

The A-League soccer is nearly finished (6 of 29 weeks left, plus playoffs) for the current season but faces the same border dilemma with Wellington Phoenix.

Super Rugby (rugby union) must surely be impossible with the NZ border decision, and that's assuming Argentina or South Africa don't make their own similar measures.

 

[Takhisis]

The "Libertadores da America" cup is suspended until further notice (which sucks as my Flamengo, the standing champion, is considered favorite to win again this year)

I do not particularly care for Flamengo, but those two last-minute goals saved me from an entire summer's worth of putting up with fans bragging all over the place.

That sucks. Which player?

One member of Flamengo's administration (a vice president) is confirmed with COVID; there are 3 more suspicions, all in staff, but they had contact with players. The entire team, and staff, are being tested, with results expected today, tomorrow tops.

Which sucks as we have a match scheduled for today!

Regards .

A reserve player. I'm trying to find the name, but it wasn't even a confirmed diagnosis. Over the river in Uruguay they've already suspended their tournament, but the narcogovernment in Argentina believes in ‘ruling by news headline’ i.e. staying in control of the narrative no matter what reality has to say about it. So first downplay everything and only start a quarantine after players have been forced to mix up and play a couple hours' worth of contact sport under (or after) a deluge, in the cold. Many of the players themselves and His Handiness Diego Armando Maradona himself have actually spoken out in favour of an immediate suspension.

The only good thing about football seems to be Ronaldinho winning yet another title (prize: a 16-kg. suckling pig).