Hub Arkush: Right or wrong, the NFL season is going to start on time
While this was not originally the topic of my thoughts Friday, starting anywhere else would be burying what has to be the lead and clearly impacts everything we report about the National Football League during our current public health crisis.
Why talk actual football if there isn't going to be a season?
However, after doing as much homework as can be done and speaking to multiple key sources, contrary to what I've suspected over recent weeks and months I am now convinced the 2020 NFL season will kick off on Thursday, Sept. 10 in Kansas City.
Should it happen?
That's not a productive conversation today.
There was a time when we all enjoyed true freedom of speech, we were interested in each other's opinions and attempted to learn from them, and civil discourse was not only possible but also productive.
Sadly these days if your opinion isn't shared by the person/people reading or hearing it all you accomplish is to be ostracized and often crucified in the miasma of the Twitter-verse, Facebook, Instagram, etc., and those who do agree will just use it as another tool to attack those who don't.
I'm not blaming anyone and I'm not pointing any fingers; there is more than enough blame to go around. That's just the way it is these days.
However for the longest time I've believed based on research and reporting, the powers that be in the NFL would make decisions about the season based strictly on what is safest for the greatest number of people.
Whether that is in fact what they think they're doing I can't really say. I can't get inside the heads of all 32 team owners and Roger Goodell.
What does appear obvious though according to multiple sources involved in the decisions being made is that while the league is clearly concerned about the health and safety of all involved, it has accepted some people will get sick and some may become seriously ill, but that mirrors society in general and is the current cost of doing business.
Whether or not games are still being played week two, week six, week 13, etc. remains to be seen.
What no one is willing to say or project is whether there is a line in the sand where play will have to stop because too many people are suffering, nor do we know yet if it will even come to that?
Teams haven't run practice drills yet let alone played the game and we have no idea how effective the planning to date to keep everyone safe will be or conversely, how bad things might get.
But with only 69 rostered players, just 2.7% opting out, and a less than 1% league wide positive coronavirus test rate so far, everyone appears committed to giving this a go.
With my own opinions on right or wrong buried on the bench, how can I report the NFL is going to be a go while much of the college football season has canceled and the rest is somewhere between flailing around for survival and life support?
In any given season there are well in excess of 10,000 student athletes on FBS school football rosters alone. No more than 500 will sign NFL contracts.
Our universities are not going to make their decisions based on 5% of a student population no matter how much money is involved, and while the churn or gross revenue for many is significant, actual profits for most are nowhere near what you probably assume.
Risking the well-being of uncompensated amateur athletes has been deemed a non-starter for the majority of the academics making these decisions.
But the prevailing belief for pros appears to be that NFL players with hundreds of thousands of dollars if not millions at stake are in a much different position when evaluating how much risk they are willing to accept.
Things can always change but almost everyone wants to play for now, and with all of the precautions being taken, and how unlikely it is all of the risks will be fully known until they actually start playing the games, it seems almost certain we are full speed ahead at the very least through opening days.
What happens after that is the next frontier the league is preparing to explore.
• Twitter: @Hub_Arkush