http://blogs.shu.edu/sportspoll/2020/04/...developed/

Quote:South Orange NJ, April 9, 2020 — While sports commissioners, governments and medical experts debate when to reopen sports leagues, a huge majority of Americans including a substantial majority of sports fans are prepared to stay home until the development of a vaccine for Coronavirus.

Asked what they would do if the leagues resumed play before the development of a vaccine, 72 percent of Americans said they would not attend games, with 12 percent saying they would if social distancing could be maintained. Only 13 percent said they would feel safe attending as in the past. Among sports fans the number drops to a still significant 61 percent.

And if social distancing continues into the fall, 70 percent thinks the NFL should not start up to insure the players safety, with 20 percent saying the league should resume but allow the players to choose not to play, and only six percent saying the league should start up as planned.

Well that will thin the crowds for a season, and that would actually be a good thing. That assumes the gov't even allows for large crowds next fall/winter.

When you are young and dumb like the majority of us were (are) between 18-25.. They'll be there regardless in masses if permitted to.

Fine with that. Lowers ticket prices.

The LSU - Clemson national championship game was the last CFB we will see during 2020.

I am one of them.

Being that pandemics come in waves, it wouldn't surprise me if the fall semester is totally cancelled and only online classes are held. That will postpone the fall football season anyways. Of course, this may be different than pandemics of our past and is over by June. Worst case scenario is we don't see any semblance of normalcy until sometime in 2022.

(04-10-2020 07:40 AM)Thiefery Wrote:  When you are young and dumb like the majority of us were (are) between 18-25.. They'll be there regardless in masses if permitted to.

In masses? That age group already wasn't attending college football games in "masses" before this year. If they were the only ones in the stadium, you could put every 18-25 year old person who regularly attended CFB games last year into a CFB stadium and still maintain social distancing of 6 feet or more, no problem.

(04-10-2020 11:51 AM)ClairtonPanther Wrote:  Being that pandemics come in waves, it wouldn't surprise me if the fall semester is totally cancelled and only online classes are held. That will postpone the fall football season anyways. Of course, this may be different than pandemics of our past and is over by June. Worst case scenario is we don't see any semblance of normalcy until sometime in 2022.

This is going to have a huge impact on private schools. Students aren't going to want to pay $45k-60k for online classes.

My brother works for a D-1 private school, and he said they are preparing for a 20%-40% reduction in revenue for the fall.

That survey only had 700 people in it and 35% of it was from landlines. Fear mongering survey and news story.

(04-10-2020 12:23 PM)MissouriStateBears Wrote:  That survey only had 700 people in it and 35% of it was from landlines. Fear mongering survey and news story.

I think that people who don't like a poll result have complained about the poll's methodology since around 1936.

Is this the best poll ever? Ironclad? No.

It is what it is. A lot of people won't go in large crowds if/until a coronavirus vaccine is developed.

This poll result is not shocking to me at all.

I bought season tickets last month in the middle of the pandemic and plan to attend every home game and travel to a couple of road games, if they play the games and permit inter-state travel.

(04-10-2020 01:08 PM)TerryD Wrote:  

(04-10-2020 12:23 PM)MissouriStateBears Wrote:  That survey only had 700 people in it and 35% of it was from landlines. Fear mongering survey and news story.

I think that people who don't like a poll result have complained about the poll's methodology since around 1936.

Is this the best poll ever? Ironclad? No.

It is what it is. A lot of people won't go in large crowds if/until a coronavirus vaccine is developed.

This poll result is not shocking to me at all.

Same here. I'm 72 and a die hard Memphis fan. I'm not going anywhere near a large crowd until we get the vaccine.

I love sports, but not enough to risk dying for them, lol.

I imagine that poll is reflective of the whole country.

My guess is we figure out how to play football in the fall without fans, and then see how it goes for 2021.

A developed vaccine may be 16-18 months away at a minimum. In the meantime, infection rates will level off and decline, but the population will still be susceptible to periodic outbreaks in varying locales.

There is a chance college football will return in the fall, but I am not confident it will. Beyond the matter of fan attendance, it is an intense contact sport. There will have to be thorough and frequent team testing for COVID-19.
Preparation for such will take much work and will cost.

Unless I have the antibodies in my system either from recovering from the virus (and I might, there is a fair chance I already had the virus and recovered ... I just have not been tested -- waiting for the Stanford antibody test to be widely available, only 3200 tested) or a vaccine (realistically well over a year away), I will continue to engage in social distancing, and so will most people.

Sports are probably dead for the next 12 to 18 months.

(04-10-2020 01:35 PM)TripleA Wrote:  

(04-10-2020 01:08 PM)TerryD Wrote:  

(04-10-2020 12:23 PM)MissouriStateBears Wrote:  That survey only had 700 people in it and 35% of it was from landlines. Fear mongering survey and news story.

I think that people who don't like a poll result have complained about the poll's methodology since around 1936.

Is this the best poll ever? Ironclad? No.

It is what it is. A lot of people won't go in large crowds if/until a coronavirus vaccine is developed.

This poll result is not shocking to me at all.

Same here. I'm 72 and a die hard Memphis fan. I'm not going anywhere near a large crowd until we get the vaccine.

I love sports, but not enough to risk dying for them, lol.

I imagine that poll is reflective of the whole country.

My guess is we figure out how to play football in the fall without fans, and then see how it goes for 2021.

Stay safe, Triple A.

I am 62.

I have no underlying conditions but that is too risky for me.

I just am not going to sit in a crowded stadium shoulder to shoulder with people who may carry the virus.

I doubt that many people are willing to risk that.

(04-10-2020 01:53 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  Unless I have the antibodies in my system either from recovering from the virus (and I might, there is a fair chance I already had the virus and recovered ... I just have not been tested -- waiting for the Stanford antibody test to be widely available, only 3200 tested) or a vaccine (realistically well over a year away), I will continue to engage in social distancing, and so will most people.

Sports are probably dead for the next 12 to 18 months.

I agree about the testing. We are not in any way close to where we need to be with testing. But we could be by August, at least in a way to get players on the field and get games going. But packed stadiums...I don't see that happening. There is too much money at stake for NFL teams, NFL players and the Networks to not have a season. In 2018, the Packers made $255 million in national revenue.

National revenue consists of TV deals along with merchandising and licensing deals, which are negotiated at the national level by the NFL itself. This money is then divided evenly between the 32 teams regardless of individual performance. They are going to find a way to have a season.

The government needs to get super aggressive on testing. Right now, less than 1% of Americans have been tested. We are a long way away. It is very understandable that 3 out of 4 Americans would say they won't attend a game in the current environment.

You could just play without fans, and then when the first player or coach dies from the virus shut it down completely. Don't worry. College presidents don't worry about that kind of bad publicity.

4 of 4 Americans that took part in the poll were at games where people had Coronavirus back in the fall. They just didn't know it.

(04-10-2020 03:04 PM)SoCalBobcat78 Wrote:  

(04-10-2020 01:53 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  Unless I have the antibodies in my system either from recovering from the virus (and I might, there is a fair chance I already had the virus and recovered ... I just have not been tested -- waiting for the Stanford antibody test to be widely available, only 3200 tested) or a vaccine (realistically well over a year away), I will continue to engage in social distancing, and so will most people.

Sports are probably dead for the next 12 to 18 months.

I agree about the testing. We are not in any way close to where we need to be with testing. But we could be by August, at least in a way to get players on the field and get games going. But packed stadiums...I don't see that happening. There is too much money at stake for NFL teams, NFL players and the Networks to not have a season. In 2018, the Packers made $255 million in national revenue.

National revenue consists of TV deals along with merchandising and licensing deals, which are negotiated at the national level by the NFL itself. This money is then divided evenly between the 32 teams regardless of individual performance. They are going to find a way to have a season.

The government needs to get super aggressive on testing. Right now, less than 1% of Americans have been tested. We are a long way away. It is very understandable that 3 out of 4 Americans would say they won't attend a game in the current environment.

It's a two fold problem on testing

1) manufacturing
2) testing facilities (for the more thorough tests that labs).

Both are bottlenecks and have capacity limits. The first because of our outsourcing almost all manufacturing to hostile PRC -- this means we are starting from scratch and find we often cannot even get the component parts, and we need time to get the expertise and ramp up--; and the second is a sheer limit to the ability to perform tests (some automation will help and we are improving).

We realistically need the ability to perform 1 billion tests (3 per person in a year) to really crush this.

I do not share your optimism about the fall. California is ahead of the game as most US states go, and our peak is not expected until mid-May, and lifting of some lock down not until June. But as has happened in Singapore, a second wave is almost certain, and could be as bad or worse than the first, since only a small fraction of the population will have developed immunity.

For those reasons I think Sports are not happening for this calendar year, and possibly not next year either. But by then it should have blown through 1/3rd or more of the people and enough resistance built up to open things up in 2021 or 2022. But there will still be spot outbreaks.