PlagueWatch 2020-23 - Coronavirus

[aimo]

Tennis is borderline.

Pro tennis is "safer" than local USTA leagues, where the women go back and forth tucking the extra balls under their skort legs, basically swapping bodily fluids the whole match. OK, that sounds even worse than it actually is.

[MChambers]

Testing 75+ people (players, coaches, umps) before every single game seems like a pretty wasteful process for a fairly nonessential job.

And what happens if a player tests positive? Do you quarantine all his teammates? Do you have minor leaguers you can call up? Seems intractable to me.

[camion]

And what happens if a player tests positive? Do you quarantine all his teammates? Do you have minor leaguers you can call up? Seems intractable to me.

Let's try thinking outside the (batters) box*.

Since the virus apparently doesn't seem to like the younger generation maybe they could go with an analog to the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) from WWII and create teams of youngsters, perhaps an AAKPBL (K for Kids).

[budwom]

friend of mine is a pilot for a major U.S. airline, and yesterday the pilots had a video meeting with the CEO, discussing furloughs, pay cuts, etc...interesting takeaway was that, for the time being (and obviously this is just a best guesstimate) the CEO's best guess of when we might see most of his planes and pilots in the skies is September...obviously a TON of stuff (e.g. testing) needs to be accomplished before then, but I found the perspective interesting.

Also noted yesterday, commissioners have made it clear we can forget crowdless football games, the students will have to be back in school before games resume...

And this article describes how most MLB teams are going to participate in a wide testing study, which should, at least, give some good info on how widespread the virus is, and has been:https://www.npr.org/sections/coronav...s-in-a-big-way

[throatybeard]

To solve the umpire problem, baseball could go all electronic on the strike vs ball call. Do instant replay booths for at home calls. Just don't have the umpire at all anymore.

These radical times call for radical ideas.

The umpires have a labor union and a bargaining agreement. Legally, you can't just get rid of them with a stroke of a we felt like it.

[bundabergdevil]

With todays’s unemployment announcement, Coronavirus has wiped out approximately the same number of jobs in 4 weeks as were added in total since the Great Recession of 2008.

That is astonishing.

[jv001]

friend of mine is a pilot for a major U.S. airline, and yesterday the pilots had a video meeting with the CEO, discussing furloughs, pay cuts, etc...interesting takeaway was that, for the time being (and obviously this is just a best guesstimate) the CEO's best guess of when we might see most of his planes and pilots in the skies is September...obviously a TON of stuff (e.g. testing) needs to be accomplished before then, but I found the perspective interesting.

Also noted yesterday, commissioners have made it clear we can forget crowdless football games, the students will have to be back in school before games resume...

And this article describes how most MLB teams are going to participate in a wide testing study, which should, at least, give some good info on how widespread the virus is, and has been:https://www.npr.org/sections/coronav...s-in-a-big-way

Seems as if MLB is doing their part in the Covid-19 fight. On a side note there's a news worthy link about a Bloomberg news article that might be better discussed in the 2020 Presidential thread.

GoDuke!

[Indoor66]

With todays’s unemployment announcement, Coronavirus has wiped out approximately the same number of jobs in 4 weeks as were added in total since the Great Recession of 2008.

That is astonishing.

Actually it is the reason for all of the thinking and effort toward opening the economy. Most who lost their job cannot survive much longer.

[MChambers]

The umpires have a labor union and a bargaining agreement. Legally, you can't just get rid of them with a stroke of a we felt like it.

But you could have a roboump doing the basic work at home plate, and keep the human home plate umpire 10ft away. But I think there are way too many obstacles to think that baseball will restart this year.

[MChambers]

Let's try thinking outside the (batters) box*.

Since the virus apparently doesn't seem to like the younger generation maybe they could go with an analog to the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) from WWII and create teams of youngsters, perhaps an AAKPBL (K for Kids).

You think people will watch T-ball? :-)

[rsvman]

You think people will watch T-ball? :-)

At this point, maybe.

[LegoBatman]

You think people will watch T-ball? :-)

At this point, maybe.

Wasn't that already on ESPN 4? Or maybe The Ocho?

[House G]

You think people will watch T-ball? :-)

If there is a line on it, they will.

[Neals384]

Minor quibble, but the catchers and home plate ump are within 6 feet of each other for the entire game, and next to at least 18 other players at times for most of the game. And then the catchers go to the dugouts, which are not spacious.

Baseball has less close contact than the other team sports, but it is still quite susceptible to the virus.

Basically golf and tennis is about it. Tennis is borderline.

Think about the baseball players who chew - the dugout is one place I would not want to be right now.

Pro tennis is "safer" than local USTA leagues, where the women go back and forth tucking the extra balls under their skort legs, basically swapping bodily fluids the whole match. OK, that sounds even worse than it actually is.

Pros do that too.

[Phredd3]

But you could have a roboump doing the basic work at home plate, and keep the human home plate umpire 10ft away. But I think there are way too many obstacles to think that baseball will restart this year.

Back in the dark ages when there was a single umpire, he used to stand halfway between the pitcher and second base and call balls and strikes from there. No reason they couldn't do that. It's plenty distanced from the players. Of course, the umps would have to be ready for a line drive, but the first- and third-base umps already have that issue from slightly farther away in foul ground. Give the ump padding, and if he gets hit, the ball is dead and it goes as a single. Done.

I agree, though, there are a lot of things to consider - you couldn't use the clubhouses, the dugouts would have to be spaced, and the biggest is what to do if someone on a team tests positive. You couldn't even consider it without readily-available testing. But on the other hand, it's only been a month of shutdown, and people are beginning to complain. And there's an awful lot of money at stake.

On the other hand, again, if you can't open the stadiums, it'll only be the millionaires making any money. The people who really need the money still won't have jobs.

It's not an easy call either way, IMO.

[throatybeard]

You think people will watch T-ball? :-)

Honestly, the pause is making me less interested in sports, not desperate for them to come back. The diehards will be back. But these leagues need to worry about the large, semi-committed swaths of their clientele. Many may gain some perspective about sports and not come back, or come back half-heartedly and watching less.

For example, it's galling to me that all these arts organizations I support--which are facing existential crises--while asking for you to donate the value of tickets to lost events, are promptly refunding ticketholders...

...while at the same time, the Blues haven't refunded any of the lost 2020 RS games and are still hitting my credit card monthly for 2020-21 games that may never occur. They announced a 13% price hike a month before the shutdown. The tickets, which I sell 90% of, are illiquid at present.

I "inherited" my Blues season tickets from an aged friend, still living, and hold his subscriber priority back to 1974. So I get into groovy stuff like the 2017 Winter Classic and 2020 ASG. I get 30% off merch at the team store. These are great perks, but my point is, it's taking these perks plus a Stanley Cup ten months ago and sense of duty to my friend to keep the tickets, at least until he dies.

It's taking all of that for me not to throw in the towel. Because right now, if I ask the arts people for refunds, my checking account feels like it's a stage for imperiled arts organizations to subsidize a pro sports franchise that will survive just fine. This prioritizing is the opposite of my stated values about these two realms of human endeavor, and it's driving me nuts.

[CameronBornAndBred]

If this turns out to be true, you can toss any "when will the shutdown end" predictions right out the window.

A total of 141 people who had apparently recovered from Covid-19 have tested positive again, South Korea's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said on Thursday.

KCDC deputy director Kwon Joon-wook said the agency did not know what caused the people to retest positive and was investigating.

https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/...305694147d605f

[Faustus]

Let's remember, too, that quite a few very good athletes (like Ted Williams) lost several peak years in their careers because they were off involved in something more important -- like WWII -- and things still came out ok in the end.

[CDu]

If this turns out to be true, you can toss any "when will the shutdown end" predictions right out the window.

https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/...305694147d605f

Very much hoping that this does not turn out to be the case. It would require nearly infinitely more testing access (and not just half-arsed tests, GOOD ones) and effective treatments (see below) and a huge ramp-up in vaccine programs.

Meanwhile, we are now seeing studies suggesting hydroxylchloroquine is not effective for coronavirus:
https://www.sciencealert.com/small-t...ng-coronavirus
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...10.20060699v1
http://www.zjujournals.com/med/EN/10...292.2020.03.03

Along with concerns about the initial study that touted its potential value for COVID:
https://scienceintegritydigest.com/2...19-infections/

And also we are finding that cardiovascular complications are a substantial side effect of using hydroxlchloroquine in patients with COVID:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...ug/2983129001/

So it appears we're still not there on the treatment side. Fingers crossed that changes, and definitely fingers crossed that the duration of immunity from prior infection is longer than just a month or two.

[rsvman]

If this turns out to be true, you can toss any "when will the shutdown end" predictions right out the window.



https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/...305694147d605f

I posted similar findings upthread; in the study I referenced, it occurred in about 1 in 6 patients.

The key component of this information that is entirely missing is this: we don't know whether these people who test positive are contagious. The test looks for two short segments of the viral RNA, a total of about 100 base pairs. If any of this RNA is in the sample, the test will turn positive. But RNA is not contagious, only intact virions are contagious. Plus, generally speaking, there is an certain amount of viral shedding that has to take place in order to infect somebody else; the PCR amplifies samples, usually by about 37 cycles, each cycle doubling the amount of genetic material. So even a tiny amount of RNA will trip the test.

What needs to happen (and it sounds like from the article that they are working on it now) is that swab samples from these patients need to be inoculated onto cell cultures to see if there is any replication-competent virus there, and, if so, how much is there. Only then will we be able to know whether these people could potentially pose a public health problem.