Do sports, and more specifically NCAAB, return?

[English]

I just don't get the rationale for this view. I understand that it would be a nice idea that everyone has suddenly rediscovered books, exercise, and nature walks but the reality is your average American is just bored waiting for stuff to start happening again. Sports is stuff.

Just a take peek at the ratings of the few sports that ARE back, and you'll see actual data that supports Acymetric's point. I mean, the exhibition golf events that popped up at the beginning of stay-at-home orders had higher ratings than previous majors. People are even watching freaking Korean baseball and the Bundesliga. Ratings are up, basically, across the board. People are stuck at home, not traveling or going out to eat or going to bars or parties (you know, things that typically preoccupy folks). I'm with Acymetric on this--I think it's really bizarre thinking to suggest people would be LESS interested in sports because they're stuck at home and have started reading and doing cardio.

[CameronBornAndBred]

Miami-Dade County is reporting a massive spike in cases, with over 1/3 of those being tested turning up positive. How many schools are going to be nervous about making that trip?

[budwom]

Miami-Dade County is reporting a massive spike in cases, with over 1/3 of those being tested turning up positive. How many schools are going to be nervous about making that trip?

Just heard the Miami-Dade school superintendent on the radio (may have the jurisdiction slightly wrong, FL is complicated) and he made it completely clear that he isn't comfortable opening his schools in this environment. He doesn't think it's safe, regardless of what POTUS and the Gov are saying...

[duke79]

Honestly I don't think your odds are that far off. I would be tempted to put the odds for an NFL season even higher...just too much money on the table. You only suggested "some games" for college at 60%, which is probably a little high but I don't think its appreciably worse than 50/50 yet so not all that far off.

Yea, it would NOT surprise me to see many, if not most, colleges cancel their Fall inter-collegiate sports (a la The Ivy League). Despite all the precautions the colleges plan to take to prevent the virus from infecting people (students, faculty, coaches, staff, employees, etc), I think it will be almost impossible to prevent the spread of the virus on many, if not most, campuses (including the athletes). Even if the young athletes and other college students do not (mostly) have serious complications from the virus, undoubtedly some WILL and older faculty and coaches and staff will be at a much higher risk for complications. I just can not see the colleges assuming that type of potential liability. I hope I'm wrong but I'd put the odds at least at 50/50 that Fall sports do not happen and it also would not surprise me if many colleges end up cancelling on campus classes for all students.

No doubt the odds are greater that the NFL (and other professional sports) will TRY to play some sort of season. Everybody (the owners, players, coaches, etc) will all want their money!

[budwom]

^ yeah, lots of at risk older coaches and staff, plus colleges are VERY risk averse, and it's not going to look good if someone dies on their watch while playing a sport other colleges have chosen to not play.

the term "student athletes" is going to ring hollow if they insist on playing games with the current headwinds.

[DU82]

Yea, it would NOT surprise me to see many, if not most, colleges cancel their Fall inter-collegiate sports (a la The Ivy League). Despite all the precautions the colleges plan to take to prevent the virus from infecting people (students, faculty, coaches, staff, employees, etc), I think it will be almost impossible to prevent the spread of the virus on many, if not most, campuses (including the athletes). Even if the young athletes and other college students do not (mostly) have serious complications from the virus, undoubtedly some WILL and older faculty and coaches and staff will be at a much higher risk for complications. I just can not see the colleges assuming that type of potential liability. I hope I'm wrong but I'd put the odds at least at 50/50 that Fall sports do not happen and it also would not surprise me if many colleges end up cancelling on campus classes for all students.

No doubt the odds are greater that the NFL (and other professional sports) will TRY to play some sort of season. Everybody (the owners, players, coaches, etc) will all want their money!

Sounds like the Ivy League is again ahead of the curve in dealing with this issue. Seems the Director of the Ivy League knows what she's doing. She'd make a great ACC Commissioner! Except she actually cares about the student-athletes and emphasizes the first part. So, certain Smurf-like creatures ten miles west probably wouldn't go for that. They'd actually be punished for cheating.

[rasputin]

Yea, it would NOT surprise me to see many, if not most, colleges cancel their Fall inter-collegiate sports (a la The Ivy League). Despite all the precautions the colleges plan to take to prevent the virus from infecting people (students, faculty, coaches, staff, employees, etc), I think it will be almost impossible to prevent the spread of the virus on many, if not most, campuses (including the athletes). Even if the young athletes and other college students do not (mostly) have serious complications from the virus, undoubtedly some WILL and older faculty and coaches and staff will be at a much higher risk for complications. I just can not see the colleges assuming that type of potential liability. I hope I'm wrong but I'd put the odds at least at 50/50 that Fall sports do not happen and it also would not surprise me if many colleges end up cancelling on campus classes for all students.

No doubt the odds are greater that the NFL (and other professional sports) will TRY to play some sort of season. Everybody (the owners, players, coaches, etc) will all want their money!

If I recall correctly, the Ivy League was the first Division 1 league to shut down their basketball season.

[Steven43]

Just a take peek at the ratings of the few sports that ARE back, and you'll see actual data that supports Acymetric's point. I mean, the exhibition golf events that popped up at the beginning of stay-at-home orders had higher ratings than previous majors. People are even watching freaking Korean baseball and the Bundesliga. Ratings are up, basically, across the board. People are stuck at home, not traveling or going out to eat or going to bars or parties (you know, things that typically preoccupy folks). I'm with Acymetric on this--I think it's really bizarre thinking to suggest people would be LESS interested in sports because they're stuck at home and have started reading and doing cardio.

I don’t think it makes sense to look at the viewer numbers for what people have been watching (golf, Bundesliga, Korean baseball) during the pandemic and assume anything whatsoever about what that portends for sports-watching once the pandemic is over.

I think there is little question that many people have learned during this forced time away from sports that they don’t need them nearly as much as they thought they did before the pandemic. I don’t see how it’s even an argument. When people are forced to change their lifestyle and habits it logically follows that some of those changes become more permanent in nature.

I think it makes sense that sports-watching is going to be down (at least in the lifetimes of those who were alive during the pandemic) for years to come from what it was pre-pandemic.

[MChambers]

Never take medical or scientific advice from a man who can't figure out the strike zone. #lifehack

Yes, Joe is still making bad calls, as explained in this recent article:

https://www.golfdigest.com/story/eve...king-bad-calls

He makes country music albums and even appeared at the Grand Ole Opry, but here's a piece of a review from his Wikipedia entry:

In a September 2012 review, music blog Long After Dark said, "Blue Cowboy easily ranks with Ron Artest and Carl Lewis as one of the worst albums that a sports figure has cut ... ever. I can say that I managed to make it through the record, although it was not easy."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_We...tside_baseball

Made me smile.

[Acymetric]

I don’t think it makes sense to look at the viewer numbers for what people have been watching (golf, Bundesliga, Korean baseball) during the pandemic and assume anything whatsoever about what that portends for sports-watching once the pandemic is over.

I think there is little question that many people have learned during this forced time away from sports that they don’t need them nearly as much as they thought they did before the pandemic. I don’t see how it’s even an argument. When people are forced to change their lifestyle and habits it is not at all surprising when some of those changes become more permanent in nature.

I think it makes perfect sense that sports-watching is going to be down (at least in the lifetimes of those who were alive during the pandemic) for decades from what it was pre-pandemic.

So, part of the disagreement is about whether people will return to old habits after the pandemic is over. "Old habits die hard" as they say, and I don't expect some of these lifestyle changes to be as permanent as others suggest for the broader population.

The other issue is that at least for me, I'm assuming sports return before the pandemic is "over" (forget how hard it would be to even define that). The posts I was responding to were suggesting that viewership would be down for the sports that are about to start up, which would obviously be "during the pandemic" unless we think its going to be over in the next 2 months, so looking at other sports that are operating in some capacity now is the perfect reference point for this discussion.

I was commenting on what viewership would look like for the NFL this coming September, not what I think it might be in 5 years when COVID fears have finally abated (which is much harder to predict, too much unknown about what happens between now and then but I still don't see any compelling reason why it would significantly drop).

[jimsumner]

I'll be writing more about this later but via Zoom, Cut just suggested that a compressed football schedule this fall makes sense to him. He's not a big fan, however, of moving to the spring. Worst-case scenario.

[CameronBornAndBred]

This is an interesting take on Louisville's football fate. Assuming that the ACC also goes conference only, it leaves many in Kentucky scratching their heads.

However, the focus for Louisville football fans should not be on conference play, but on the non-conference schedule, which features three teams from Kentucky.

The Cardinals are slated to play their third and fourth games of the season against Western Kentucky and Murray State and finish the year hosting Kentucky.

Are you seeing the issue at hand here? In an attempt to keep teams within their region and limit the coronavirus spread, the ACC has prevented Louisville from playing three games from teams within its own state. At the same time, the Cardinals will have to travel to games in Syracuse, New York, and Tallahassee, Florida, among other trips.

https://bigredlouie.com/2020/07/10/l...akes-no-sense/

That would also apply to Duke, as we are scheduled against Elon and Charlotte.

[cato]

7E84DD9F-B881-4149-9339-5A005D08CB17.jpg

[Blue in the Face]

Meanwhile, pugnacious, irascible veteran MLB umpire Joe West has something of a unique view on the virus...he says the figure of 130,000 is ridiculously overstated..."you get hit by a car, it's coronavirus."

This sounds just about right for Joe.

Joe West is the President of the umpire's union. Which did not stop the umpire's union from issuing a statement basically smacking him down.

[English]

So, part of the disagreement is about whether people will return to old habits after the pandemic is over. "Old habits die hard" as they say, and I don't expect some of these lifestyle changes to be as permanent as others suggest for the broader population.

The other issue is that at least for me, I'm assuming sports return before the pandemic is "over" (forget how hard it would be to even define that). The posts I was responding to were suggesting that viewership would be down for the sports that are about to start up, which would obviously be "during the pandemic" unless we think its going to be over in the next 2 months, so looking at other sports that are operating in some capacity now is the perfect reference point for this discussion.

I was commenting on what viewership would look like for the NFL this coming September, not what I think it might be in 5 years when COVID fears have finally abated (which is much harder to predict, too much unknown about what happens between now and then but I still don't see any compelling reason why it would significantly drop).

One of the first posts to incite this thought exercise literally referred to the NBA playoffs, which are scheduled to begin next month (with regular season games resuming THIS MONTH). Needless to say, again this is my thinking as well.

[budwom]

Joe West is the President of the umpire's union. Which did not stop the umpire's union from issuing a statement basically smacking him down.

That's great. I'm generally fine with umpires, but West has always been looking to pick fights and act like a complete jerk...given his age and physical condition, he might want to reconsider the perils of Covid.

[AustinDevil]

Just a take peek at the ratings of the few sports that ARE back, and you'll see actual data that supports Acymetric's point. I mean, the exhibition golf events that popped up at the beginning of stay-at-home orders had higher ratings than previous majors. People are even watching freaking Korean baseball and the Bundesliga. Ratings are up, basically, across the board. People are stuck at home, not traveling or going out to eat or going to bars or parties (you know, things that typically preoccupy folks). I'm with Acymetric on this--I think it's really bizarre thinking to suggest people would be LESS interested in sports because they're stuck at home and have started reading and doing cardio.

I was fortunate to already have a rowing machine and a Peloton bike at home when this started. But I absolutely cannot face doing cardio work on them without some sports to watch. So I'll just point out that that activity is not an either/or with sports. And I'm so glad the Premier League, at least, is back, because I've rewatched Chrissie and Martina square off in Paris and New York in the mid-80s, I've rewatched the Americans win the team cross-country skiing in Korea last year, and I've rewatched all of the Duke basketball and football that I can think of (man, I wish 1989 Duke FB @ Carolina was online--at least 2012 Carolina @ Duke mostly is).

[throatybeard]

The folks that frequent DBR will probably watch any sport in which a Duke student-athlete is participating.

However, how do we think the pandemic is affecting the casual fan. Even if college football returns or college basketball...has the casual fan already found other activities to fill their time?

The reason I ask is that I am a casual NBA fan. In the past I would tune into the playoffs. I know that the NBA is starting up soon but I have already moved on to other things and probably won't watch any of the NBA games.

Just curious.

Honestly, I believe the COVID interruption is going to permanently damage sports viewership. Some percentage of people won't come back, or will come back half-engaged. A few years ago, SI released market data from all the major sports leagues, indicating that the average television viewer for almost every league was markedly older than in 2000, except for MMA. The average NHL viewer had aged nearly as many years as the span between 2000 and this story, in, I think 2016. There's some methodology about how you count cordcutters and cord-nevers, but the general trend is undeniable. Younger people aren't adopting sports viewership/attendance at the rates we did, if you were young in the 1970s, 80s, or 90s.

Part of the problem with aging sports fans is, at least until retirement, you just have less and less time to devote to sitting in front of a TV watching a ball fly around. Unless you're a sportswriter. Many of your friends from Duke, if you went to Duke after cable TV became widespread, y'all watched the late SportsCenter, and during youth you followed six or eight or even ten sports closely. Then people grew up and had jobs mortgages spouses and kids, and you just can't keep up with all of it, retreating to your favorite sport or two and your favorite teams; you're not watching Oregon State-UNLV at midnight just because it's on. A surprising number of my friends from Krzyzewskiville don't even watch the home Carolina game anymore, much less Duke-Northwestern football, much less WBB.

Too, people get in the habit of doing something, and when they stop, or have to stop, for a period of months or a couple years, they just don't get back to whatever it was they were doing. You've probably observed this with Fantasy Football, which was all the rage in 2010. By 2020, you're struggling to fill a league. Each off-season is an interruption, and a lot of people just don't do the next season.

I think "Peak Sports Fandom" in the United States took place somewhere in the stretch 2007-2012 or so. That's when late middle aged moms were joining the fantasy leagues, a high water mark.

Whatever 100 was on the sportsometer in February 2020, 100's not coming back. I don't know whether 2022 is gonna be at 95 of that level, or 90, or what, but this whole hustle has started a decline phase, and had before COVID. In 2007, half my made up sentences in the Grammar class we're about Blues, Cardinals, and Rams. I've given up on that because only a few of the students watch sports anymore. And you can be sure as shineola that zero young people are adopting live sports viewership during a span in which there isn't any.

[throatybeard]

No Jill was a coxswain on the Cal open weight team and competed at NCAA’s.

Gotcha. Thanks!

[CameronBornAndBred]

PAC 12 has gone conference only as well.