The NFL is just silly right now. Everywhere you turn, the COVID-19 pandemic is imposing events that almost never happen.
The Denver Broncos became the first team to start a non-quarterback at the position since 1965, according to the Elias Sports Bureau, but only after the NFL denied their request to activate an assistant coach for the role (seriously). The Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore Ravens remain on pace to play the fourth Tuesday night game in NFL history, two of which would have been played this season. The San Francisco 49ers are looking for a temporary home after Santa Clara County placed a three-week ban on all contact sports. Meanwhile, 28 of 32 teams will be required to close their practice facilities on Monday and Tuesday to guard against spread of potential Thanksgiving Day infections.
On the positive side, the NFL managed to play all of Sunday's 12 scheduled contests. No games have been canceled in 2020. On the other hand, five more weeks of the regular season remain -- amid the country's highest infection rates since the pandemic began -- before the league can make a possible shift to local playoff bubbles. (The rolling seven-day average of new daily coronavirus cases is 163,314, according to the Johns Hopkins University of Medicine.)
The confluence of ridiculous circumstances has been dizzying and alarming in equal measures. Let's take stock of where the NFL is and where it might go during the next two months.
What in the world is the NFL doing?
Very fair question considering the circumstances. In short, the league and the NFL Players Association remain committed to an evolving set of protocols they believe can identify infections quickly and minimize their spread. Dr. Allen Sills, the NFL's chief medical officer, analogized this approach to preventing a campfire from turning into forest fire. Their job has become considerably more difficult in recent weeks as infections have surged around the country. To no surprise, the NFL has reported 108 confirmed positive tests in its two most recent testing periods (covering Oct. 25 to Nov. 7), as compared to 146 in its previous 11.
Isn't the Ravens' outbreak a forest fire?
Yes. Yes, it is. And so was the Tennessee Titans' outbreak, which engulfed 24 team employees and forced a total of four games to be postponed and rescheduled. And in both cases, the NFL has determined that protocol violations -- not faulty protocols -- were the root cause.
The Ravens' outbreak -- which as of Sunday had resulted in confirmed positive tests for at least 20 players and staff -- included a strength and conditioning coach who didn't promptly report symptoms or consistently wear a mask. The team has since disciplined him. Needless to say, protocols designed to minimize spread won't work if they're not followed.
The NFL has issued significant fines and occasionally docked teams draft picks for violations. Most recently, the league fined the New England Patriots $350,000 and the New Orleans Saints $500,000. The Saints also lost a seventh-round 2021 draft pick.
Does that apply to the Broncos as well?
Yes. After one of their quarterbacks (backup Jeff Driskel) returned a confirmed positive test on Thursday, the NFL on Saturday deemed their other three signal-callers -- Drew Lock, Brett Rypien and Blake Bortles -- to be "high-risk" close contacts, a midseason protocol addition that requires a five-day isolation from the last day of exposure. That made all four ineligible to play Sunday against the New Orleans Saints, prompting the Broncos to petition the NFL to allow offensive quality control coach Rob Calabrese -- a former college quarterback -- to start.
When the league declined, citing its rules against moving coaches to the active roster, Denver head coach Vic Fangio converted practice squad wide receiver Kendall Hinton into a quarterback and promoted him to the active roster. Officially, the Broncos started tailback Phillip Lindsay as a Wildcat quarterback. Hinton ended up completing only 1 of 9 passes for 13 yards and two interceptions, and the Broncos managed just six total first downs in a 31-3 loss.
Lock, Rypien and Bortles were considered high risk because the NFL found evidence that they were not consistently wearing masks during a meeting that involved Driskel. Sills has said repeatedly that one of the primary factors in declaring a player high risk is mask usage. Lock apologized in a statement on Sunday, calling it an "honest mistake."
Haven't these players tested negative? Why should they isolate?
They have, but the NFL's protocol reflects research that shows infected individuals can be contagious even if they test negative, because they are early in the infection process. Earlier this month, Sills said that nine high-risk close contacts had later tested positive during the five-day isolation period.
Wait, can we go back to the Broncos wanting to use an assistant coach at quarterback?
Sure. The Broncos were desperate, but they assuredly knew the NFL's answer before they received it. The NFL actually has a policy that specifically prevents assistant coaches from being added to the roster. This rule exists for the same reason that most every NFL rule exists: to prevent teams from sneaking around. In this case, teams could use low-level coaching jobs as ways to stash extra players outside of typical roster limits.
So the Broncos hadn't quarantined a quarterback?
Nope. There was plenty of preseason discussion about teams keeping one of their quarterbacks away from the rest of the team during practice weeks, and perhaps even games, to prevent just such a scenario. It became especially relevant when the NFL created a six-day intake process for new players. So even if the Broncos wanted to sign a quarterback on Saturday, that player wouldn't have been available until the middle of next week.
As it turned out, only a handful of teams have taken significant steps to separate one quarterback from the rest. And by Week 12, the only team known to be continuing the practice was the Buffalo Bills with rookie Jake Fromm. After seeing the Broncos' performance on Sunday, that could change this week.
As a result, the Saints-Broncos game was brutal. Why wouldn't the NFL push it back?
Once it was determined that the Broncos had no other high-risk close contacts, and thus the game was safe to play based on its protocols, the NFL fell back on what commissioner Roger Goodell told NBC Sports at the start of the season. Playing amid a pandemic required that "competitive inequities" would be a "reality of 2020," Goodell said. In other words, it was going to be hard enough to play a full 256 games this season. Ensuring competitive balance at all times, the league believed, would make it impossible. If that means the Saints got a gimme win over the Broncos as they pursue the NFC's No. 1 overall playoff seed, then so be it.
But how was this good for the game?
It's pretty simple. The NFL believes that games, regardless of quality, are better than no games. The league has prioritized providing its full season to its television partners, which accounted for most of its $9.5 billion in shared revenue in 2019.
That explains Saints-Broncos. But how can the Steelers-Ravens game still be on track?
The NFL has established an extensive contact tracing and surveillance program that gives it a huge amount of data to project the likelihood of spread within a building, from electronic trackers to video access of indoor and outdoor interaction at team facilities. It has even used genomic testing to determine whether, in instances of multiple positive tests, the infection has come from a teammate or from the community.
The Ravens had another confirmed positive test returned Sunday afternoon (WR Willie Snead), for an eighth consecutive day of positive tests; and the Steelers have had multiple positive tests of their own and in recent days have placed four players on the COVID-19 list. The NFL, however, must believe that the potential transmission chain is nearing its conclusion. The Ravens would be taking the field without quarterback Lamar Jackson and six other offensive starters, but again, the league is prioritizing playing the game over the quality of the game.
Is the NFL really going to get through the season?
That's the plan, but there is so little room for error.
The NFL was realistic in accepting the inevitability of infections and the impracticability of a season-long bubble. But look at the country at large. Many people are wearing masks. Some aren't. Many people are following every state and local regulation. Some aren't. It might not be intentional or malicious. Mistakes happen. If perfect adherence is necessary to prevent outbreaks in the NFL, then outbreaks seem inevitable.
So what does that mean?
Most people around the league expect it to continue staging games for the next five weeks. There are no immediate plans to institute a pause or otherwise cut the regular season short. With that said, it would not be shocking if a few games are pushed aside along the way. Remember, NFL owners already have voted to expand the playoffs from 14 to 16 teams if some games are canceled. The only thing we don't know is how many games must go unplayed to trigger that shift. (The NFL hasn't revealed the formula.)
Owners also have agreed to eliminate the extra week before the Super Bowl if they ultimately decide to add an 18th week to the regular season to account for postponed games.
And then what? A playoff bubble?
The NFL has been discussing this possibility for months. Saints coach Sean Payton broached the topic during an August meeting of the competition committee. The likeliest option is sequestering players, coaches and other key staff members in local hotels during the week leading up to their first (and each ensuing) playoff game. Some teams, including the Dallas Cowboys, have offered players and coaches similar arrangements during training camp and the regular season.
Such an arrangement would be closer to a "secure environment" -- as NFL executive vice president of football operations Troy Vincent called it over the summer -- rather than a bubble. Sills has expressed some reservations about the concept, however, noting both the psychological impact of isolation from families as well as the likelihood that an infection could spread more quickly with an entire team under one roof. But given the importance of playing postseason games and the Super Bowl, and barring an unexpected drop in community cases around the country, the odds seem good that the NFL will attempt to implement some version of this approach.