The state of the annual union of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell in the Super Bowl is famous for its ratio of actual words spoken to the number of words that carry an ounce of meaning or meaning. Like any politician or CEO, the man at the front of the league’s property has perfected a kind of subtlety that allows him to deal with the urgent issues of the day in a legal language so practiced that anyone who asks a question doesn’t realize he was shooed away until he heard the recorder minutes away. after.
On Thursday his response to the league’s minority training crisis, which provoked little more than a We’re working on it, Jeez! It was true in answering a question by Colin Kaepernick, who was essentially You know that Colin, in fact, was not the first person to raise these issues in order to somehow purify us of all transgressions. But was in fact, probably true when Goodell was asked about a long list of questions about the 2021 NFL season, which, as we all know, begins to accelerate feverishly as confetti is swept from the field at the end of the 2020 Super Bowl.
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Perhaps the realist in all of us already knew what he was going to say, but that didn’t take any weight off the real answer. This time, he was talking to the part of his brain that doesn’t depend on a script. None of us really know if football is going to be different in 2021. Less skittish. Less uncertain. Less ethical and moral distortion. Less insecure. And, in turn, no one knows whether regular daily life will also be very different.
Since sports – especially the NBA – were a signal to all Americans that the country was closing last March and that we must take this new strain of virus seriously, they will almost certainly be part of its grand reopening. There will be 25,000 fans in attendance at the Raymond James Stadium for the Super Bowl, although it looks more like an elaborate stage setting than anything else (and an accusation of the Florida Wonton’s general disregard for common sense). Nothing, except the cacophony of a stadium like Arrowhead or Lumen Field at full capacity, will be able to symbolize the league (and perhaps, for some, America!) being truly free from a pandemic.
“I don’t know when the normal will happen again and I don’t know if the normal will happen again,” said Goodell. “I know that, we learned to operate in a difficult environment. We find solutions and we will do it again. “
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The NFL would to like to play in England and elsewhere next year, as Goodell was asked, but who knows if he will? The NFL would to like to pack stadiums, and perhaps he could with the proof that everyone rubbing shoulder to shoulder, breathing the same air closely, were vaccinated. Does science confirm this as a reasonable solution? Can we all get the vaccine? Will international travel be advisable?
“The virtual is going to be part of our lives,” said Goodell, when asked how to draw lessons from 2020 and apply them in the near future of the league. “For the long term. We learned, coaches learned, players learned. ”
Before answering questions on Thursday, Goodell was asked by the event’s host, NFL Network reporter Steve Wyche, about the Center for Disease Control’s advice on limiting the audience for Super Bowl meetings at home. Dr. Anthony Fauci is circulating, alerting us, just as he did before the holiday meetings at the end of winter, so as not to mix with unknown crowds. To be mostly with the people with whom we have been quarantined for most of the year. Weeks after the pandemic started last year, it would be incomprehensible to all of us who would still be far away; that the Super Bowl would serve as another reminder of how our lives have changed.
But maybe a little honesty from Goodell was a good thing. The virtual will be part of our lives and that’s fine. The NFL we knew is back. The life we knew is coming back. We just don’t know when.