Joe Judge, holed up in a hotel, says not to call Giants training camp a bubble
The coronavirus’ compromise of the Major League Baseball schedule prompted natural questions about whether the NFL could successfully complete its season this fall.
Football, like baseball, is not operating in a “bubble” environment like the NBA, NHL, MLS, WNBA and NWSL — leagues that have provided the best blueprint in the United States so far.
It should be noted, however, that the NFL is leaving the door open to tightening its quarantine requirements should the league’s and union’s doctors determine it’s necessary.
“All options remain on the table,” Dr. Allen Sills, the NFL’s chief medical officer, told ProFootballTalk last weekend. “As we get into the season and we see what the data shows us, we’re gonna remain open to all these different scenarios and seeing what seems to be the most effective.”
And while players and staff are allowed to stay at home with their families if they wish, coaches like the Giants’ Joe Judge are still setting expectations sky-high for the behavior and sacrifices they expect from their employees while away from the facility.
Judge is even staying at the Giants’ team hotel himself down the street from MetLife Stadium, temporarily separated from his family and setting an example as a first-year head coach.
“To be honest with you, if it’s not completely isolated like the NBA and the NHL are working in, it’s not a bubble,” Judge, 38, said in a Zoom conference call on Wednesday. “I’d say the biggest message I’ve had for everybody, whether it’s my coaches, the support staff, the players, it’s not about being in a bubble this year. That doesn’t exist. It’s about making the right decisions away from the building and making sure we don’t bring something into the building.”
Still, it’s a bit of a surprise, frankly, that the NFL and NFL Players’ Association didn’t at least agree to require teams’ staffs, players and coaches to quarantine in the same hotel for one month of training camp to limit exposure and create an extra level of virus control.
The NFL players’ union also told agents a couple weeks ago that doctors believed the risk of a ‘super-spreader’ incident was a major reason not to put each NFL team’s entire roster of players in one hotel, where one positive case could quickly expose everyone.
(They view this as different from an NBA Orlando model because teams’ staffs would still be going home to their families, so the entire operation isn’t truly isolated).
But more than anything, especially considering protocols for a full season, both the union and league acknowledged plenty of players with families did not want to separate from their loved ones.
There is also a belief that the size of NFL teams’ support staffs makes a tighter bubble a massive and nearly impossible undertaking compared to the bubbled sports, especially since that would disrupt hundreds of families per club, as well.
So as Sills said, football’s plan for the time being therefore “combines the margin of safety with practicality.” And NFL players negotiated the right to opt out of the 2020 season entirely by Thursday at 4 p.m.
So far, around 60 players have opted out. That group includes including two Giants: starting left tackle Nate Solder (as a high-risk opt-out) and reserve receiver Da’Mari Scott (as a voluntary opt-out). Several high-profile players have opted out elsewhere, including Patriots edge Dont’a Hightower and Jets linebacker C.J Mosley. Bills stud corner Tre’Davious White said Wednesday he is still undecided.
In the face of so much uncertainty, it’s a wonder more teams aren’t following the lead of the New Orleans Saints, if the league and union aren’t going to require it themselves.
Sean Payton’s Saints, per NBC’s Peter King, have invented a semi-bubble by renting four floors of a Loews Hotel in the city’s French Quarter so that most of the club’s Tier 1 and 2 employees and players can further quarantine prior to opening day.
The Saints have about 180 employees including coaches and personnel, facilities and support staff, and players. And Payton expects about 150 of them to end up in the hotel, though no one will be forced to stay.
“It’s not a bubble,” Payton told King last weekend. “It’s a sequester. The message from the league is, ‘The show must go on.’ If so, we’ve got to do everything we can to be sure that happens.” (Payton himself was sick with the coronavirus in March.)
Judge and the Giants actually are doing something similar.
“Some teams have hotels. Look, we have a hotel, too,” Judge said. “We have multiple floors at a hotel right down the street rented out for our players and our coaches should they choose to stay there. We have players and coaches on this team that have wives and children. Everyone wants to go home and see their wives and children. I want to go see mine as much as I can.
“The reality is there are sacrifices we’re gonna have to make this year,” the coach continued. “And we have to determine individually if that means I have to spend a little less time or make sure I don’t surround myself with other loved ones who aren’t going by the same guidelines I’m operating (by) on a daily basis. And that’s a sacrifice we have to make.”
In other words, while Judge is “not mandating” that any coach stays in the hotel and cannot require a player to either, he has stressed the importance of making the necessary sacrifices whether a player opted in to living in the hotel or opted out.
“The ones that are in the hotel have a curfew. We’ve expressed to the ones on the outside that they have to make the right decisions when they’re away from the building in terms of how they structure their nights,” Judge said.
“But let’s be realistic,” Judge added. “(In the real world) you’ve got guys on oil tankers for months at a time, you’ve got soldiers overseas making a lot less money who don’t see their families either at times. I’m not suggesting (our) people don’t see their families. I am suggesting that everybody — on the team and family away from the team that we’re gonna see — have to make decisions responsibly to account for the sacrifice of being a part of the National Football League this year. That’s just the reality. We have to all understand that. And the challenge is gonna be real.”
It’s encouraging so far to see that the NFL’s number of positive COVID-19 tests have been lower than anticipated entering camp.
The Giants have had two players on the reserve/COVID-19 list so far: wideout David Sills V and linebacker Josiah Tauaefa. Sills rejoined the team on Tuesday after a week as an asymptomatic test. Tauaefa went on the list on Tuesday.
The NFL said Wednesday morning that 90 of approximately 2,600 players on rosters across the league (3.4%) have been placed on the reserve/COVID-19 list so far, and 25 already have been activated from that group of 90.
Low early numbers, however, do not promise an outbreak isn’t on the horizon, especially in a country that has failed to get the virus under control.
And so coaches like Judge and Payton know it’s important to do all they can now to keep the numbers low — and players, coaches and the league are aware it may require more if the current plan isn’t sufficient.
Though it feels like a stronger mandated training camp quarantine league-wide might have been wise.
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