HockeyCrazy1970 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 20, 2020 10:04 pm
I am now heading into week 6 for my beer league play and almost everything is the same as February. We go in the building with a mask on. Most guys take them off in the locker room. We play the game just like before, guys on the same bench breathing hard, etc. We don't shake hands afterwards... They want us out of the locker room faster. Less beer is consumed afterwards. The refs are all there and I bet average over 50 yr old and we all have those pesky comorbidities. My team probably has 4-5 of us over 50.
Kids have been doing clinics, camps, tryouts, tournaments now for months.
USHL just announced 54 game season starting Nov 6.
https://m.startribune.com/ushl-plans-fo ... 572153482/
NAHL starts before that.
What is MSHSL waiting for?
I'm not actually surprised that "Cigar" hasn't responded to the questions I posed to him yet. But, a number of you have made it clear your opinions lie on a similar side as his and yet, none of the rest of you have responded to the questions I posed to Cigar either. In fact, "WestMetro" actually asks those of us on the cautious side of the debate to answer HIS questions...actually kind of humorous in a way....Well "WestMetro", I will answer your questions but, before I do that, let me first provide more evidence that the potential long-term health issues the virus may present are becoming more and more challenging to ignore or brush off as it relates to the possibility of having to make the extremely difficult decisions to postpone or even cancel the season -- at the youth and high school levels. Here's a link to an ESPN article about the Georgia State quarterback having to sit out the entire season:
https://www.espn.com/college-football/s ... d-covid-19
Here's the opening paragraph from the article:
"Georgia State quarterback Mikele Colasurdo has been diagnosed with a heart condition as a result of contracting the coronavirus and won't be able to play football this season, he announced Thursday."
Huh...another high level, young athlete who developed has developed myocarditis after being infected with Covid. Weird.
Here's a link to a USAToday article that talks about the results of a recent study published by the Journal of American Medical Association;
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/2 ... 344409001/
The study was done on "100 patients who had recovered from COVID-19. Heart imaging showed "cardiac involvement" in 78% of the patients and 60% "ongoing myocardial inflammation" among the participants." That's an incredibly high percentage of people affected. So, if 60-70% of kids that get infected end up with some level of myocarditis, that doesn't give you any pause about the real risk of trying to pay a "normal" season? I get it, NOBODY WANTS to have to cancel an entire season. However, even if the players lose a year of development, what good does it do to play if, in the end 7 of every 10 players that become infected has life long heart damage and can't play the sport in an organized fashion moving forward as USA Hockey or the MSHSL won't allow them to play due to the increased liability risk? Very interested to hear your guys' thoughts on this.
And, just in case you guys forgot or, are too lazy to go back and look at my previous post, here are the three questions I posed to "Cigar"
Just curious -- serious question here -- are any of you currently serving in any type of youth or high school sports administrative leadership position?
Next, what's your response/perspective in regards to the BIG10/Pac-12 choosing not to play fall sports due to the same potential medical concerns that the articles I provided lay out? As I stated last night, outside of the basic health of their athletes, those conferences/schools have a heckuva lot more to lose than than the MSHSL, So, if they're concerned enough to cancel, how do you defend putting even younger kids at risk?
How do you respond to the very real concerns that by allowing youth/high school athletics, especially team contact sports, we significantly increase the risk of secondary transmission to both the athletes' classmates and, more importantly, parents, coaches, officials, and teachers who are often older than 50 and have a much likely higher risks of pre-existing comorbidities?
So, while I'm waiting for all of you to answer my questions, I'll answer "WestMetro's" questions, as well as respond to the answers that "InThePipes" provided to "WestMetro's" questions. However, before I get to any of that, I have to respond to "HockeyCrazy's" last post.
"HC", I've explained in great detail what the MSHSL is probably waiting for. And, I've done it using very specific, well developed reasons, backed up by very specific facts and science in regards to the virus. You obviously don't agree with the bigger concept of emphasizing health and safety over "we have to get out and play!!". Fair enough. However, one of the main concepts to these types of forums is the idea that topics, some that are very controversial, can be discussed and debated in detail to see which sides best stands up to the proper scrutiny of the "other side". The problem is, if one side of a debate refuses to genuinely engage in the debate by actually addressing/answering the questions/points posed by the other side, then the topic being debated will never be fairly or properly fleshed out. And...to this point, none of you other than "Cigar" have even attempted to push back in a legitimate way. Unfortunately, "Cigar's" attempt didn't include a single detailed point of push back. Are the points I'm making so well thought out that none of you feel confident in responding or pushing back in a similarly detailed, fact and science based way? C'mon guys... engage in the debate.
However, in relation to the analogy you made regarding your recent "beer league" experiences... First, how do you know none of the guys who play or officiated haven't been infected but, were simply asymptomatic? To be honest, the reason none of you may have not been infected is probably... just simple pure luck.
As for your other points about all of the other hockey choosing to play or, having been playing the last two months; there are a lot of medical experts/scientists with expertise around Covid that would tell you they don't think any of these games/tournaments should've played or should play moving forward until we have a vaccine. It's just that simple. And, I'll restate my point about the Iowa H.S. League's challenges with trying to finish their baseball and softball seasons after 25 different baseball teams and 20 different softball teams had to quarantine for 14 days at various points throughout the season. It was an absolute cluster-blank. How do you (and the others) explain what happens when we have one team in a section have a 18-2 record but didn't play a single team in the top 10 and, whose two losses were to .500 teams, while another team with two different 14 day quarantines has a 9-4 record, with 5 of their wins and 3 of their losses against top 10 teams? Who gets the top seed when there's that much of a difference in games played? I'd really like to hear how you guys solve that conundrum.
OK, now for my answers to "WestMetro's" questions.
1.) This one is easy but it sure as heck won't be popular... a vaccine with 60-80% efficacy. Otherwise, do what Michael Olsterholm suggested in his New York Times Op Ed piece two weeks ago which he wrote with the Chair of the Minneapolis Fed. An Italian level, 6 week lock down which allows us to get to 1 case in 100,000 people on a daily basis. That's approximately 3,300 positive cases nationwide per day or lower. Remember, we're at about 50,000 positives per day at the moment. As Olsterholm stated, that would allow us to do proper contact tracing and limit breakouts before they become super spreader events.
2.) Personally, I don't know why the MSHSL would consider doing a shortened season. And no, it doesn't prevent unnecessary spread to any real measurable level. To be fair, I haven't seen anything from any reputable source that indicates the MSHSL is seriously considering the shortened season option at this point.
3.) The way it's been explained to me by my state representative, the governors office isn't going to step into that situation unless the evidence becomes so overwhelming on the side of it being too risky for all sports to play, but not for just a few sports or a single sport. Obviously, at each level of amateur hockey (youth, H.S., Juniors, and NCAA) there is an associated national and state governing body that manages each level. And, governmental entities try their best to allow those governing bodies to figure things out. Not to mention the fact that, the issues with myocarditis, lungs, thyroid, and others have only become known in the last 45 days or so. And, since we all know government is usually pretty slow to react to these situations, it's not surprising government hasn't reacted yet. Let's be honest, at this point we haven't heard of any high school or younger hockey players being diagnosed with any of the issues I've mentioned. To be clear, that doesn't mean it hasn't happened, and possibly happened a lot. But, since it's now kids we're talking about, we're a LOT less likely to have heard about it.
4.) There is a very significant debate about this question on a national level, with numerous ADs, coaches, and school administrators falling on both sides of the question. There are very good arguments to support either side of the debate. Not sure surrendering all high school sports to their youth governing bodies would even be possible. However, and maybe I'm misunderstanding your question, why would surrendering all of the sports to their youth governing bodies "ignore all the learning benefits that athletics and teamwork provide." If I'm understanding you correctly, the lessons I think you're referring to are able to be learned whether the players are actually attending school or not.
5.) Agree with you completely on this. Do I think the finances of having or not having the boys state hockey tournament will be part of their discussions? I'm sure it will be. However, in the end, the fact that we still probably won't be able to put people in any numbers into the "X" by that time, will make it even easier for the MSHSL Board to base whatever decision they make as much about the potential health risks as possible, versus the money.
Now for my response to "InThePipes" responses to "West's" questions...
1.) Agree, hockey is on-going everywhere and has been for more than 2 months (STP, AAA, Tier 1, BEL, MASH, Junior camps, summer camps) with a few minor outbreaks for teams/facilities. I'd question the logic behind the proposal to reduce the ability of HS aged players to participate in hockey this winter by limiting the season length or games (which is already far shorter than youth seasons in MN and everywhere else in the country).
My response... "Pipes"... you're calling the outbreaks that have occurred as "minor". First, what's your definition of minor? Second, how do you know exactly how many people were infected at each event? Other than me providing the number for the Ashland outbreak as I know someone intimately involved in that situation? Next, you say you'd "question the logic behind the proposal to reduce the high school season or number of games." Please explain your specific reason(s) for questioning the logic. It's fine to question it but, give us your rationale.
2.) I don't understand the logic, I'm highly skeptical that playing half the games reduces the disease transmission by 50%. Of course, there is no way to know this with certainty and let's not even get into the modeling the U of M conducted back in April and May that the state has based it's early policy decisions on.
My response... I actually agree completely with you on this. Although your criticism of models regarding pandemic predictions is probably unwarranted. Why you ask? Because there is plenty of info out there from modeling experts who will tell you that the absolute most challenging thing to model are deaths in a pandemic outbreak as there are simply too many uncontrolled variables that can affect the various formulas they traditionally use.
3.) I would suggest the risk is acceptably low based on the experience in the first couple of months, there is never no risk (in anything you do). I also appreciate each family/individual is different and there are many families that may feel the risk is still too high based on a multitude of considerations, I can certainly respect that.
My response...."Pipes", I appreciate your acknowledgement that each family's situation or, how they approach the various risks can be very different. However, you also say that you "suggest the risk is acceptably low based on the last two months". Much like your previous statement that you believe the outbreaks were "minor", you don't provide any hard evidence that your perceptions are actually supportable by legitimate evidence. Again, most of the potentially significant health issues have only revealed themselves in the last 30 days. Along with the fact that the virus is now accepted as being aerosolized. Meaning, especially in indoor situations, the virus can survive in infectious levels on much smaller droplets than previously thought. This in turn allows the infectious particles to remain in the air within an indoor space for as long as a few hours, and maybe longer. As well as meaning the current 6ft social distance is probably not a safe enough distance in those specific situations.
4.) I think the major difference is Minnesota Hockey. There probably isn't a corresponding organization sitting in the background in football or other sports. This allows the opportunity for MSHSL to opt out if they feel the risk is too high and allow all families to make the choice if they want to participate or not under the USA Hockey/MN Hockey umbrella. If you want to participate here is your avenue, if you feel the risk is too high for your family that's understandable.
My response... Believe it or not "Pipes", I actually agree with your reasoning 100%. However, I can absolutely guarantee that if USA Hockey was on the hook from a Covid liability standpoint, they would've already announced that they weren't sanctioning a normal season. Which makes me ask all of you again, what happens when a youth hockey association gets sued because a player gets infected and ends up in the ICU? I don't know of too many associations that could handle the financial hit of simply defending themselves, let alone being able to pay out any level of damages if they lose. These are real considerations that any responsible administrator or board member has to consider if they're upholding their commitment to their respective organizations.
5.) Agree, I would suspect MSHSL will base their decision on the risk, probably not the revenue loss, at least that's what they'll state publicly. No doubt that revenue loss is going to be substantial this year, but playing a partial year does very little or nothing regardless of if they play no season or a partial season.
My response... Wow "Pipes", I basically agree with your reasoning here as well. I'll say one more time, I challenge all of you to answer the questions I posed to "Cigar".
Maybe it's his alter ego then?
