The Hot Corner
Life is slowly returning to some form of normalcy.
I am making trips to Ira and Hermleigh for football practices and am visiting Tiger Gym for Snyder volleyball games once again.
Yet there is a sense of “how long will it last?” hanging overhead. Just how long can we play? What will it take for it all to shut down? Will we finish the season?
I don’t think we know those answers, at least not right now. They may become clear once games begin and teams begin traveling. College football hasn’t given us any promising indications, as Power 5 conferences like the Big 10 and the Pac-12 have already cancelled the 2020 football season.
The fear over spreading this virus has many colleges concerned about fielding football and other teams this year and I can only imagine that concern exists at the high school level as well.
On the bright side, statistics show that Texas high school football is doing something right as far as protecting its athletes. According to the Texas High School Coaches Association, of the 65,290 athletes that participated in summer strength and conditioning workouts in Texas the past two months, only 278 tested positive. Only 4 of those positive cases could even be traced back to the training camps, meaning they saw just a 0.004 percent rate of athletes testing positive.
The UIL’s guidelines and protocols are seemingly working and schools are following them. There are still several questions that will be answered as the season goes on. Will that positivity rate go up once fans are in attendance and the players start contact on the field? Will an outbreak end a team’s season?
Only time will answer these questions.
For now, enjoy watching the athletes back on the field or court. Relish it, because if life has taught us anything over the past few months, it taught us that life is too short and you need to enjoy what you have before it is gone.
See you at the game.
Reed Graff is the sports editor for The Snyder News. Comments on this article can be made to sports@thesnydernews.com