jacklewis014

I suspect that each of you experience the same volume of activity as I do in the spring months - I shoot almost 50% of my yearly events in March through May. Since I almost exclusively shoot college sports, I am effectively out of work until fall sports begin in August/September.
I just received word from two colleges where I work most of my events. Because of the coronavirus they have shut down all sports for the rest of the school year. Additionally, I lost the SEC Women's Gymnastics championships next weekend.
I'm not complaining, but it causes me to stop and think about people whose jobs depend on schools to remain open and sporting events to be conducted. Anyone who won't get a paycheck unless they have events to serve. My daughter works in the school cafeteria and she won't get paid for at least the next 2 weeks as they have closed school due to the virus. She's a single Mom supporting four kids.
I realize everyone is expressing sympathy and compassion for players that are loosing their seasons, but it's not the end of the world. Just the end of a sports season. This is an inconvenience to some but a major economic hardship to many.

btbg

I know what you mean. We are also starting to see economic impact here as well.

I was at the state basketball tournament shooting a game yesterday at Oregon State University when the PAC 12 decided to close all of their athletic facilities. The game was already being played without any spectators and as soon as it ended OSU closed the gym so no further games could be played. Within an hour the Oregon Schools Activities Association stopped all the remaining winter playoffs and then today the governor closed all schools until at least April 1.

All sports are on hold until further notice. I was planning on retiring at the end of the spring sports season, but right now it is beginning to look like I may be retiring earlier than I expected because I may not have any work anyway.

I feel really bad for the kids that won games in the state tournament and are not being allowed to finish. The school I was covering had never won a state playoff game before and had a good chance to earn their first ever trophy.

But it's the hourly school workers and people like that that are going to be most hurt finaincially.

david vt Loc: Vermont

as far a sports, it can be disappointing to the athletes, but for the vast majority, it is not, literally, life or death. It may even help put a little balance back in as to where sports should be as a priority vs other facets of life.

@btbg, I have been thinking lately as much about the “economically vulnerable” as much as the “health vulnerable”. Lots of attention to the latter, but, especially for many service sector workers (sports venue workers as noted, photography stringers such as those UHH pros reading this, waitstaff, hairdressers, nail salon etc.). Think about anyone whom works the gig economy, per appt or for tips. If we slow down going out to eat, cancel haircuts and nail appts, etc as part of social distancing, how long before they can’t pay rent or buy food?

And I don’t have much faith in government programs to make them whole. Might they help? Sure, but likely no more than 50-60% of normal take home pay.

I started yesterday doing what I could for this. We did takeout rather than going out, but I still sought out the waitstaff whom would have taken care of us (we are regulars there) and gave her what would have been our tip. Tipped 300% for a cup of coffee this morning. Not saying everyone should do this, as I know many are not in a position to do so.

But we are a community, and we need to think through protecting our community’s families from all harms, not just COVID 19, as we work through this. This storm will eventually pass, and we want to know we have done what we could to help those we can.

My apologies if this got preachy.....

btbg

AS far as economic vulnerability versus health vulnerability I have no doubt that the economic costs of the decisions government employees are making will be much more costly to most Americans then the health costs.

I absolutely don't understand what government officials and others are thinking. 1,000 people died from h1n1 before government did much of anything and even then public gatherings, school, athletics, etc... were never canceled. Currently health officials are telling us that the symptoms of this virus will be mild or non-existent for 80 percent or more of us and yet they have shot everything down when there is hardly anyone even sick.

That means that either it is more serious then what they are telling us, or they are big time overreacting.

When it comes to athletics, there is a huge difference between the seasons that have been postponed or canceled then the ones that were already in the playoffs when they were stopped.

The school I was at the state tournament to cover had not been to the tournament since 1948 and then they lost both of their games.

The school took two bus loads of students to Wednesday's first round game. Then Wednesday night the governor banned spectators from the rest of the playoffs by banning any gathering of 250 people or more.

Media was still allowed into the first game Thursday morning in the consolation rounds. There were three media people, four administrators from one school and two from the other as well as a video cameraman who they paid to televise the game live, with just one camera, four people at the front door of the coliseum, and three support staff. That is all the people that were allowed into the game.

While it was being played Oregon State University stopped the entire tournament and said they were closing their campus. Fortunately the game in progress was allowed to finish.

Those kids were crushed. They went from celebrating that they were playing for fourth place the next day to finding out that their season was over in just 15 minutes. It was terribly unfair to the participants. If anyone with coronavirus was allowed into the game the day before they were all already exposed. Playing the remainder of the tournament without spectators would have put no one at any additional risk. So, why did officials make such a drastic decision? It makes no sense. We are stopping life as we know it with no apparent consideration of the consequences of the decisions being made.

For example, Oregon closed all schools as of this coming Monday for the remainder of the month, but they allowed schools to conclude on Friday. Well if it is really dangerous to public health to have school on Monday then it was dangerous on Friday.

What difference would it have made to allow athletes to finish their seasons with no spectators? I promise you that this isn't bringing balance back. And I can say that with absolute assurance because I have been involved in one similar situation involving athletes. In 1980 we boycotted the Olympics. I had made the provisional qualifying standard in the javelin. At the time all track and field was amateur, so if you didn't have sponsorship once you were out of college it was nearly impossible to continue training. Anyway, no Olympics meant the end to my athletic career. It didn't bring balance, it just ended any chance I had of moving forward in the sport with absolutely no justification for Carter's decision.

Many of us lost any chance for endorsements, any chance to continue in the sport and any chance to finish our career on our terms. The same is true for all the seniors who had the plug pulled on them Thursday morning. They are now done, and had no way to close out their seasons in a normal way. And it won't bring balance, because now they can't even go back to school and tell their friends that they won the first state tournament game in school history. Instead they are being told to stay home alone.

That doesn't bring balance to their lives. That just makes a hole in their routine with nothing to replace it.

And just in case you really don't think people are overreacting today Alaska announced that they are closing their schools for the next six weeks. There are two confirmed cases in the entire state and if you look at the size of the state that means that many people have no way that they could possibly have been exposed at this point in time. There would be no risk for the rural outlying communities to continue school. Instead they will have to go to school this summer when they could have had jobs instead.

It's a major cluster and so far they have shown absolutely no justification for their actions.