Rant #2,478: Play the Game

The coronavirus has greatly impacted every facet of our lives.

Whether we have gotten it or not, it has impacted everything, and I do mean everything.

If you are two years old or 92 years old, it has put a crimp in your life.

It has impacted the serious things we do--like work--and the fun things we do--like play sports.

Look what has happened to Major League Baseball.

No matter what precautions have been taken, players and those affiliated with the teams have gotten the disease, and it has shut down teams for days.

Just this past weekend, tow members of the New York Mets' entourage--one player and another person with the team--tested positive for the disease, and an entire series with the New York Yankees was postponed.

On another level, this scourge not only threatens the school year, but also threatens school athletics, including the fall season.

Whether schools will open and have kids in the classes or not is another issue, and is a much bigger issue than whether the fall sports season will happen.

Several school districts around the country have opened for classes, and are going ahead with school athletics as part of a rounded school year.

Other districts are waiting for word about how classes will be held, if they will be held, and how remote learning might fit into the equation.

Again, school athletics really means nothing when maybe 10 percent of the students in a school participate, but it is still an important facet of students' lives.

New York's Governor Cuomo just gave the go-ahead to some high school sports to be played during the fall season, including soccer and tennis.

But no football right now, which means that even down the line, there probably won't be basketball played, wither, unless something miraculous happens.

And yes, student athletes receive scholarships for tennis and soccer and some other of the "permitted" sports, but football and basketball are "king" when it comes to scholarships and interest.

Those two sports are also where the money is, whether we like it or not, and without these two sports in action, student athletes looking for scholarships are going to have to go another route to gain those scholarships.

Some people would tell these teens to "enter the real world, nothing is given to you in the real world on a silver platter," and I might even do that too, but the whole "game" of recruiting and the granting of these scholarships has been thrown on its ear by this scourge we are battling.

But it is really a slippery slope, kind of putting the cart before the horse.

First, let's concentrate on the schools, because let's be honest about it: 100 percent of students go to school, while only 10 percent or so (my estimation) play high school athletics.

Let's get the school thing straight first, because if the schools don't even know how they are going to proceed this fall semester, how can we even give an iota of worry about school athletics?

Get the schools straight first, and then move onto school athletics.

I saw a couple of high school coaches interviewed, and they were generally overjoyed at the governor's message about some school athletics.

But to a coach, these coaches are from school districts on Long Island that have no idea, at this late date, how they are going to handle their primary duty, which is education.

Will they have full classes, split schedules, some mix between in-school learning and remote, at home learning?

How can you even think of athletics when these issues haven't been sorted out yet?

New York City is thinking about having outdoor classes, one of the most insipidly stupid ideas I have ever heard.

It puts an extra burden on teachers, who now have to worry about kids deciding to wander off under their watch, and even beyond that, what happens when summer turns into fall and then turns into winter? Are you going to have classes outside in the middle of a snowstorm?

School athletics are important, but education is what the schools are here to do.

Focus on how schooling is going to be handled, and then think about school athletics.

We must stop putting the cart before the horse, and education of our children must be paramount.

Without proper secondary education, high school sports mean NOTHING.