NFL agrees to daily COVID-19 testing; Seahawks rookies not expected in camp Tuesday
After the Seahawks report for training camp next week, they won’t be practicing.
For a while. Apparently, not until deep into August.
The NFL and the NFL Players Association agreed Monday on a testing protocol for the first two weeks of training camps. The players got their wish that Russell Wilson and others loudly voiced online Sunday: they will be tested every day for the COVID-19 virus.
Players will get tested on the day they report to training camp. Then they have a three-day self-quarantine period at their home, if they live in the area of his team’s headquarters, or in a nearby hotel. Players will get a second test for COVID-19 on day four, three days after they had first reported to camp. Only after that second positive test can players began strength and conditioning training.
The NFL management council sent this information in a memorandum to each team’s president, general manager, head physicians, head trainers and counsel on Monday afternoon.
“Waiting another day helps make sure to capture the virus as it incubates,” NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero reported as the league’s stance.
Also possibly waiting: Seahawks rookies.
They were to report to training camp at the team’s Virginia Mason Athletic Center in Renton on Tuesday, per a letter the NFL sent to teams this past weekend. A league source told The News Tribune Monday the actual day the rookies will report to Renton was still “to be determined.” It could be Thursday.
The San Francisco 49ers have told their rookies to hold off reporting to camp for two more days, until Thursday. That is according to multiple reports out of the Bay Area.
Dr. Allen Stills, the league’s chief medical officer, said in a conference call Monday the NFL will assess the daily testing of players, coaches and those in close, regular contact with the players for the first two weeks of training camps. If rates of positive cases drops below 5%, as the league expects it to by then, testing will go to every other day. That is according to the league-owned nfl.com.
Everything an initially tested player does after his initial COVID-19 screening at camp is going to be on hold, for four days.
The NFLPA saw these developments as a win for player safety.
Here’s a practice application of how this apparently is going to work over the next couple weeks:
Let’s use the case of DK Metcalf. Seattle’s second-year wide receiver posted online Sunday it was “crazy” the NFL had yet to address major health and safety issues for players reporting to camp.
Metcalf and all other Seahawks who aren’t rookies, quarterbacks or injured players are scheduled to report to training camp July 28. Metcalf will get tested outside Seahawks headquarters that day, then get sent away from the team facility he hasn’t been in since January. Metcalf would not be able to enter the team facility and get his annual pre-camp physical until Aug. 1, and only after a second positive COVID-19 test.
That’s a five-day period from initial COVID-19 test, through second test and physical exam before Metcalf and every other Seahawk reporting July 28 can enter the team facility and begin strength and conditioning work.
Then what?
The players’ union wants the NFL to following the recommendation of its joint committee of doctors, trainers and strength coaches of a 21-day period for strength and conditioning. Players did not have an offseason training program, nor organized team activities (OTAs) or minicamp practices on the field, as they do every other April through June.
Team facilities have been closed to players since March, when the coronavirus pandemic began sweeping the country.
The league and players are still negotiating whether to incorporate all or some of the recommendations for training camps from the joint committee. That committee has recommended a 45-day program for training camps. It also calls for 10 days of non-padded practices following the 21 days of strength and conditioning. The NFLPA wants the league to accept that, in full.
That would mean Metcalf and his teammates would not be practicing on the field at team headquarters in Renton until Aug. 22. That would be the first no-pads practice of the preseason. The 10th and final one would be Aug. 31.
That leaves 13 days between the first full-pads practice and the Seahawks’ first scheduled game, Sept. 13 at Atlanta.
That leaves zero time for preseason games—and a lot of chances for the muscle pulls and acclimation injuries players often get in late July or early August, in the first days of a usual training camp.
The league has wanted to play two preseason games. The players’ union wants zero, to avoid unnecessary risk of exposure and for the above reasons of acclimation time for the games that count. The NFL on Monday offered the union zero preseason games, per a report by NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport.
Nothing in the NFL comes for free. It’s likely negotiations will continue with the league asking for more money back from the players to cover what could become billions of dollars in losses this year because of games inside likely empty or mostly empty stadiums.
Wilson and Geno Smith are in a slightly different situation than Metcalf. Seahawks quarterbacks are scheduled to report to camp on Thursday, per a letter the NFL sent to teams this past weekend. So Wilson’s day one for COVID-19 testing will be Thursday. Day four, the day of his second virus test, will be Monday, July 27.
Wilson could conceivably begin strength and conditioning training July 28, the day Metcalf and the rest of the Seahawks veterans are due to report and get tested for the first time.
The league expects—and science says—there will be “a considerable number” of positive tests on each team upon players reporting from their homes across the country to camps in the next eight days.
According to nfl.com, the league has told teams if a player tests positive but has no symptoms he can return to the facility 10 days after the initial positive test. He can also come back if he receives two consecutive negative tests within five days of the initial positive test. If the player has a positive test and symptoms, he can return after at least 10 days have passed since the symptoms first appeared, and a minimum of 72 hours since his last symptoms.
This story was originally published July 20, 2020 at 3:45 PM.
