Ian Rapoport@RapSheet
Update on where things stand 18 days out:
— Almost everything is done and agreed to except for number of preseason games and testing protocols.
— No fans will be at training camp, but teams can have up to two fan events at stadiums this preseason with strict protocols if allowed
Other notes:
— Where fans are allowed at games, they will wear face coverings.
— Actual training camp schedule of practices can be tied to the preseason game questions, so not there yet.
— The economics are not yet finalized, either.

==

NFL, NFLPA still have major issues to negotiate

NFL, NFLPA still have major issues to negotiate

The NFL and NFL Players Association have approached the negotiations on the 2020 season like negotiations on a broader labor deal: Start with the easy issues, and then move to the difficult ones.

As to football in a pandemic, the easy ones are done. The difficult ones remain.

Ian Rapoport of the NFL reports that “[a]lmost everything is done and agreed to except for number of preseason games and testing protocols.” Those are two very significant issues, however.

The NFL wants two preseason games, the NFLPA wants none, and the two sides are stuck at an impasse on the issue. The testing protocols remain a point of contention, given that the players want testing more frequently. Throw in the fact that it may not be easy to get results quickly (and that doing so could slow down the process of finalizing tests for the general public), it will not be a simple process to reach a consensus on how often testing will be conducted and how quickly teams and players reasonably will obtain results.

Rapoport’s final point is this: “The economics are not yet finalized, either.”

That’s perhaps the most significant remaining area of tension. It was Rapoport and his colleagues who first floated, under the umbrella of the league’s in-house media conglomerate, the notion of salary givebacks. Then, NFL Media reported on the fact that the league suggested placing 35 percent of 2020 player salaries into escrow, which will make it easier to claw back money later.

The NFLPA recognizes that lost revenues now will impact salary-cap calculations later, but the suggestion that any player should take less in a season during which players will be assuming a greater risk is nonsensical. Plenty of the men who play in 2020 won’t even be in the league in 2021, whether due to injury, retirement, or erosion of skills relative to younger, cheaper options. Why take less now (while absorbing all the risks of football in a pandemic) so that there will be more later, if the players who take less now won’t be around to get more later?

Taken together, these aren’t small issues. They are major points of contention that must be resolved before anything can happen. Meanwhile, rookies are due to report for COVID-19 testing in only nine days.

That leads us back to the point that J.J. Watt made earlier this week on #PFTPM: What’s the rush? It makes much more sense to get it right and delay things a bit than it does to rush into a headwind that could blow down what ultimately could be a house of cards.

NFL, NFLPA discussing plan for potential player opt-outs in 2020

https://www.nfl.com/news/nfl-nflpa-discussing-plan-for-potential-player-opt-outs-in-2020

With veterans expected to report to training camps in 20 days, the NFL and NFL Players Association have a host of issues to continue to sort out before players return.

Among the questions lingering in the air amid the COVID-19 pandemic is the potential for players opting out of participating in 2020.

NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero reported Wednesday on NFL NOW that the league and union anticipate player opt-outs would be available, but would need to be communicated by a certain date.

“My understanding is both the union and the league intend to have an opt-out for players who have either a pre-existing condition, family (members) with pre-existing conditions, just general concerns over COVID-19, would not want to play this season,” Pelissero said. “General managers were told on a call earlier this week there would be a specific date by which players would need to opt-out. That date is still to be determined.”

We’ve seen players in the MLB and NBA opt to sit out as their respective sports return to play. It’s unclear how many NFL players would consider sitting an entire season. Several veterans, including the McCourty twins in New England and Stefon Diggs in Buffalo, recently have voiced concerns about playing amid the pandemic.

With any potential opt-outs comes the question of how that would affect a player’s contract.

Pelissero reported that possible tolling of contracts of players who opt out is still to be determined and is something that would need to be agreed to prior to the start of training camp

BREAKING: THE CAPITOL COMMISSION VOTES TO REMOVE THE KKK GRAND WIZARD BUST FROM THE TENNESSEE STATE CAPITOL!!!!🚨🚨🚨🚨🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/XFnQ7PC4kv

— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) July 9, 2020

Another 1 of the 5 Gabriel TD's from that day! https://t.co/c0ULsl15Fg pic.twitter.com/BCuNSPq6GC

— Roman Gabriel for Pro Football Hall of Fame (@RGabriel4HOF) July 10, 2020

Rams legend Kurt Warner hopes movie about life and career will continue to “inspire and impact people”

Stu Jackson

https://www.therams.com/news/kurt-warner-hopes-movie-will-continue-to-inspire-others

Scheduled to hit theaters Dec. 18, “American Underdog: The Kurt Warner Story” will be based on parts of Warner’s memoir, All Things Possible: My Story of Faith, Football and the First Miracle Season, as well as separate interviews with the Rams legend.

The possibility of his journey being made into a movie never crossed Warner’s mind during it, but as he reflects on it many years later, he understands why and hopes it continues to inspire and impact people.

“We look at it now, how grateful we are for the journey. A long, big part of it, we weren’t really feeling grateful for the journey, we were wondering, ‘Why me? Why do I have to take this route to get to where I want to go?'” Warner told theRams.com in a phone interview Thursday morning. “But looking back now, it’s a once in a lifetime-type journey, and I think that’s one the reasons that A) you get a movie made about you, but B) it’s had such an impact on so many people, because it crosses the lines of the football field and resonates with a lot of people, that life isn’t always easy and life’s not always perfect. And sometimes you got to do what you got to do while you’re waiting to do what you were born to do.

“So those things happen in life, and so many people I believe can associate with our story because it is different, because it is unique from other athletes, but similar to what most people go through. Just grateful for the journey, grateful that we find ourselves here, and grateful that we get another opportunity to use the platform and the story to hopefully inspire and impact people.”

While Warner’s football career is an important part to the story, it is really the story of both he and his wife Brenda, given they’ve been by each other’s side throughout the journey as well as the prominent role she’s had.

Before becoming a two-time NFL MVP, Super Bowl champion and Hall-of-Famer, Warner’s journey to the Rams included:

– Signing with the Green Bay Packers as a free agent after graduating from the University of Northern Iowa in 1994, then getting cut during training camp.
– Returning to Northern Iowa after getting cut to work as an assistant coach while also working shifts at a local Hy-Vee grocery store to support Brenda – at the time his girlfriend – and her two kids.
– Playing three seasons in the Arena Football League with the Iowa Barnstormers.
– Playing one season with NFL Europe’s Amsterdam Admirals.

Off the field, Brenda’s parents were tragically killed in a tornado in Arkansas in 1996. When Kurt left to play overseas in NFL Europe, Brenda, while pregnant with their third-oldest child Kade, received results of a Pap smear which came back positive, potentially jeopardizing her ability to deliver a healthy baby. Fortunately, she delivered a healthy Kade, and a biopsy doctors conducted on a piece of her cervix shortly thereafter revealed no cancer.

Zachary Levi has been cast to play Kurt, but whoever gets cast to play Brenda will also have a prominent role in the film.

“Her life journey was way more difficult than anything that I dealt with,” Warner said. “Strength, the ability to endure and overcome I think is a big trait. The ability to show that strength but also be very compassionate and very loving. That’s kind of a unique contrast, because a lot of times when we think of people being strong, we don’t see them as being as compassionate, but Brenda has both qualities. So I’m excited. I think it can be a powerful role. It’s going to take a unique individual to play it and pull it off.”

Though the Warners initially weren’t grateful in the early stages of their journey, what got them through it and continues to give them perspective today is their Christian faith.

Kurt said they feel it is their calling to display Jesus in whatever way they have to, and “to be able to connect with people where they’re at, not just where you’re at.” Additionally, It was important to them during the process to work with people who understand that faith as an underlying theme in a movie can be portrayed in different ways, and that the film didn’t have to look like whatever someone automatically thinks of when they initially hear faith-based movie.

Developed by Lionsgate, the film is being produced by the Erwin Brothers through their Kingdom Story Company with partner Kevin Downes. It is being written by David Aaron Cohen (“Friday Night Lights”), Jon Gunn and Jon Erwin. The Erwin brothers previously collaborated with Lionsgate on faith-based films like the 2018 drama “I Can Only Imagine” and the March 2020 biopic on Christian musician Jeremy Camp.

“I think that for us becomes the challenge and the exciting part of this movie, is we’ve got people involved that understand that,” Kurt said. “We want to make a movie that reaches as many people as possible, with the true essence of what the story is and who we are. That to me is why we’re excited about our team and what they know and what they understand about the story, and who they are as people. I believe we have a chance to do something extremely unique and special because of those perspectives, and bring the right story to the big screen, whatever that looks like.”

Warner played at the highest level of professional football and won one Super Bowl, during that miracle 1999 season, while appearing in two more. However, he said winning a Super Bowl – among other qualifiers that the world uses to deem a person as successful – is not the only definition of a successful life.

He hopes the movie not only teaches that, but also inspires viewers and fans to find a great confidence and be very content in whatever their dreams are, regardless of what the world says.

“The bottom line is, we want people to believe that with faith in yourself, with faith in something greater, that all things really are possible,” Kurt said. “That even though circumstances might say something different or people, outside forces may say something different, those things do not have to define us, and define who we are and what we can be.”

Ohio State athletic director "really concerned" about season https://t.co/It0ESWRwW9

— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) July 9, 2020

Next to the definition of “deep-threat” in the dictionary is a picture of Willie “Flipper” Anderson. Flipper ranks 4th all time with a career average of 20.1 yards per reception!

This one – on a nice 55 yard snag against the Eagles in the 1989 playoffs pic.twitter.com/5KEOlNVcVi

— RAMS ON FILM (@RamsOnFilm) July 9, 2020

Sweden Has Become the World’s Cautionary Tale

Its decision to carry on in the face of the pandemic has yielded a surge of deaths without sparing its economy from damage — a red flag as the United States and Britain move to lift lockdowns.

link https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/07/business/sweden-economy-coronavirus.html?searchResultPosition=1

LONDON — Ever since the coronavirus emerged in Europe, Sweden has captured international attention by conducting an unorthodox, open-air experiment. It has allowed the world to examine what happens in a pandemic when a government allows life to carry on largely unhindered.

This is what has happened: Not only have thousands more people died than in neighboring countries that imposed lockdowns, but Sweden’s economy has fared little better.

“They literally gained nothing,” said Jacob F. Kirkegaard, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington. “It’s a self-inflicted wound, and they have no economic gains.”

The results of Sweden’s experience are relevant well beyond Scandinavian shores. In the United States, where the virus is spreading with alarming speed, many states have — at President Trump’s urging — avoided lockdowns or lifted them prematurely on the assumption that this would foster economic revival, allowing people to return to workplaces, shops and restaurants.

In Britain, Prime Minister Boris Johnson — previously hospitalized with Covid-19 — reopened pubs and restaurants last weekend in a bid to restore normal economic life.

Implicit in these approaches is the assumption that governments must balance saving lives against the imperative to spare jobs, with the extra health risks of rolling back social distancing potentially justified by a resulting boost to prosperity. But Sweden’s grim result — more death, and nearly equal economic damage — suggests that the supposed choice between lives and paychecks is a false one: A failure to impose social distancing can cost lives and jobs at the same time.

Sweden put stock in the sensibility of its people as it largely avoided imposing government prohibitions. The government allowed restaurants, gyms, shops, playgrounds and most schools to remain open. By contrast, Denmark and Norway opted for strict quarantines, banning large groups and locking down shops and restaurants.

More than three months later, the coronavirus is blamed for 5,420 deaths in Sweden, according to the World Health Organization. That might not sound especially horrendous compared with the more than 129,000 Americans who have died. But Sweden is a country of only 10 million people. Per million people, Sweden has suffered 40 percent more deaths than the United States, 12 times more than Norway, seven times more than Finland and six times more than Denmark.

The elevated death toll resulting from Sweden’s approach has been clear for many weeks. What is only now emerging is how Sweden, despite letting its economy run unimpeded, has still suffered business-destroying, prosperity-diminishing damage, and at nearly the same magnitude of its neighbors.

Sweden’s central bank expects its economy to contract by 4.5 percent this year, a revision from a previously expected gain of 1.3 percent. The unemployment rate jumped to 9 percent in May from 7.1 percent in March. “The overall damage to the economy means the recovery will be protracted, with unemployment remaining elevated,” Oxford Economics concluded in a recent research note.

This is more or less how damage caused by the pandemic has played out in Denmark, where the central bank expects that the economy will shrink 4.1 percent this year, and where joblessness has edged up to 5.6 percent in May from 4.1 percent in March.

In short, Sweden suffered a vastly higher death rate while failing to collect on the expected economic gains.

The coronavirus does not stop at national borders. Despite the government’s decision to allow the domestic economy to roll on, Swedish businesses are stuck with the same conditions that produced recession everywhere else. And Swedish people responded to the fear of the virus by limiting their shopping — not enough to prevent elevated deaths, but enough to produce a decline in business activity.

Here is one takeaway with potentially universal import: It is simplistic to portray government actions such as quarantines as the cause of economic damage. The real culprit is the virus itself. From Asia to Europe to the Americas, the risks of the pandemic have disrupted businesses while prompting people to avoid shopping malls and restaurants, regardless of official policy.

Sweden is exposed to the vagaries of global trade. Once the pandemic was unleashed, it was certain to suffer the economic consequences, said Mr. Kirkegaard, the economist.

“The Swedish manufacturing sector shut down when everyone else shut down because of the supply chain situation,” he said. “This was entirely predictable.”

What remained in the government’s sphere of influence was how many people would die.

“There is just no questioning and no willingness from the Swedish government to really change tack, until it’s too late,” Mr. Kirkegaard said. “Which is astonishing, given that it’s been clear for quite some time that the economic gains that they claim to have gotten from this are just nonexistent.”

Norway, on the other hand, was not only quick to impose an aggressive lockdown, but early to relax it as the virus slowed, and as the government ramped up testing. It is now expected to see a more rapid economic turnaround. Norway’s central bank predicts that its mainland economy — excluding the turbulent oil and gas sector — will contract by 3.9 percent this year. That amounts to a marked improvement over the 5.5 percent decline expected in the midst of the lockdown.

Sweden’s laissez faire approach does appear to have minimized the economic damage compared with its neighbors in the first three months of the year, according to an assessment by the International Monetary Fund. But that effect has worn off as the force of the pandemic has swept through the global economy, and as Swedish consumers have voluntarily curbed their shopping anyway.

Researchers at the University of Copenhagen gained access to credit data from Danske Bank, one of the largest in Scandinavia. They studied spending patterns from mid-March, when Denmark put the clamps on the economy, to early April. The pandemic prompted Danes to reduce their spending 29 percent in that period, the study concluded. During the same weeks, consumers in Sweden — where freedom reigned — reduced their spending 25 percent.

Strikingly, older people — those over 70 — reduced their spending more in Sweden than in Denmark, perhaps concerned that the business-as-usual circumstances made going out especially risky.

Collectively, Scandinavian consumers are expected to continue spending far more robustly than in the United States, said Thomas Harr, global head of research at Danske Bank, emphasizing those nations’ generous social safety nets, including national health care systems. Americans, by contrast, tend to rely on their jobs for health care, making them more cautious about their health and their spending during the pandemic, knowing that hospitalization can be a gateway to financial calamity.

“It’s very much about the welfare state,” Mr. Harr said of Scandinavian countries. “You’re not as concerned about catching the virus, because you know that, if you do, the state is paying for health care.”

Texas may not have high school football in 2020 https://t.co/ZWXrCOGO6e

— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) July 9, 2020

HotdaddyWags@hotdaddywags
There’s definitely some irony in the fact that all of these NFL owners donated to the Trump campaign and now his mismanagement of COVID is going to cost them all far more than the tax breaks he gave them.

Doug Farrar@NFL_DougFarrar
You know the whole “Nickel is the new base” thing? Very true, as nickel made up 59% of all dropbacks. But this surprised me — in 2019, defenses played more dime (20.9%) than base (18%). Which means that defenses are putting six DBs on the field more than they’re putting four.

Michael Giardi@MikeGiardi
Which then makes you wonder when a team is gonna go 2 and 3 tight ends and shove it down opponents throats? I mean aside from Baltimore.

from PFF: Best- and worst-case scenarios for every NFL team ahead of the 2020 season

https://www.pff.com/news/nfl-best-worse-case-scenarios-every-afc-team-2020-season#NFC%20West

LOS ANGELES RAMS
10th percentile outcome: 6-10
How they get there: The offensive line remains a real problem for Jared Goff and this offense. Given Goff’s stark splits when it comes to working from a clean pocket versus working under pressure, along with Sean McVay’s reliance on longer-developing pass plays, a poor offensive line can derail things very quickly — as we saw last year. Coming into this season, the group ranks 25th on PFF’s initial 2020 offensive line rankings. They still have a lot of work to do if they want to show that they’re closer to the group we saw in 2018 than the one we saw in 2019.

On defense, Aaron Donald can only do so much on his own, and Los Angeles’ young, unproven linebackers get tested early and often.

90th percentile outcome: 11-5
How they get there: The offensive line getting healthy and improvements from guys such as Rob Havenstein creates a more stable offensive environment for Goff. As we saw in 2018, particularly early that year, Goff can look like one of the better quarterbacks in the league when he has clean pockets to work from.

Even with the loss of Brandin Cooks, there are still guys he can get the ball to. Robert Woods is one of the more underappreciated wide receivers in the NFL, and Cooper Kupp has been one of the league’s most effective slot receivers over the past several years. That step forward on offense, along with a defense that’s highlighted by the star power of Aaron Donald and Jalen Ramsey, is enough to get the Rams back to the playoffs.