President Donald Trump said Saturday that executives of the leading professional sports operations are eager to resume operations that have been suspended because of the coronavirus pandemic.
"They want to get back," he said. "They have to get back. They can't do this. The sports weren't designed for it. The whole concept of our nation wasn't designed for it."
Trump held a conference call Saturday afternoon with the leaders of a number of major sports entities, including the NFL's Roger Goodell, the NHL's Gary Bettman and Major League Baseball's Rob Manfred.
All of them have shut down because of the pandemic.
ESPN reported that during that conference call, Trump told the executives that he believes the NFL season should open in September, as scheduled, and that he hopes to have fans back in arenas and stadiums by August.
He was a bit less specific when speaking with reporters during a later briefing at the White House.
"I want fans back in the arenas," Trump said. "I think it's ... whenever we're ready. As soon as we can, obviously. And the fans want to be back, too. They want to see basketball and baseball and football and hockey. They want to see their sports. They want to go out onto the golf courses and breathe nice, clean, beautiful, fresh air. I can't tell you a date, but I think it's going to be sooner rather than later."
Dr. Anthony Fauci, a member of the White House task force on the pandemic, told the briefing there that "everybody should be doing some degree of this physical separation," adding that "mitigation works" when trying to control a pandemic.
However, during the same session, Trump said that keeping the economy paused indefinitely could do more damage to the nation than coronavirus will.
"We have to open our country again," he said. "We don't want to do this for months and months and months."
On several occasions, he repeated what has become a mantra of late: "The cure cannot be worse than the problem itself."
After the league executives spoke with the president, the NFL decided to conduct its draft April 23-25 via cyberspace.
The start of baseball season has been postponed indefinitely and the NHL suspended play March 12, hours before the Penguins were scheduled to play a game in Columbus.
NHL officials have asked teams to check on arena-availability dates for July and August, and it's possible that a decision on whether to try to salvage some of the 2019-20 season will be made in the not-too-distant future.
In an interview on SiruisXM Radio Saturday, NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly acknowledged that the league will not have the final say on when to resume operations.
"It’s been almost taken out of our hands,” said. “As we’ve progressed over the last three weeks, the vast majority of jurisdictions in which our clubs operate have stay-at-home orders, which makes it unlawful for players to go and use team facilities. When we get to April 15 and we look at the world -- and we’ll probably make a decision before April 15, as we have the last two times -- we’re going to look at what’s best and beneficial from a health standpoint, but we’re also going to see where we are to even open facilities.
“Frankly, once we get to a point where restrictions may be lifted in some locations, but not others, we also have to give consideration to what’s fair from a competitive standpoint if we hope to resume play this year, giving certain players and clubs a leg up over others. There are a variety of considerations, but first and foremost is the health and safety of the players.”
Daly's full appearance can be heard here:
According to an ESPN report, the NBA's Adam Silver told those on the call that the leagues were the first to shut down and that they would love to lead the way in starting the economy once there was an “all clear” from public health officials.
