Tag: cancellation

Report: 2021 NFL Scouting Combine could face changes, cancellation due to COVID-19

The NFL is reportedly set to decide the fate of the 2021 NFL Scouting Combine this upcoming week.

The NFL’s annual scouting combine is in jeopardy of changes or cancellation amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to a new report from ESPN, the league is mulling their plans for the 2021 NFL Scouting Combine and is expected to have a decision in the coming weeks. The annual event typically takes place in Indianapolis, Indiana, serving as meeting space for team representatives, agents and NFL draft prospects. The players compete in the annual combine, interview with media members and teams alike. The NFL also uses the event as a space for teams to lay the groundwork for contract extensions, trades and more.

ESPN’s report says there are many options that have been discussed in the wake of the pandemic. Those options include but are not limited to, having a smaller combine in Indianapolis in February, delaying the combine until April, or using smaller regional combines that don’t require prospects to travel as far.

One challenge noted is that the NCAA is planning to host March Madness in Indianapolis from mid-March through the beginning of April. That’d make any delay of the combine in Indianapolis tricky to navigate. Pushing the combine back would also undoubtedly push back the start of the NFL’s free agency period as well as the start date of the 2021 NFL draft.

While league officials appear committed to having the combine take place in some capacity, the logistics are proving to be more challenging than perhaps anyone expected. There will be a decision in the coming days, but it might be to simply cancel the event altogether.

Thankfully, the Kansas City Chiefs have been active during the college football season. Scouts have been credentialed for a number of top games this season checking out some top prospects up close. There’s also the 2021 Senior Bowl set to take place in Mobile, AL later this month and that is a full-go. There will certainly be other opportunities for teams to get to know draft prospects.

At the same time, any change or cancellation to the combine could see many teams straying from a tried and true strategy that has helped teams shaped their rosters over the years. It’s just another challenge that teams will be forced to adapt to during the COVID-19 era of football.

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Cancellation of 2021 East-West Shrine Bowl could impact Chiefs’ draft strategy

Traditionally, the Chiefs have found some of their biggest steals at the East-West Shrine Bowl.

The East-West Shrine Bowl announced last month that the annual game will not be played in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The game was scheduled to take place on January 23rd in St. Petersburg, Florida, but now the longest-running collegiate all-star game will take a year off.

This decision is an understandable one given the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, but there’s no denying that it could vastly alter the draft strategy in 2021 for the Kansas City Chiefs. The game and practice week is typically among the most prominent pre-draft scouting stops. It historically has produced a number of Day 3 draft picks and undrafted free agents throughout the NFL.

Since Andy Reid’s arrival in 2013, the Chiefs have had over 30 players on the team who have participated in the East-West Shrine Bowl. Right now the team has eight players on the 53-man roster and four on the practice squad who previously played in the game. Check it out:

  • DB Daniel Sorensen (2014)
  • RG Laurent Duvernay-Tardif (2014)**
  • WR Gehrig Dieter (2017)*
  • DB Tedric Thompson (2017)
  • CB Rashad Fenton (2019)
  • OG Nick Allegretti (2019)
  • DE Mike Danna (2020)
  • P Tommy Townsend (2020)
  • DT Tershawn Wharton (2020)
  • OT Yasir Durant (2020)
  • OL Darryl Williams (2020)*
  • CB Lavert Hill (2020)*
  • DB Rodney Clemons (2020)*

*practice squad, **opt-out

As you can see, even in recent years, the Chiefs have relied heavily on the game to find some of their most productive late-round and undrafted players. Between Daniel Sorensen and Laurant Duvernay-Tardif alone, the East-West Shrine Game has produced thousands of snaps and over 80 career starts in Kansas City.

Standout rookie DT Tershawn Wharton might not have been on the Chiefs’ radar if it weren’t for this all-star game. Brett Veach told reporters after Wharton had signed that the East-West game was where he caught the attention of the team.

This cancellation just adds another challenge for the front office in Kansas City when it comes to evaluating prospects in the 2021 draft class. It’s also a big blow to the prospects who were already at a disadvantage due to a college football season altered by the COVID-19 pandemic. It’ll make every single snap ahead of draft season that much more important for the players who plan to declare for the 2021 NFL draft.

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LOOK: Twitter reacts to Alabama-LSU game cancellation

Alabama will have a second week off from playing after an outbreak within the LSU program forces this saturdays contest to be canceled.

News broke today of the Alabama vs. LSU contest being postponed, the game was originally scheduled for this upcoming Saturday. The cancellation is due to an outbreak of COVID-19 within the LSU program.

Fans of both teams are upset and frustrated over the cancellation, leading to them voicing their emotions on Twitter.

Here’s what some had to say:

Fans across the country are crying since their will no longer be a night game in ‘Death Valley.’

Tennessee‘s matchup against Texas A&M was also canceled due to an outbreak within the Aggies program.  Is this even possibility?

LSU already had to reschedule their game against Florida earlier on in the season, this fan suggests putting them through an SEC gauntlet in  single day.

Creative, but the emotion is still there.

Mac Jones in this picture represents all of us.

This theory has been making the rounds on Twitter.

This is the only appropriate response.

Wait a minute…

This fan already added one to Alabama’s win column, game or not.

Pac-12 announces it will not play college football this fall

The announcement by the two leagues foreshadows a series of moves that may eventually lead to the cancellation of the entire FBS season.

Editor’s note: This article was originally published by USA TODAY Sports and has been republished in its entirety below. 

The Pac-12 has decided to not play its football season this fall over concerns that the sport carries too much risk for athletes, the conference said Tuesday, joining the Big Ten as the second member of the Power Five to elect not to play over the health issues raised by the coronavirus pandemic.

Combined, the announcement by the two leagues less than two hours apart foreshadow a series of similar moves that may eventually lead to the cancellation of the entire Bowl Subdivision season.

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“The health, safety and well-being of our student-athletes and all those connected to Pac-12 sports has been our number one priority since the start of this current crisis,” said Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott. “Our student-athletes, fans, staff and all those who love college sports would like to have seen the season played this calendar year as originally planned, and we know how disappointing this is.”

All Pac-12 sports competitions will be postponed until at least Jan. 1, the league said. The decision came following a meeting of the Pac-12 CEO Group.

In addition to canceling the football season, the announcement impacts a number of other fall sports in the Pac-12, including volleyball and soccer.

The remaining members of the Power Five remain scheduled to play beginning in September. Commissioners from the Big 12 and SEC have preached a patient approach while evaluating health concerns that may arise due to the coronavirus.

“Unlike professional sports, college sports cannot operate in a bubble,” Scott said. “Our athletic programs are a part of broader campuses in communities where in many cases the prevalence of COVID-19 is significant.  We will continue to monitor the situation and when conditions change we will be ready to explore all options to play the impacted sports in the new calendar year.”

The conference will guarantee all scholarships and will encourage the NCAA to grant athletes an additional season of eligibility, the Pac-12 said.

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The Pac-12 announced on July 31 an altered schedule of 10 conference games beginning no earlier than Sept. 26. Like the Big Ten and SEC, the league opted against playing non-conference games as a way to provide scheduling flexibility and slightly minimize the potential risks in travel and competing against teams from areas outside the Pac-12 footprint.

The postponement of the Pac-12 fall sports season doesn’t directly impact other Power Five leagues due to this removal of non-conference play. (Only the ACC and Big 12 allowed a single non-league game under certain conditions.) However, removing the Pac-12 and Big Ten from the season does raise questions about the ability to conduct a hypothetical postseason and College Football Playoff without a complete roster of conferences.

While not as deep with championship contenders as the Big Ten and SEC and lacking a Clemson-like national front-runner, the Pac-12 was predicted to have at least on team, Oregon, be a factor in the playoff chase.

The Ducks were ranked ninth in the preseason Amway Coaches Poll. Another two teams, No. 17 Southern California and No. 20 Utah, joined Oregon in the preseason Top 25.

In all, four FBS conferences have decided against playing in the fall, with the Big Ten and Pac-12 joined by two Group of Five leagues, the MAC and Mountain West. Two independent programs, Connecticut and Massachusetts, have also decided to shift toward the potential for a spring season.

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A second FBS conference postpones its fall football season

After the Mid-American Conference became the first FBS conference to cancel its fall football season three days ago, a second conference…

After the Mid-American Conference became the first FBS conference to cancel its fall football season three days ago, a second conference joined them on the sidelines yesterday.

That conference is the Mountain West.

The dominoes have obviously started to fall towards some or even all of the Power Five also electing against playing football this fall, with the Big Ten already seeming to be on the brink of postponing the season.

Here are a few clips from the Mountain West’s announcement:

“Nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our students, student-athletes, coaches, faculty, staff and overall communities,” said Dr. Mary Papazian, President at San José State University and Chair of the MW Board of Directors. “Through the hard work of many over the past several months, the Conference made every effort to create an opportunity for our student-athletes to compete, and we empathize with the disappointment this creates for everyone associated with our programs. The best interests of our students and student-athletes remain our focus and we will persist in our efforts to forge a viable and responsible path forward.”

“Since the start of the pandemic, our membership and staff have been working diligently to prepare for a fall sports season,” said MW Commissioner Craig Thompson. “We were hopeful we could carefully and responsibly conduct competition as originally scheduled with essential protocols in place. However, numerous external factors and unknowns outside our control made this difficult decision necessary. I fully understand the impact of this outcome on our student- athletes, coaches, administrators and staff who work so hard daily to play the sports we all love, and I share in their disappointment. We will continue to navigate this pandemic together, overcome the obstacles and return to intercollegiate athletics at the earliest opportunity.”

Players react as potential college football cancellation looms

With the college football season appearing to be in jeopardy, players across the country took to social media to voice their desire to play.

On Sunday night, reports began to surface that the Big 10 university presidents were close to moving to cancel the 2020 fall sports season, including college football. The news came after the Group of Five’s Mid-American Conference announced that it was canceling all fall competition earlier in the day.

With the college football season appearing to be in jeopardy, players across the country took to social media to voice their concerns and desire for a season to be held. It started with Clemson quarterback and projected first-overall pick in the 2021 NFL draft Trevor Lawrence, who posted a series of tweets pointing out that players may be safer at school with the program than some would be at home, if university policy dictated they could no longer be on campus.

Players nationwide followed Lawrence’s lead, posting their support for the “We Want to Play” movement. That list included Florida running back Lorenzo Lingard, who is eligible this season after transferring from Miami, and defensive lineman Kyree Campbell.

Campbell, a senior in 2020, is expected to see a bigger role on the team than he has in the past. If the season were to be canceled, its unclear what the course of action would be in terms of eligibility relief. Though the NCAA is currently allowing players to opt-out of the season and retain their eligibility, its unlikely such a provision could be guaranteed to all players should all competition this year be nixed.

Tight end Kyle Pitts also joined his teammates in voicing his support for a season in the fall on Monday morning.

After news broke late Sunday night that the Big 10 administrators would be having an impromptu meeting to discuss the season, Lawrence posted once again, this time sharing a graphic of joint demands between the “We Are United” movement (started by Pac-12 players to ensure safety standards, compensation and other improvements for student-athletes) and the “We Want to Play” movement. Among the list of demands Lawrence posted was improved open communication between athletes and officials, with the ultimate goal of forming a college football players association.

Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields, currently the projected No. 2 pick in next year’s draft, also tweeted his support for these demands.

On Monday morning, it was reported that at the meeting Sunday night, Big 10 presidents voted 12-2 to cancel the season, with Iowa and Nebraska reportedly being the dissenting votes. Dan Patrick reported Monday that the Pac-12 will follow the Big 10’s lead shortly.

Though the SEC, ACC and Big 12 are currently holding firm and hoping to see how the return of students to campus in the coming weeks, ESPN reported Sunday night that those leagues could be forced into action by decisions from the Big 10 and Pac-12.

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A second FCS conference announces a cancellation of its fall athletic competition

After July 8’s news of the Ivy League cancelling its fall athletic competition, a second FCS conference has followed suit and it is the…

After July 8’s news of the Ivy League cancelling its fall athletic competition, a second FCS conference has followed suit and it is the Patriot League.

The conference is the first that participates in the FCS playoffs to shut down their football season and is the next piece in a continuing long line of news pointing towards an abridged, postponed or even completely cancelled fall college football season.

Nicole Auerbach, a senior college football writer for The Athletic, continued to describe the difference between how the Ivy League and Patriot League went about altering their athletic calendar.

And if all of that wasn’t enough, the ACC also announced today that it is postponing its virtual ACC Football Kickoff media event until further notice.

A few weeks ago many signs pointed towards college football starting on time and with a normal schedule.

Now, after two second division conferences announced a cancellation of their fall athletic seasons and several Power Five conferences moved to a conference-only schedule, that season is looking more and more in question.