Football players and athletic department staff at Colorado State have accused CSU football coaches of trying to stymie evidence of the COVID-19 threat facing the team, according to a report from the Coloradoan.
Rams coaches allegedly instructed players not to report symptoms, threatened to cut their playing time if they quarantined and altered contract tracing reports to allow practices to continue.
The head coach at Colorado State, Steve Addazio, was as an assistant coach at Florida throughout Urban Meyer’s tenure from 2005-10, serving as offensive coordinator for his final two seasons in Gainesville.
Members of the program said they believed it was engaging in a cover-up.
“I believe there is a cover-up going on at CSU,” said a current football player who wished to remain anonymous for fear of retribution. “But they could only cover it up so long and now that we have so many cases across athletics, they can’t cover it up anymore. It’s not about the health and safety of the players but about just trying to make money off the players.”
Said an athletic department staff member: “There are some red flags in the athletic department but the common denominator with this administration is to protect the coaches before the student-athletes and that makes them feel more like cattle than student-athletes.”
Twenty-seven players were missing from practice due to COVID-19 on Wednesday, the last day of practice before the university temporarily halted it. Players believe the spur in new cases to stem from a Fourth of July party attended by a number of members of the team.
Athletic director Joe Parker said that while he’s unhappy to hear about the criticism, he believes in the efficacy of Colorado State’s plan.
“This (student-athlete) population is the most tested population there is here but obviously some feel that is not a good enough job to make them feel comfortable regarding their health,” he said. “If that’s the feeling, we will need to amp it up.”
Parker added that if players were told not to report symptoms to trainers, that is unacceptable.
Players said that Addazio and defensive coordinator Chuck Heater, both in their 60s, rarely wear masks at practice. They also alleged that coaches are coercing health administrators not to quarantine athletes, but that claim was disputed by Parker.
“There is no influence from our coaching staff on those kinds of decisions and those decisions are made outside of the athletic department and that is the way I want it,” he said.
Many players allegedly don’t wear masks at practice, leading to an environment many players deem to be unsafe.
“We had a player who definitely had coronavirus symptoms coughing at practice and he wasn’t wearing a mask and I was next to him, touching him and there was spit and sweat,” a player said. “I told him he needed to get tested but he really didn’t want to because then he would be out. The next day he is not at practice. (If he tested positive) he already had spread the virus. That’s why a lot of players don’t feel safe at football practice.”
Colorado State tested 150 athletes on Monday and is currently awaiting those results.
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