Mark Madden: This sports shutdown stinks, but greed will bring the games back

I’m not as worried about no sports as I am about no toilet paper. You can’t even get it on Amazon. You’d think the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor. We might need rationing.

I got nine rolls. May God have mercy on my soul. Or, if I have to use paper towels, may God have mercy on … something more tangible. (This is where the decline of the newspaper industry really hits home.)

As for sports, the shutdown stinks.

I keep getting told by virtue-signalers that sports aren’t that important. (If you work in my profession and say that, you’re in the wrong job.) But sports are important, not least to those who make their living on sports’ fringes and have their income cut off. What about senior basketball players who lost their last hurrah when March Madness got canceled? Dayton and San Diego State might never again have men’s basketball teams that good. Sports inspire passion and allow those who don’t otherwise have much to live vicariously.

Guilty as charged.

The potentially disastrous nature of the covid-19 situation duly noted, I want sports back. Sports are, indeed, important. (I especially need the Premier League to resume and six more points. That’s most critical of all. #LFC #YNWA.)

During the nonstop torrent of postponements and cancellations that began Wednesday, I thought all of sports’ current seasons were done. See you next year.

But, after reflecting, I no longer think that. Sports will resume in a month, or six weeks, and for one reason: greed.

Everything that got canceled either had a finite and present time frame, like March Madness, or was painfully minor-league. (The XFL doubled up.) Some of the events aborted will lose less money by not existing. Those decisions were easy.

But the big-time sports leagues lose millions every day they’re on hiatus. They can get some of that money back via resumption but none through cancellation.

If covid-19 doesn’t run absolutely rampant in the next month and flattens out at all, the NHL and NBA will resume, and MLB will start after a delay. Bet that. Only a dramatically rising body count will stop it, and I don’t say that at all flippantly.

This is America. Money talks, and it shouts down safety.

Things have to be just a little safer, not a lot safer. A “little safer” can be inflated for appearance’s sake. Maybe the arenas and stadiums will be empty for a bit, but sports will resume. (Get that TV money.) Greed could be derailed by an epidemic of covid-19 cases among athletes, especially if it spreads to their families. But the leagues and teams figure to look after their athletes with great care in the interim.

Greed is pretty close to undefeated. Greed is always a good bet. Sports will be back within four to six weeks. If sports aren’t, then the world might have problems that sports can’t help us forget about.

The NHL told its teams to make sure they have ice available through the end of July. Can you skate on concrete? In most NHL rinks, the ice is bad by May.