The NFL Thread

“As a kid who grew up in the (D.C. area), it’ll always be #HTTR (fight song ‘Hail to the Redskins’) but looking forward to the future,” starting quarterback Dwayne Haskins tweeted.

The “R” in “Hail to the Redskins” could soon be replaced by Redtails, Redwolves or Redhawks. Redtails or Red Tails — an homage to the Tuskegee Airmen from World War II — is the favorite on online sportsbook BetOnline, and the group said it “would be honored and pleased to work with the organization during and after the (name change) process, should this name be adopted.”

This will be the NFL’s first name change since the late 1990s when the Tennessee Oilers became the Titans two seasons after moving from Houston.

After President Donald Trump last week criticized the Redskins and Major League Baseball’s Cleveland Indians for considering name changes, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said the president “believes that the Native American community would be very angry at this and he does have polling to back him up.” She cited a 2016 Washington Post poll showing 90% of Native Americans aren’t offended by the name, a survey that has since been discredited by experts.

The announcement came less than two weeks after Snyder, a boyhood fan of the team who once declared he would never get rid of the name, launched a “thorough review” amid pressure from sponsors. FedEx, Nike, Pepsi and Bank of America all lined up against the name, which was given to the franchise in 1933 when the team was still based in Boston.

Native American advocates and experts have long criticized the name they call a “dictionary-defined racial slur.” Over a dozen Native leaders and organizations wrote to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell last week demanding an immediate end to Washington’s use of the name. Goodell, who has fielded questions on the topic for years, said he supported the review.

“The NFL and Dan Snyder, we have to commend them on making the right call to change the name,” said Oneida Indian Nation Representative Ray Halbritter, leader of the “Change the Mascot” campaign. “Dan Snyder won today because now he has a legacy that will be different from the racial slur that was the team name. I know that’s not an easy thing to do, but it was the right thing to do.”

Protests against the name predate Snyder buying the team in 1999, and, until now, he had shown no willingness to consider a change. Strong words from sponsors — including a company run by a minority stakeholder of the team — changed the equation.

FedEx earlier this month became the first sponsor to announce it had asked the organization to change the name, particularly important because CEO Frederick Smith owns part of the team. FedEx paid $205 million for the long-term naming rights to the team’s stadium in Landover, Maryland.

The lease at FedEx Field expires in 2027, and dropping the name keeps open various possibilities in Maryland, Virginia and Washington for the team’s new stadium and headquarters. District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser has said the name was an “obstacle” to Snyder building on the old RFK Stadium site, which is believed to be his preference.

Bowser said she welcomed the name change but there were still obstacles to overcome before the team’s return from suburban Maryland became a serious possibility.

“Yes, we want to change the name and change the location,” she said. “The Washington football team should be playing in Washington.”

At a Dick’s Sporting Goods store in the northeast part of the district, Redskins burgundy gear took up far less rack space Monday than that of the reigning MLB champion Nationals and about as much as the NHL’s Capitals. A store employee said the merchandise generally doesn’t sell very well, crediting that to a combination of the name, the move out of the district and years of professional mediocrity.

MLB’s Atlanta Braves and the NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks have said they have no inclination to make a change. Some advocates would like to see all Native American names, mascots and imagery out of sports.

“Our fight continues,” Crystal Echo Hawk of the Native American advocacy group IllumiNative said in a statement. “We will not rest until the offensive use of Native imagery, logos and names are eradicated from professional, collegiate and (other school) sports. The time is now to stand in solidarity and declare that racism will not be tolerated.”

Halbritter said it was important to note those other names are not a slur, but he hopes a “broader discussion” can be had. He pointed out that Florida State spoke with the Seminole tribe about its name, the same thing a minor league baseball team in Spokane, Washington, did with local Native Americans.

Long removed from the glory days of winning Super Bowl titles in the 1982, 1987 and 1991 seasons under coach Joe Gibbs, Washington’s NFL team has just five playoff appearances in 21 years and no postseason victories since 2005. The team has lacked a nationally marketable player since Robert Griffin III’s short-lived stardom, and the 2020 schedule features zero prime-time games for a franchise that used to be a draw.

Re-branding with a new name and logo — and perhaps the same burgundy and gold colors — coupled with turning football operations over to Rivera could be a boon for Snyder on and off the field. Even if a segment of the fan base opposes the change in the name of tradition, winning would more than make up for those losses.

Marty Conway, a Georgetown University adjunct professor of sports marketing and business, said that while the NFL and team could pay tens of millions of dollars to buy back old merchandise, the long-term benefits are more lucrative with a new stadium naming rights deal and other corporate sponsorships.

“It’s a huge opportunity, certainly long overdue in terms of the time frame,” Conway said. “But I think there’s sort of an immediate opportunity, which we’re seeing play out every day, which is to reposition the franchise and in a step-by-step way away from the roots of its past and consistent with the change in time and social climate.”

The Pac-12 vote comes one day after the Pac-12 Medical Advisory Board presented a document to commissioner Larry Scott recommending Pac-12 programs “stop contact and competitive activities” until each institution can meet a set of mandatory criteria, University of Utah and Utah Jazz team physician Dr. Dave Petron told ESPN Radio 700 in Salt Lake City on Monday evening. The criteria hinges on the availability of point-of-care COVID-19 testing that would allow institutions to receive results within 24 hours. It also includes access to a complete cardiac evaluation, ability to isolate and quarantine positive cases and adequate health care capacity in the local community.

“Ideally, if we can test somebody within 24 hours of competition and the tests all week have been negative and that test the same day of competition is negative, really the risk of spreading the virus is essentially zero,” Petron said. “The people that are playing (would not be) infected by the virus. But the testing has to be ramped up significantly from where we are right now.”

On Tuesday, Yahoo Sports’ Pete Thamel tweeted that “Pac-12 coaches and ADs got a sobering medical perspective from a group of Pac-12 doctors last night. Source called it ‘eye opening’ and the information on myocarditis ‘made it real.’”

ESPN published a story on Monday afternoon that stated that myocarditis — a rare heart inflammation that could be linked to COVID-19 — has been found in at least five Big Ten athletes as well as several athletes in other conferences, according to two sources with knowledge of the athletes’ medical care.

Dr. Jonathan Drezner — director of the UW Medicine Center for Sports Cardiology and a UW team physician — gave voice to those concerns in a phone interview with The Times on Monday night.

“We’re hearing from colleagues at other Power Five institutions who are finding cases of myocarditis in their athletes who had asymptomatic or mild (COVID-19) infections,” said Drezner, who represents UW on the Pac-12 Medical Advisory Board. “It has really raised a concern within the medical community that there’s just a lot of unanswered questions that we need to learn more about as we think about sports.”

According to Drezner — the team physician for UW men’s basketball, track and field and cross-country, who also works with the Seattle Seahawks and OL Reign — myocarditis is responsible for roughly 9% of sudden cardiac deaths in college athletes. It can also cause rapid or abnormal heart rhythms or scar tissue in the heart. It is typically caused by a viral infection, including those associated with the common cold, H1N1 influenza or mononucleosis.

As for cardiac evaluations at UW, any athlete who tests positive for COVID-19 receives an electrocardiogram (EKG) to measure electric signals in the heart, a troponin test to gauge proteins in the blood and a heart ultrasound. If any of those tests are abnormal they administer a cardiac MRI, “which is harder to get and certainly uses more resources” according to Drezner but also most accurately identifies myocarditis and other heart conditions.

Drezner is working with Dr. Kim Harmon at UW and Harvard cardiologist Dr. Aaron Baggish to launch a study that will help determine the severity of the link between COVID-19 and myocarditis. But until that information is available, Pac-12 football may stay on the sidelines.

“Everybody really wants to know, ‘Well, what is the risk? What’s the prevalence of myocarditis from COVID-19 in young competitive athletes?’ That’s a question that we don’t have an answer for right now,” Drezner said. “But we do know that concerns from the hospitalized patients and some of what we’re hearing from reports from institutions is that COVID-19 affects the heart more so than other viruses. So it has our caution flag up.”

But, apparently, not for everybody. There continues to be discussion surrounding the viability of a fall college football season, even in the medical community. Dr. Cameron Wolfe — an infectious disease specialist at Duke and chair of the ACC’s medical advisory team — told Sports Business Daily on Tuesday that he believes football can be played (relatively) safely.

“You have to feel some level of comfortable playing in a non-zero risk environment,” wolfe acknowledged. “You can’t tell me that running onto a football field is supposed to be a zero-risk environment. Look at all of the regular sporting injuries that we accept as a certain level of risk as part and parcel of football. Now the reality is that we have to accept a little bit of COVID risk to be a part of that.”

Mayo Clinic Dr. Michael J. Ackerman also cautioned against conferences using cardiac links as justification to cancel college football. In a tweet, Ackerman referenced a JAMA Cardiology study from last month that showed that from a group of 100 recovering COVID-19 patients, “60% had evidence of active myocardial inflammation.”

“If #medical experts for the Pac-12 and Big 10 #CollegeFootball conferences are using the very good @jamacardio paper on cardiac MRI findings in #COVID19 patients as compelling for cancellation, that is a big FOUL. The data does NOT support this at all! #WeWantToPlay #RefuseToFear,” Ackerman tweeted.

Politicians have also been outspoken on the issue of college football’s immediate future. President Donald Trump repeatedly tweeted that the sport should be played on Monday, and reiterated that belief in an interview on Fox Sports Radio on Tuesday morning.

“These football players are very young, strong people,” Trump said. Physically they’re in extraordinary shape. So they’re not going to have a problem. You’re not going to see people … could there be? Could it happen? But I doubt it. You’re not going to see people dying.”

Later, the president added: “I think football’s making a tragic mistake.”

Still, the Pac-12 and Big Ten’s decisions may also prevent unnecessary tragedies.

This story will be updated.