The pandemic's rules are dumb...when it comes to sports (part 2)

No one is against imposing player health and safety rules during a pandemic, in fact, they should be encouraged. But at a certain point, the new rules and regulations are asinine and have little to no scientific logic working in their favor. Players are constantly bumping up against one another while also breathing heavily and shouting on the court, so the idea of banning handshakes makes no sense. These are some of the protocol changes, as reported by ESPN Senior NBA Insider Adrian Wojnarowski:

After witnessing some opposing players disregarding new league rules against unnecessary contact on game nights, the NBA is moving team security into the midcourt area to dissuade violations that include hugging and handshakes, according to a league memo obtained by ESPN on Wednesday.

The league has also banned jersey exchanges post-game.

The thing that the NBA and other sports leagues have wrong about COVID-19 is that it does not politely wait 15 minutes and then decide to enter your system. The coronavirus is not a defender in a game of 4th-grade touch-football at recess who needs to count to five Mississippi before rushing the quarterback. Reducing exposure time absolutely reduces the chances of contracting the virus. Making cuts in exposure opportunities whenever possible makes sense. But banning three-second interactions that are already happening on the court regardless of the rules just pushes players to rebel against the serious ones even more.

When it comes to restricting handshakes and jersey exchanges, it’s gone too far. If LeBron James and Kawhi Leonard are posting each other up for an entire game, chances are the contact will have already happened. If they want to exchange a handshake with one another, it’s not like they haven’t already grabbed onto each other multiple times a game. The additional few seconds they spend at half court will not change anything besides a topical view of the league. If anyone is upset with handshakes, they would be appalled with playing an entire game maskless. I cannot imagine anyone drawing the line at handshakes.

This is yet another example of leagues making up bogus rules for the optics. In the days following the implementation of the new restriction, Kyrie Irving attempted to exchange jerseys with Bam Adebayo after a game and was blocked at half court by security. The exchange being prevented was understandable. Those are the new rules, silly as they may be. But the next night, Irving proceeded to surreptitiously pass his jerseys to Adebayo anyways. When questionable restrictions are put into place it only makes people want to break them even more.

Alternatives should be put in place to help facilitate the common gestures before and after the game. If you want to have a jersey swap, have an equipment manager run the jersey through the tunnel after the game. If you want to have a handshake, ask that the players wear masks if it is outside the field of play. But restricting these commonalities altogether pushes players like James Harden and Irving to go to parties and disregard the rules that actually matter in keeping the entire league healthy.