Opinion: Cancel University of Houston football this fall to keep players safe from pandemic
by Billy Hawkins and Robert Zaretsky
‘Fall term now also rhymes with fatal germs. Two weeks ago, the news site Axios described Houston as “the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in Texas.” A couple of days ago, Houston could better be described as the epidemic’s molten core. As our city lurched toward the holiday weekend, the Houston Fire Department was “overwhelmed” by COVID-19-related calls and the base ICU capacity of our hospitals topped 102 percent.’
Hawkins is a professor at the University of Houston in the department of Health and Human Performance. Zaretsky teaches history at the Honors College, University of Houston.
So, does that mean that the Astros, Texans, and Rockets should cancel their planned seasons also? How about the rest of the AAC, or for that matter all of NCAA college football and sports?
Have one considered different scenarios for consideration?
Have one considered the economic impacts?
How about that today is July 6th and it isn’t September 6th?
One of these days Dr Zaretsky will find the magic combination required to eliminate all sports. Can’t someone pick him first at the Honors Retreat softball game and save the rest of us the pontificating?
This opinion piece in the only newspaper in a city as large as Houston most is likely Robert Zaretsky’s most-read work. He never misses an opportunity to suggest that athletic funds would be better spent on academia, completely ignoring that the donor base for athletics exists to create a comprehensive collegiate culture on campus to attract the best scholars possible. He wrote similar articles about his lack of understanding about soccer while living in France.
We get it, Bob, you hate sports.
This is just another chronicle in the obsession some people have with safety. Safety is a virtue, but is by no means the only virtue. If it were, nothing would get done.
Love it. Wish I’s said that!! Go Coogs, ignore your professors!! (Well, except for when you have their class, then jump through their hoops and forget that junk asap.)
In the real world, most of us are made to figure complex issues out and make them work and still deliver otherwise we starve versus pontificating from the ivory BS tower and still getting to take a state paycheck while delivering little value.
Agreed…I have a retired buddy who was super high up in Shell (not just America). He always says that people with Doctorates (Ph.D, MD, JD), all think that once they get their degree in one little corner of knowledge, that they all think they know EVERYTHING…
True…
So Thanks Professor !!!
As if anyone gave a rat’s ass what you think about this.
Cancel the Chronicle instead of football. As another poster said, the Texans, Aggies, Horns etc. are not cancelled so why should we? These two writers are full of nonsense. That’s as nice as I can be.