Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - Dr. Fauci Suggests Caution & Geoff Answers Questions

Episode Date: June 19, 2020

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases said players would need to remain in a “bubble” environment for a season to be successfully staged this fall and winter. Geoff reacts to Dr. Fauci's concerns; and later, explains the newest bit of Panthers uproar and opens the mailbag to respond to listener questions. Cold open: Dr. Anthony Fauci, on The Dan Patrick Show Seasonal concern: (1:13) Panthers greats: (13:47) Social Mailbag: (16:05) @The_Krimowski: (17:57) @adamrads0925: (20:08) @JoshWinn11: (20:05) @ChrisSittner: (21:45) Tweet your question to @geoffschwartz on for a chance to be featured in next week's show. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Are you talking about getting a sport going that can be observed, even in a situation where a lot of parts of the country are being restricted in their physical contact? Namely, you're not going to have people sitting in the stands close to each other, sneezing and coughing on each other. That's going to be a problem. that's going to be a problem. Welcome back to another episode of Jeff Schwartz is smarter than you. The podcast that tries to make you a smarter football fan. This is Jeff Schwartz on Friday, June 19th. Hope you guys had a great week. Look, it's interesting. There's some days when the producers and I,

Zuri Gabe and Matt talk about ideas. And we say, hey, is there anything to talk about? And earlier this week, in the middle of the week, we're talking about ideas for the show. And there weren't many, but guess what? Now there are a lot. Dr. Fauci talks about the NFL having to play in a bubble this year. Backlash about a Panthers harmless tweet. We're going to have a mailbag as well and also talk about NFL preseason modifications possibly to the schedule.

Let's start with Dr. Fauci, who was quoted in his article and saying, unless players are essentially in a bubble insulated from the community and are tested nearly every day, it would be very hard to see how football is able to be played in the fall. There's a second wave, which is certainly a possibility, and which would be complicated by the predictable flu season. Football may not happen this year. And I totally understand that from his perspective as someone who has followed these viruses for his entire career, right? For someone who's the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and someone who's been on the White House task force, how he could feel this way, right?

He's a scientist. But I've said this for months now, and it's no surprise I'm saying this, is I don't think people are going to care. And by people caring, I mean the people involved with making sure football happens, whether on the state level, making sure the state's open to play football, the local level, making sure the county is open to play football, down to the owners, the players, they all want to play. And I think the reason they want to play, obviously there's financial reasons for that, but to me personally, it feels like normalcy

returning if we get football in the fall. So let's go back to March and we shut down. We shut down. States shut down. We kind of stopped movement in this country and try to flatten the curve, whatever. Some states are more stringent, some are not. I was in a state that kind of was in the middle, kind of shut down in the middle of it. We project all the way out to football. So that was March, April, May, June, July, August. The first game is middle of September for the NFL, September 13th. Not the first game, the first weekend.

First game, September 10th. That's seven months, okay? So my feeling all along has been that if we can't have football back in seven months, that we are really not a good place in this country. And we might not be the good place in this country and still get football back. But my mind has always been, and I think people feel this way, maybe not real consciously, but this is deep down and kind of why we were activated to football not being there, football not being able to be played, is that it would signify that we're not even close to combating this virus at all. And again, we might not be, we're forging ahead

anyways, but in my mind, football being back has signified that we have some normalcy back in our lives. I hate the word new normals. I feel like when the virus eventually, either we get a vaccine or we build antibodies or herd immunity immunity whatever word you want to use for that but when this peters out we'll get back to normals the new normal thing i don't really like because new normal is different for everyone some places are more open some are not but sports coming back would feel that we're getting back to normal especially football which football is such a big part of a lot of our lives and to to not have football would mean we're in bad shape. In seven months, we haven't figured out how to do this

at least a little bit in a safe manner. So I understand what Fauci's saying, but I think it's going to happen anyways because of the money involved, the passion people have for football, and the sense of normalcy, a way for us to feel like we are getting back to normal. We've talked about the NFL, the guidelines they've tried to put in

to make this happen as far as trying to figure out, you know, how we're going to social distance, how we're going to physical distance as well. And, you know, just they're trying to do the best they can. And even the NFL chief medical officer, Dr. Alan Sills, said we are developing a comprehensive and rapid result testing program and rigorous protocols that call for a shared responsibility from everyone inside our football ecosystem. This is based on the collective guidance of public health officials,

including the White House Task Force, the CDC, infectious disease experts, and other sports leagues. Make no mistake, this is no easy task. We will need to be flexible and adaptable in this environment to adjust to the virus as needed. So the NFL is trying to do their best to make this a healthy transition of getting guys back in the facility. And we're going to have guys test positive.

We're seeing on the college side, Alabama, Auburn. Now, the story yesterday or the day before now, the day is kind of running through. Texas has over 10 players test positive for the coronavirus. And most of these players are asymptomatic. And we understand that the data is showing that the age range of the players should not be concerned with getting very sick from coronavirus. Now, of course, you could pass on to someone else who can be sick, who can get sick, worse, I guess, get very ill. And those people can be in the building,

your coaches who are much older, maybe a trainer, a support staff member, equipment manager, right? There's many other player people, I should say, that could get sick in the building who they can pass on to someone else, or you can pass on to someone else. But the concern is not really the player themselves

because we've seen the data showing that the player, the age range of the players, you're not going to get very efficient. The one question we don't have an answer for, and my wife's a nurse and we've talked about this and something that she's concerned about is that, you know, there's no research right now on the long-term effects of COVID. So if you have COVID, you're asymptomatic, are there long-term effects on your respiratory system? If you've had it, are there long-term effects in your respiratory system? If it's been very bad, like what are the long, so that's the question obviously is that, you know, what's the long-term effects? So, but if you've had it and you're young, you're not going to be that ill from COVID. So all these things considered is why I think we're going to have football this year. NFL players will be tested every three days. And they're hoping, obviously, to get a more potent test, a faster test, a more reliable

test, come back within a couple hours possibly as well. But we're going to have to acknowledge and accept that they're going to be tested positive. And there's going to be a situation where we're going to have to accept that that's part of the reality we're going to play this season in. And all along those note, we've seen that there's talk about the NFL wanting to expand their practice squads to be able to allow for the possibility that they need more roster spots. Maybe expand it from 10, where it's supposed to be this year, to 16, to 18, and just find a way to just have more players on board

if there are guys that are sick. And this is a great idea because unless one position group is just desperate, let's say your quarterbacks are out, all three of them. You're screwed for the week. But otherwise, you can piece together enough players to at least put out a 53-man roster. Or it might be 55 in the new CBA. Whatever the number is, you can piece together.

The one thing I will push back on is people have said, well, have unlimited game day roster sizes. That's a little unfair because what if one team has, you know, the 46 guys that can make the roster and for game day, another team has 57. That's a big disadvantage for a team that has 43 when the other guy

has 45 when the other team has 12 more players than them. That's why you can't do it that way. So it has to be uniform. But maybe you increase the game day roster size. But this way you can have do it that way. So it has to be uniform. But maybe you increase the game day roster size. But this way you can have enough players to play every week.

And there might be times this year where a team has to forfeit. Two of you guys are sick. An entire position group is out quarantined. You have to forfeit the game. The train

is not going to stop. Once the train gets going, it ain't stopping everybody. And you might disagree with it, but I've been practical with this for months now. You listen to my Pac-12 show on SiriusXM, 373. We're all times.

I think they go to the app and find it on demand. I've been saying this for months now. It's not anything new that I've shared. I really do think once this gets started, we're not turning around unless there's a catastrophic multi-state closures as we get into flu season and COVID picks back up. So I like the idea of expanding the roster sizes, especially practice squad, to allow for more flexibility

of players are out, have to be quarantined because of COVID. This does not really affect salary caps. I don't think practice squad counts on salary cap. It's, you know, kind of typically, you know, flat rate that you get. There are times when players get paid more to stay in the practice squad on a certain team just so they don't go anywhere else. You know, they lose kind of a year of pension, I think, but it can be given back to them. Mine got brought back to me. My first year I was on practice squad.

They credited me that season because I played for so long that I got that season back from my pension. So it wouldn't affect that whatsoever. So that's a great idea. It's a great way to just make it a little bit easier for your players to be able to – no, your players, your coaches, to just have a pool of players available to play if people do get hurt. Along the same lines of roster size, training camp, Dr. Fauci,

there was talk today that NFL players got got a conference call this week and said, we're not going to start any earlier. So in college football, they're doing a six-week practice plan for football that begins in July and hopes to start the season on time. So instead of going to camp August 1st, let's say, they're going to camp middle of July. They're adding two weeks on, kind of an acclimation period. The NFL players said, look, we're not coming in early, guys.

And it makes sense why they want an acclimation period. They haven't been training together, haven't been coaching together, haven't been in the facility together, haven't been in plays together. And players are varying degrees of in shape right now. Some have done a great job of working out. Some haven't. Some have been lazy. Some are ramping up now.

So, you know, getting early, going in an extra week or too early would be a great way for players and team and coaches and executives and everyone just to see each other, see what shape we're in, see if we're ready to play yet. Players, I wouldn't want to go early. I would never vote for that. Camp is brutal and it's easier now, but nonetheless, still brutal. It's something I would never, never tell him, hey, I'm in to go early, never in to go early. So what happens if they go in on time? Is there a ramp up period needed? That's something that we're talking about in the NFL now. It'll be conditioning and football activities, replace the first one or two games. This is probably needed. So as much as guys can work out, nothing can prepare you for football movements. As much as you do in the weight room, as much as you do just running and moving around and trying to get ready for the season on your own,

nothing mimics the movements and the different stresses on the body that actual practice does. You have to build into that. Typically, you build into that in the spring, up to training camp, and into training camp. And it would make sense if everyone's been scattered around the country, and they might have to come back a week early to test, but you start training camp on time, you're going to need a big ramp-up period to make this work. I guess you don't need it. I mean, you hope that professionals

can be ready to play, but realistically you need it, right? You need it. And it would be safer, in my opinion, to have a slow ramp up into practice rather than go full steam ahead and play your preseason games. You want to make sure your players are healthy, they're in shape, they know the plays, and they don't get hurt. And that to make sure your players are healthy, they're in shape, they know the plays, and they don't get hurt. And that's the number one thing. They don't get hurt. And if you start right away,

I think you lead to possibility of a lot of injuries early in camp. Achilles, hamstrings, groin injuries. You need a lot of those early in camp, in my opinion. You need a lot in this NFL season, more than usual. I'm telling you, you can do a lot of stuff in the way you want to prepare, but you cannot prepare your body for football moves unless you do football. And if you start slow and work your way up, you should be able to prevent an Achilles tear, a hamstring tear, a groin pop. You should be able to prevent some of these things by just easing your way into things. So I think that would actually make sense.

It'd make a ton of sense. The coaches might not agree with it. Some coaches might not. I remember, look, 2011 lockout. We just came in first day, like usual, my recollection, went to practice, like nothing happened. And maybe this is the way that, that they're going to do it here. I feel like we're, I feel like we're, we're progressing with how we do training

and we're progressing with how we look at the bodies and preventing injuries. And so that I think we're – that's a positive about how we are looking at players now and protecting players, and that will continue on kind of a ramp-up period. Let's move along to a silly topic, in my opinion, before we get to the mailbag. And you guys gave me a lot of questions, so we're going to have a lot of fun with the mailbag.

Some football, some non-football. It's going to be a lot of fun. So there's a meme going around the old internet machine on Twitter. So ESPN NFL account tweeted out, which quarterback would you want? Aaron Rodgers was with a reply. Lamar was the retweet. So ESPN NFL account tweeted out, which quarterback would you want? Aaron Rodgers was with a reply. Lamar was the retweet. And Pat Mahomes was the heart. All right, simple, right?

Three guys. So everyone's got to get in on this. So the Carolina Panthers, team I played for for four years. I live in Charlotte now. I'm looking out my window right now. It's nice weather. Okay. They put out the same meme.

Different players, obviously. All they put out was the symbol of a goat right greatest of all time they put three panthers julius peppers 159 and a half sacks in his career fourth all time is a half sack away from being third all time with kevin green used to be a chief as well hall of famer next up is Steve Smith. Harden sold the Panthers for 10 years. Eighth all-time in receiving yards. Third, Luke Keegly. Seven-time All-Pro, defensive player of the year, rookie defensive player of the year. Led the league in tackles multiple seasons. All three guys retired. All three guys Hall of Famers. The name they left out was Cam Newton. And boy, is social media mad. And this is such an odd thing to be upset about.

They didn't say the most influential Panthers and leave Cam out, which would be a mistake. They didn't say like, I don't even know what would have been different to, you know, they didn't say, you know, most MVPs as a Panther. They didn't say best players of the last decade. They didn't say any of that. All they said was a goat symbol. They put three Hall of Fame players, Julius Peppers, Steve Smith, and Luke Keekly, onto the meme. It's a harmless internet meme.

And I get it. People think they slide in Cam. Maybe they are sliding Cam. But Cam is not a Hall of Famer right now. Cam might be a Hall of Famer. Goes and signs with the Chargers, maybe the Patriots, somewhere else. He can definitely be a Hall of Famer. As of right now, he's not.

They put on three Hall of Famers. We get so upset about the most mundane things. The simplest things we get upset about. I just don't get it. I don't get it. It makes no sense to me. All right, everyone. Let's get to the mailbag I really really appreciate you sending in these

questions there's a lot of them a lot of them this week we have some that are football related some are life related so we'll get to maybe 5, 6, 7 of these alright let'll get to maybe, uh, you know, five, six, seven of these. Um, all right,

let's do this. Give us some football ones first. Um, what is the biggest thing coaches look for when it comes to offensive lineman development? Um, obviously the NFL level size won't be the issue with that being said, what makes a young O-line a raw prospect? This is from Al Fernandez. Thank you for sending this in. Finish. Finish. Okay. So people think finish as an offensive lineman is a pancake. Yeah.

Great. Pancakes are great. Love them. But finish from the offensive line position is moving another human, another grown man from point A to point B against his will. And that is what finishes. Finish is taking a guy from the B gap to the C gap, removing him one whole gap in the back runs behind you.

That's what finishes. Finishes in pass protection, guy jumps, you punch him in the chest, he falls down. Pass protection, you're the tackle. Guy goes wide, you run him around the corner, you just down. Pass protection. You're the tackle. Guy goes wide. You run him around the corner. You just keep running him. Finish. Finish, finish, finish. You can't teach finish. And that will set guys apart. Now, if you're a finisher, let's say in college, but you're not very athletic, yeah, you're going to go lower in the draft. You might struggle in the NFL. But if you can't finish anybody, you're never going to be a good player

in the NFL. Some guys are drafted on raw ability, athletic ability. You know, the thing they could grow into a finisher, grow into someone that can pass protect, run block. It's tough, man. It's tough to do it. How long after the season ends do you start missing football as a fan? Has that changed for you as you progress further as your post-playing career? Great question from Dan.

I feel like I'm going to butcher his last name. I'm really bad with names. Dan, I appreciate it. Good question. Okay, so I would say that as a player, you love the offseason. You like live for the offseason. I know that about three or four weeks into the offseason,

I started getting itched to work out again. I got really excited to work out again and started doing it. So I take about three or four weeks into the off season, I started getting itched to work out again. I got really excited to work out again and started doing it. So I take about three or four weeks off and start working. I got really pumped to start working out again. To actually play, I don't know when I got in that mood, but I do know that when it was about time to get back to work, I felt excited to get back in the facility in April and see my friends and kind of get back to the season.

So there was never a time when I thought, like March 12th, I want to be back in the facility. I just knew that I want to start working out about three or four weeks after the season. I got this itch to work out again. And then I enjoyed the family time because you don't get family time during the season when you're an NFL player. So I love the offseason. Now, as someone who covers football in the media, it's a little different because you have football like 24-7, man. You really do.

And I am exhausted by the end of the season. Exhausted. I mean, I work a lot of hours. I'm not complaining about it. I have a lot of different jobs. And, you know, after the Super Bowl, Super Bowl week is crazy, right? Super Bowl week, I'm down in Miami last year, and I'm doing, I'm at Radio Row every day.

I'm there for six, seven hours a day. I'm doing interviews. I'm going to parties. Like, I'm doing it all, networking. And you're so exhausted. I take off about two weeks after the Super Bowl, but then we get right into, like, draft season, right? Free agency, combine, or really combine free agency.

Then you have the draft coming up. So it never really stops. But I miss football in the summer when there's not much happening as someone in the media. So as a player, I don't know if I ever really missed it off season. I was excited to get back as a media member. I missed it in the summer. I missed it in the summer because I'm still working. I feel immersed in football during the draft.

I feel immersed in football during the combine, during free agency. So I never really feel like it ever leaves me until the summer. All right, from Adam. What's a greater fear for you? Football not starting on time or the kids not going back to school in the fall? Oh, geez. I would say that, geez, I mean, if football doesn't start on time, the kids probably aren't going back to school in the fall.

So I would probably say football not starting on time because if football can't play,, the kids probably aren't going back to school in the fall. So I would probably say football doesn't start on time because if football can't play, that means the kids aren't going back to school. That means things are so bad, again, like I mentioned early on, that we could not have a normal life or even close to a normal life. So I would probably say football doesn't start on time. I have a good situation with a nanny that helps me out with my kids right now. So that obviously has been helpful. that helps me out with my kids right now. So that obviously has been helpful.

We feel very, very fortunate for that to be the case. Really, really, really fortunate. Let's get some food ones here. Let's get two food ones and we'll move on. Josh Wynn, 11. Am I alone in feeling like a healthy eater when I snack on kettle cook chips? So I love to eat, folks. I love carbs like everyone else does.

I'm not a sweet tooth guy. I'm a big carb guy. And I love kettle chips. I love carbs. Kettle chips is my favorite. I have it back. It's the only treat I kind of have at the house because I need to lose weight. I've lost almost 30 pounds in five months or so.

So I would say kettle chips are not low fat. They have a lot of calories. I would say that I do not feel healthy eating them. I love eating them. I don't think I feel healthier. I mean, how could you feel healthy eating fried potatoes? So I really enjoy kettle chips. They're fantastic.

How do you prefer to sear your meat after cooking sous vide? You seem like a blowtorch guy to me. For those who don't know what a sous vide is, it circulates water in a big pot for you. It keeps it at a certain temperature. Put your piece of steak in there in a food saver bag, you know, sucked out. You cook it in there at a low temperature for a couple hours.

Get it medium rare, and then you just sear it you get really really hot really really hot you sear it and it gets a nice crust on it it's a nice little medium rare a little crust you know perfect i am a cast iron guy so i have a cast iron at the house obviously like most people should have. Put a little avocado oil, good searing oil, right? Get really, really hot, not burn. But the key here, guys, is you really do have to wait a while for the cast iron to get hot. You got to wait five minutes for the cast iron to get hot. And you really don't want to put the oil in until it gets really, really hot because the oil will kind of smoke up.

And I get after it, dude. One minute, one and a half minutes on each side. I mean, it's boom, boom, boom. God, it's so perfect. One more question here from Ethan. Who's your favorite jersey swap? So jersey swap, for those who don't know, after the game, players exchange jerseys.

I am as anti-memorabilia of a player as you can get. My wall in my office has four helmets, the football, five pictures, six pictures. It's only on there because when I do a TV hit in my office, I don't want my screen just to be, my screen really, my wall to be blank. I want to look like I actually played football. The only reason why, my wife did it for me. I really, it was just like a birthday present. I never did a jersey swap. I don't, I don't really like need that to kind of validate my career

or to remember I played or the memories that I made. I've never been a member, I don't have like any memory in my house. I just don't. So, that's,

that's it for the mailbag. Guys, by the way, I have a ton of questions. We're going to do a more football technical one. I saved a bunch of football-ish questions for next week. I just the way I have a ton of questions we're going to do a more football technical I saved a bunch of football ish questions for next week

just want to have a little bit of fun with you guys alright everyone have a great weekend please rate review subscribe and I'll talk to you guys

next week take care everybody