I have touched on it before but the contingency planning of those in the upper echelons in sport is still absolutely woeful. It was highlighted again this week by the shocking episode of Damar Hamlin. Fortunately it appears he is on the road to recovery.
It has taken several days for the NFL to come up with a strategy as to how they would deal with the Bills and Bengals game not being resumed. I appreciate it is slightly trickier given the impact it has on the post season. It shouldn’t really matter though. What happened to Hamlin is not some unforeseeable event. It is a ridiculously brutal game and the reality is that injuries such as this (and worse) will happen time and time again. The fact it was on a Monday Night game and an important one, amplified the situation. Many people got to watch the horror unfold. In that sense it was no different to what happened to Eriksen in Euro 2020 when he collapsed and was resuscitated on the pitch. It is horrible viewing and the decision to cancel the game was the right one.
However, the issue here isnt about this incident in particular. It is more that the NFL doesn’t have clear rules in place for circumstances such as this. They have literally spent all week making the rules up as they go along. I thought after Covid and the impact that had on the big sports, that these organisations would take planning for unusual events more seriously. It should be there in black and white for all to see. If that was the case none of the drama would ensue.
When doing rules and regs at Betfair we had to try and plan for all sorts of different unusual things happening. Its not easy but this is not something that is so crazy that it couldn’t be planned for properly. It just reflects so poorly on the organisation.
The same can be said for entities like Yahoo and ESPN with regard to their fantasy football offerings. There are a lot of people who have money involved in various leagues and their wishy washy approach to it is not great. I understand they have been waiting for confirmation from the NFL that the match wouldn’t take place but again the outcomes seem wholly unsatisfactory. If there was clarity in the rules then there would be far fewer issues. Everyone would know where they stand.
These are billion pound businesses damaging their reputation by not having the foresight to do a small amount of proper contingency planning and painting a very clear picture as to what happens in the case of something unusual happening. These are not black swan events.
ProPunting 