Trouble with bubbles

“It’s the sense of agency or the sense of control over your own destiny or outcome of your career. My success or my failure depends on me and me alone. I’ve got no one to blame my failures on, and I have no one to attribute my success to but myself.” – Casey Neistat

The NBA and Major League Baseball are undertaking the daring experiment of functioning during the pandemic, in the country worst hit by it. Initially, a handful of spoiled NBA players whined about being cloistered, the food and other services. It reminded this writer of the time the late Kobe Bryant was lent the Los Angels Lakers jet to attend his rape hearings in Colorado, then complained about the service on the plane.

But for a moment, let’s bear in mind that these athletes grew up in an environment where their every need was catered to because their families and schools counted on them. Then their agents filled their heads with dreams of untold riches. Then NBA teams scrambled to hire them. They pretty much got whatever they wanted. Now, they can’t go anywhere. Boo hoo.

Oklahoma City Thunder center Steven Adams rebuffed those complaining about the confinement. He said it shouldn’t be that hard since they aren’t in a war zone like Syria, and that they are, after all, “living in a resort.” Besides, more than their ridiculously valuing personal freedom over all things, the one thing Americans prize is being paid well. In countries like Australia, even returning citizens undergo individual government-mandated quarantine in hotels, and are forbidden from leaving their rooms for two weeks. Their food is delivered to their door, and anything they need will be bought for them (at their expense) and brought to their rooms, as well. Should they try to leave their rooms, their electronic keys will not let them back in, and they will face fines and other consequences. They are only allocated 15 minutes of fresh air poolside every day, under the watchful eyes of police. Then they are tested for COVID-19 on the 12th day. NBA players are relatively freer.

In the Philippines, sport is still at a standstill, save for a few pro boxers who left the country for scheduled pro fights in the US. Among them are the resurgent Mark “Magnifico” Magsayo, who last fought in August of 2019. Magsayo has found new life with Sen. Manny Pacquiao’s MP Promotions, and is training under Freddie Roach. Other than that, the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) has clamped down on any sporting event which it feels may cause undue risk of spreading the virus. This includes the Philippine Basketball Association, horse racing, collegiate sports, and so on.

The question is this: can the Philippines approximate the NBA bubble?

Firstly, America has a very strong car culture. Its vastness has necessitated development of the automobile industry, which has been resurgent since the time of President Barack Obama. Drive-in movies and diners and truck stops dot the mainland. In the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, the opening ceremony featured the pick-up truck as an American icon. Land is also expensive. These factors compelled coliseum and theme park developers to move away from urban centers. If you build it, they will come (by car) anyway. This isolation has helped both the NBA and MLB in finding places where they could fly everyone in, hunker down, and go back to business. Their revival is also hoped to spur other businesses to be more daring.

The US is also home to dozens of the world’s biggest, most profitable pharmaceutical companies, like 3M, which practically owns the industry for now due to public preference for its N95 masks. The company is pulling in trillions of dollars, as doctors around the world replace their masks after every patient. This has also spurred a dark new multi-billion dollar underground economy of resellers around the world. But that is another story. The point is that it would cost little, yet be of enormous benefit for one of Big Pharma’s elite to sponsor all the testing needs of a cloistered NBA. Even the announced weekly testing would be a piece of cake. Besides, these are athletes in peak physical condition, who could more easily shrug off any infection.

This leaves three questions for the Philippines. The initial question is under what conditions would the IATF be convinced to allow the PBA and other sports to resume operations under modified conditions? As of now, with the lack of discipline being displayed by many in the general public, the national government has to make the hard choice to reopen the economy despite less than ideal conditions. Any gathering is still a gamble with human lives.

The second question is where the PBA could play in relative isolation, with hotels in close proximity, and a testing facility could be set up. Where could the players be safely shuttled between a playing venue and their hotel? Would the hotel make special arrangements to accommodate them, such as allocating an exclusive elevator from the main lobby or basement parking directly to floors restricted to them? Meals would be delivered to their rooms, and for anything else they need, they would have to give money to assigned hotel personnel to buy for them. Bear in mind also that basketball players are often larger than average, so this influences which rooms will be assigned to them. Offhand, Araneta Center and Mall of Asia seem potentially suited for this purpose. But would the hotels give discounted rates or even sponsorship under these conditions?

This brings up the most crucial question, the cost. With no ticket sales (unless they build in luxury boxes), and only television revenue to bank on, would a league like the PBA – or any league – be willing to absorb the huge additional costs of resuming operations? Hotels, meals, shuttles, testing and so on for a few hundred people becomes prohibitive after a while. And if the PBA can’t do it even when they’re allowed to, who can?