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"A huge experiment, with human subjects": Sports fans are returning to stadiums

26 August 2020
Dan Ackermann

After months of empty stadiums, the ancient practice of attending in-person sporting events is coming back — and in a hurry.

Driving the news: Sporting Kansas City became the second MLS team to play in front of fans on Tuesday, joining FC Dallas, which played its first home game in front of a reported 2,912 people two weeks ago.

And of course, the floodgates are set to open on Sept. 10, when multiple NFL teams kick off their seasons in front of limited-capacity crowds.

What they're saying: "The question everyone wants to know the answer to: Is it safe? The answer, unfortunately, isn't easy to determine," writes Neil deMause on his blog, "Field of Schemes."

  • "Will you get sick from COVID by going to an NFL game...? Probably not."
  • "But in epidemiology, what's important isn't whether you get sick but rather whether somebody gets sick."
  • "Really the question, then, is less 'Is it safe to go to an NFL game in the middle of a pandemic?' than 'Is it safe for a nation in the middle of a pandemic to allow people to go to NFL games?'
  • "The only way to know for sure is to do a huge experiment, with human subjects — and for better or for worse, that's what we're about to get."

Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times

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Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.

Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.

The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.

  • The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.

What the transcripts say:

  • Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
  • The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
  • Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."

Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.