NFL Draft 2020: Amid coronavirus pandemic, general managers want event delayed

Story Originally Published by NJ.com (3/25/20)

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The NFL is pushing back against its general managers, who want the 2020 NFL Draft delayed amid the worldwide coronavirus pandemic.

The league is insisting the event will still go on as planned, April 23-25, though the original plan to hold it in Las Vegas has been scrapped. The event likely will happen in a TV studio.

The NFL plans to stick with its original April 23-25 schedule for this year’s draft despite a unanimous recommendation from the league’s general manager subcommittee to commissioner Roger Goodell on Tuesday that it be moved back due to the COVID-19 pandemic, league sources said.

General managers are concerned that, in this current environment, with offseason activities and some teams’ facilities closed, there won’t be enough time for player physicals, gathering psychological testing, getting further verified information about the players and some teams having to conduct the draft from home.

League sources have said that it would be a competitive disadvantage to have some teams in their training facilities during the draft while teams in California, New Jersey and other hard-hit areas would be in lockdown and unable to be in their teams’ buildings.

The coronavirus pandemic has already wiped out pre-draft visits, though GMs were able to speak with players at the NFL Scouting Combine, which wasn’t affected by the crisis.

So this is going to be a strange draft, in many ways, no matter what. But the dates are still on.

NFL teams ordered to shut down facilities for at least two weeks due to coronavirus

Roger Goodell issued a memo to NFL teams informing them to close their facilities, with limited exceptions, by 6 p.m. on Wednesday.

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