Why Darius Slay thought NFL should cancel season originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
With the NFL dealing with increased positive COVID tests and the prospect of more postponements, Darius Slay conceded Wednesday that he didn’t think there should have been a football season in the first place.
“My true opinion, I felt like we shouldn’t even have (a season), just because of what was going on,” Slay said on a Zoom call with Eagles beat writers. “It’s a difficult time.”
Asked a moment later to confirm that he was saying he didn’t think there should be an NFL season, Slay said: “We shouldn’t have one. But it is what it is. We’ll go to work and get it done. If there’s a way we can play, I’ll go play.”
A little while after his interview, after seeing the reaction on social media to his comment, Slay returned to Zoom and said he actually meant he felt there shouldn’t have been a season before he learned of the protocols the NFL was putting in place.
“I was just basically saying when (COVID) first came out, we shouldn’t have a season,” he said. “They came up with a great game plan to have us in the building. Before then I was thinking to myself, ‘How are they going to do this? How are they going to find a way for us to not have this? How are they going to know who has it?’ So now I feel comfortable doing it because of the fact that I’m getting tested every day. Because I have kids so I had to make sure my kids and my wife are all OK.”
Earlier, Slay discussed the challenges of an entire team of 53 players staying virus-free.
“It’s not going to be easy,” he said. “It’s going to take all of us. … But we all make sacrifices and we made them. I think our staff and our team and the Eagles are doing a great job of just securing us, making sure we’re doing the right thing and I think everybody’s kind of committed to doing their job to make sure we’re able to play Sunday. We’ll continue to keep knocking on wood, we didn’t have a sickness here yet, so we’ll continue to keep trying to find a way.”
The Titans’ game last weekend against the Steelers was postponed until later this year because of a rash of positive tests among players and staff, the Patriots-Chiefs game was postponed a day after Cam Newton tested positive and on Wednesday Patriots cornerback Stephon Gilmore tested positive.
Slay said that despite the positive tests popping up around the league, he’s not scared.
“I ain’t scared of too much,” he said. “The only thing I’m really scared of is the good lord, and he on my side, so I’m not really too much scared of anything like that. If it’s there, it’s there, but if we can prevent it we can prevent it. I wouldn’t say scary. I don’t live in fear. So I just live the day as it is.”
