Sunday morning brings an unusual and difficult situation for the NFL. Despite teams throughout the league expecting to wake up and practice in the morning, the league has to contend with a result of positive testing at one laboratory for analysis.
The nature of the positive tests is unknown, but the fact that there are multiple positive tests in each team whose samples were sent to this lab suggests that something unusual may happen. Indeed, several teams reported that subsequent test results were negative, suggesting a result of false positions at this lab. The Chicago Bears, for example, had all nine people who tested positive turn negative on their next test, according to Adam Schefter of ESPN.
Here is the formal statement issued by the NFL about the situation:
Saturday’s daily COVID tests returned several positive tests from each of the clubs served by the same lab in New Jersey. We work with our test partner, BioReference, to investigate these results, while the clubs work to confirm or rule out the positive tests. Clubs take immediate precautionary measures as outlined in the NFL-NFLPA’s health and safety protocols to track contact, isolate individuals, and temporarily adjust the schedule, as appropriate. The other labs used for NFL testing did not have similar results.
For now, the Green Bay Packers still plan to take the field as planned. This may be thanks to the team using a different service for their testing, although head coach Matt LaFleur has previously said in camp that the team uses a New Jersey-based lab. It could also be that the team has already received confirmation that all of Saturday’s positive results were false positives, similar to the Bears.
In either case, the Packers are still on their way to practice at 10:30 a.m. central time. Keep it here for updates via practice and during expected player availability.
