Top 5 conclusions from Detroit Lions CEO Bob Quinn’s press conference

Detroit Lions general manager Bob Quinn held a virtual press conference on Wednesday morning. The topic at hand was clear: During the first 20 minutes of the session, Quinn spoke extensively about the security protocols the team has been implementing for the past four months to prepare his team’s Allen Park facilities for training camp. .

However, towards the end of the conference, Quinn answered some questions from local reporters. Here is a summary of the main conclusions from Wednesday’s session.

We still don’t know if someone has tested positive or will be excluded

Out of the blue, Quinn wanted to make it clear that he had no updates on the status of some players for the 2020 season.

“We have nothing to report on any positive tests or opt-out options this morning,” Quinn said at the beginning of the Zoom session. “If there is anything to report on that, it will be later today.”

That makes sense. The players had their first round of COVID-19 tests on Tuesday, and according to a video with team president Rod Wood, the results take around 24 hours to arrive. Players will have three rounds of testing before they can enter the Lions facility – as early as Saturday

Regarding opt-out, Quinn said they are still in the educational process with the players, including a virtual meeting between medical professionals and the families of the players scheduled for Wednesday night. Even if the players reported to the camp on Tuesday, they have until Monday, August 3 to choose not to participate, if they wish.

Contract tracking will be a big part of your COVID-19 protocols

If there is an employee, be it a player or anyone else, who tests positive, Lions have an interesting system in place to make sure that everyone close to that person is also quarantined. Quinn showed off a watch-like device that is microchipped to track a player’s proximity to others.

Basically, the device will serve two purposes: to ensure that certain personnel (they are divided into tiers according to their work) do not intermingle with each other, and to track data on who an infected person may have come into contact with. Quinn said they will rely on the data to make decisions about player quarantine and the data alone.

“If someone tests positive, go back to the contact tracking data and see how long those people have been around, and it really made up their minds for us,” Quinn said. “So I think that’s why the league went with Kinexon because it will give you very real data. It will not be club by club to decide who will have to sit down or who will have to quarantine. It will be very black and white. It’s going to be in the data. “

Allen Park looks very different

From plexiglass lockers to food that is no longer served in the form of a buffet, but is ordered through an app, the Lions facilities already look completely different from last year.

One of the most drastic changes has been in positional meeting rooms. The quarterback room, generally designed to house only five or six players, has now been converted into a storage room, because the quarterbacks cannot safely inhabit it while maintaining social distance. Instead, each position group has been moved to a larger room. The offensive line will occupy the full team’s normal meeting room, while the entire indoor driving range will now serve as the team’s meeting room.

Educating staff is a big goal right now

With the NFL bubble missing, a big key to an NFL’s success this season will be how players and staff react when they are not in team formation. Quinn and company are doing their best to teach their employees the importance of being safe outside of work.

“We have to be very confident, we have to be very educated, and we have to make a lot of mature decisions when people leave the facility,” Quinn said.

Part of that educational process involves Zoom consultations and meetings with medical professionals such as Geehan Suleyman, MD, an infectious disease specialist from Henry Ford who has assisted the team throughout the process.

“We’ve done a lot of them,” said Quinn. “We’ve done it with the support staff, we’ve done the support staff and the coaching families separately, we’ve made players and we have a familiar Zoom player call scheduled for tonight or tomorrow.” I think it is tonight. It is tonight 8 o’clock. Therefore, the families of our players will have the opportunity to obtain the same educational materials and ask questions of our medical staff. ”

Quinn believes ‘robust’ evidence could avoid MLB situation

Major League Baseball suffered a team outbreak in less than a week in its season when more than a dozen Miami Marlins players tested positive for COVID-19 this week. While Quinn remains concerned about the possibility of that happening in football, especially since there are no bubbles, he believes that NFL preventative measures may be stronger than in baseball.

“The only thing I know is that the difference between us and MLB is that they only tested twice in the beginning,” Quinn said. “They are on a totally different test protocol than ours. I don’t know the details, so don’t quote me about it, but I do know from what I understand that they did frequent tests at first for the first few days and everyone was fine until symptoms were shown I think there is a difference there. I think our tests are a very robust testing program. I think you would agree with that. “

The MLB tests were not exactly low intensity. After receiving an initial test before entering the facility, the players were screened for symptoms twice daily. On top of that, the players have been evaluated every other day in the season, and all of that still could not prevent an outbreak.

Still, Quinn believes the Lions have “a good plan for the facility to keep everyone safe.”