It is co vid Cove it and more covert and its impact on the National Football League.

The weekend kicks off tonight with a rematch of last year's NFC Championship game and what should have been and hopefully will still be a really good football game.

But to say the 40 Niners have been compromised would be the understatement of the millennium.

The 40 Niners will play this game tonight because of injuries and Covic without any of the players who touched the ball in the NFC championship game in January.

They had seven different offensive players handled the ball, including the quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo, who barely handle it in that game.

But that's neither here nor there, all seven of them, for varying reasons.

Not available for San Francisco tonight as they take on a Green Bay team that is playing without their running backs.

So both teams air compromised, and it's an important game.

The Packers need to get things going.

The 40 Niners have a ton of ground to make up in what is the best division in football, and I know what you're thinking.

You're saying to yourself, Is this fair?

And I will repeat myself.

The answer is, of course not.

2020.

Football is not about fairness.

2020 Football fair.

Not the priority.

The priority is getting to the finish line.

Play the game if you can.

Every game that is played is better than a game not played, regardless of the circumstances.

And I will say this.

I think they have done brilliantly to get this far.

Brilliantly.

We've had some things juggled around.

We've had things moved around, but we have had a representative football season under practically impossible circumstances, and the news on that is unrelentingly bleak.

It is about to get much worse if you're paying attention amid all of the coverage of the election virus numbers, air spiking.

I mean, they're up everywhere, and I'm like he's sitting here to have a conversation about that.

Beyond, to tell you that the NFL's protocols are really going to be put to the test, as are the college protocols, because as these numbers go up, it becomes increasingly difficult to imagine multiple teams not being affected by it.

Every single week.

And so I say, Let's just be grateful for the games we get.

I encourage you to enjoy them because as much as I like the impractical jokers, I like football way better, way better.

And I can't think of a year when I needed it more than I've needed it this year.

To be able to sit in front of my television and watch these football games on Thursdays and on Saturdays and on Sundays and on Mondays and any other day that we've been lucky enough to get him, we had a Tuesday game.

Do we have one or two?

I've lost track It all kind of melds together.

We've had at least one game on a Tuesday, fabulous.

I love it.

So I implore you.

I encourage you sit back and enjoy these games and just hope they're not taken away from us.

I believe they will get to the finish line, but it is not going to be easy to get there.

Meanwhile, speaking of which in a move that I think has implications of three sorts implications on the game, which means implications on gambling and also implications on fantasy, Matthew Stafford has been added to the covert list for the week, but not necessarily the weekend for the Lions.

Lions play the Vikings Sunday.

He may be your fantasy quarterback.

He maybe someone you're considering on draftkings this weekend, as I might.

And, of course, if you're a fan of the Lions or a fan of the Vikings or just a fan of football, he's an extraordinarily important person.

He's the starting quarterback on the Lions and hear from Adam Schefter this morning on Get up is the situation with him.

The Lions placed him on Reserve Cove in 19 yesterday, and the situation there is this.

He was in close contact, high risk with somebody who had cove it on Monday.

It was a non team member, not a member of the Lions organization, and therefore the Lions put him on the Reserve Cove in 19 list.

He will not practice this week.

He will not take those reps.

Chase Daniel will, but if he tests negative for five days, he would be eligible to come off the reserve covert list in time to play Sunday's game against the Minnesota Vikings.

But he won't practice.

He is on that list, and if he does test positive, he would be out.

If he is clear, obviously, he'll be eligible to play in that game.

Sunday begs a fascinating question.

If you are a fan, or if you are one who was considering using him in some sort of a fantasy scenario, how impacted would a player like Matthew Stafford, who has been there forever, who was a longtime veteran and assuming he continues to test positive all week long?

A guy who you would think could be working out at home and doing things to stay feeling physically good?

How much, if at all, would he be affected?

His performance be affected by being out all week?

You have to believe it's some.

I'll go back to what happened when Cam Newton tested positive.

He missed a bunch of time, and when he came back, he looked awful.

But I have attributed that.

At least I assume that some of the reason for that is probably the fact that he did have the coronavirus.

And there are implications, physical implications.

There was probably take pride, couldn't do anything athletically for a longer period of time.

It wasn't just the practice that he missed it may have actually sapped him of some of his strength and his energy.

So what we saw Cam come back.

Brian Clark said it on.

Get up.

He looked like he aged five years in five weeks, the coronavirus.

I don't know this.

I'm not a doctor, and I have no proof of it, but it certainly seems hard to imagine that wasn't some factor in that.

But Stafford doesn't have that Stafford.

It was just a close contact of someone has been contact traced.

So if he is taken off the list on Saturday, hey will play Sunday.

I can't imagine a scenario where he doesn't start the game on Sunday.

The question is, how impacted will he be by it?

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