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The NFL season is here, and as with most other sports at the moment, it will be one with no fans at some stadiums, but fans at others, and thus a season with no precedent. At least some Home Field Advantage (HFA) has long been held to come from the thousands of screaming fans in the stands who intentionally make more noise when the visiting team is driving and hard for them to hear play calls. This season, some teams will have fans from the start, e.g. Miami Dolphins. Others hope to have fans as the season unfolds, e.g. the New Orleans Saints and Green Bay Packers, while others, e.g. the New York Giants have ruled out fans completely, at least for the time being. Last week, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell told reporters on a conference call that there will be no advantage for teams with fans in the stands. How can this be? Here's how - on the same call, it was announced that: "For teams with no fans in the stands, we�ve created audio that will be played in all stadiums" ...

"It's certainly been an interesting stock to invest in, with hardly a day going by without some news." I wrote the above just two days ago , and so it continues, with Tesla's stock price surging by another 16% on Monday coming within a whisker of $1,800, before losing all its gains and closing at around $1,500. Never a dull moment! At one point on Monday, the losses since February 19th were erased, but there's a saying about counting chickens which I was reminded of as the trading day came to a close. Yesterday was a more steady day for Tesla, closing at $1,532, and with the markets all generally positive, the 146 day draw-down since February's slide is finally over after touching a nadir of -23.3% in March.  In football, it's been a very quiet run of matches in the EPL as far as qualifiers for the Draw bets go with only four "Toss-Up" qualifiers since the hiatus, and just another five in the "Close" category. Totals for the season and...

I mentioned College Football yesterday and the decision of one Conference (the Ivy League) to suspend all sports, including football, until at least 2021. While the decision was significant, the Ivy League isn't one of the Power Five (P5) or Group of Five (G5) conferences, but the Big Ten is, and yesterday they announced that they would only play conference games. There are actually 14 teams in the Big Ten, but teams usually play games against teams from outside their own conferences. It comes a day after Big Ten school Ohio State announced that it was... ...pausing all voluntary athletic workouts, football included, after receiving the results of COVID-19 testing of its student-athletes, the school announced Wednesday. The university did not release how many of its athletes tested positive for the virus, citing privacy concerns. The question now is will other big conferences follow the lead of the Big Ten?  It seems quite likely, with the ACC and the Pac-12 already rumoured to be...

With the American Football seasons (College and pro) getting closer by the day, and the number of new cases in the US continuing to climb every day, the question of if and how the seasons will be played out continues to be uncertain. At the College level, one Division 1 Conference (read this post for a primer on how College Football is structured ) - the Ivy League - has said there will be no sports played by any of its members until at least 2021. Most readers might not care too much, but College Football is the only sport that generates profits at most universities, and so the knock-on effect to other sports teams of losing a season is likely to be significant.  As for the NFL, it's still not certain whether fans will be allowed to attend, but it seems certain that if they are, the number will be significantly reduced. The Green Bay Packers announced last week that face masks would be mandatory, and that the stadium's seating capacity would be significantly reduced, while the...

Still no definitive date on schedules or when MLB might be back, but pre-season training camps have begun and confirmation today that the annual mid-season All-Star game will not be played but the Los Angeles Dodgers will host instead in 2022. No fewer than 31 players have tested positive for COVID-19 in Major League Baseball's first round of testing. Two players were named, one from the San Diego Padres, and another from the Cleveland Indians who may well have a new name if and when the season re-starts. The Washington Redskins NFL team also look almost certain to change their name. Such changes have long been discussed, but have never come to anything, but as the New York Times put it: But in the last month, the ground underneath their feet has shifted. American society is undergoing a wide uprising over police brutality and systemic racism that flared after the killing of George Floyd in police custody, a widespread movement that has led to a reconsideration of statues, flags, s...