NFL Postpones Titans Game, Fines Teams $1.7 Million For Breaching COVID-19 Protocols

Heading into the third week of the NFL season, Sunday’s game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Tennessee Titans was postponed due to a flare-up in positive COVID-19 tests among players. 

The NFL released a statement Wednesday, indicating the new game date and time will be announced as soon as possible. The statement read: 

“​The Steelers-Titans game, originally scheduled for Sunday at 1 p.m. ET, will be rescheduled to allow additional time for further daily COVID-19 testing and to ensure the health and safety of players, coaches and game day personnel. Details on the new game date and time on either Monday or Tuesday will be announced as soon as possible,” the NFL said. 

Besides the postponement of the game, some notable coaches and teams have already been slapped with nearly two million dollars in fines for breaching COVID-19 protocols and other safety measures. The latest fine could be directed at Ravens coach John Harbaugh. 

On Monday, Harbaugh was absolutely livid with one referee, in the first quarter of the game, against the Kansas City Chiefs. The head coach took off his face mask after he became enraged when tight end Nick Boyle was flagged for tripping. 

“After tight end Nick Boyle was flagged for tripping, the furious head coach took off his face mask to yell in the referee’s face. Unfortunately for Harbaugh, the confrontation was caught on camera. The referee was still wearing his mask,” WJZ Baltimore said. 

WJZ said Harbaugh could be fined upwards of $100,000 for taking off his mask. 

John Harbaugh about to fistfight this ref has been my mood all 2020 pic.twitter.com/ENRaKPkc8a

— Slightly Biased (@BiasedSlightly) September 29, 2020

Harbaugh has been a series mask-offender – just last week, he took off his mask during the Texans game to yell at someone. 

The NFL has slapped several coaches with mask violation fines. About $1.7 million in fines have been issued to teams for breaching safety protocols. 

“Vic Fangio, Jon Gruden, Sean Payton, Kyle Shanahan and Pete Carroll are the head coaches appealing the $100,000 penalty assessed by the league last week in its effort to uphold COVID-19 protocols and safety. Their respective teams — Denver Broncos, Las Vegas Raiders, New Orleans Saints, San Francisco 49ers and Seattle Seahawks — were also fined $250,000, bringing a grand total of fines to $1.7 million,” according to NFL.Com. 

The NFL’s war on mask violaters is absurd, unrealistic, and impossible – the last few weeks of head coaches fined for violating mask rules is evident of that.  

As virus cases continue to soar across the US, the postponement of more games would be bad news for sports betting stocks.