In a truly stupid story that just boggles the mind and encourages face-palming, the Brooklyn Nets star point guard Kyrie Irving was in the news for the past year because he refused to get vaccinated even if it meant losing his extremely lucrative contract.
The Nets stuck by him and did not fire him, which is something that made me feel good about the Nets even though I don't particularly care of the team but due to regulations that exist in the NBA and also New York City he was not allowed to play in any home games. He could play on some road games in other cities that didn't have these regulations but for all home games he wasn't even allowed in the building.
Things have changed in NYC though, and now fans are allowed to attend games regardless of vaccination status.
Kyrie, who is without a doubt a very valuable member of the team is also allowed in the building and in the stands, but he can't play with the team. Now what kind of sense does this make?
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Kyrie attends games, presumably trains with the team in secret, interacts with his teammates before and after games, but he is not allowed to lace up his shoes and play at home games. I feel as though a lot of the rules that existed in not just sports but life in general that were taken towards Covid have been silly and fruitless but this is just a new level of stupid and maybe all the publicity and ire that this is creating from Nets fans will have some sort of impact on the few remaining regulations that exist.
New York City was one of the ones in the USA that went most over-the-top as far as rules were concerned during the height of the pandemic panic and at this point I think it is just stubbornness that prevents them from eliminating the few that remain.
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This is fine, but actually playing the sport, no no, you can't do that because: Reasons
I'm one of those crazy people that thinks that all of the rules that every organization, state, and country made in regards to Covid was pointless and had no effect whatsoever. I'm not necessarily anti-vax and I'll leave this out of the conversation because it ruffles too many feathers. However, I am very anti-things-that-don't-make-any sense and I think that this is a prime example of that.
Back when non vaxxed people were not allowed around the teams or even allowed in the building at least you could make that case that this was meant to prevent the spread but now that all of these rules have gone away I would love for someone out there to explain to me what on Earth not allowing Kyrie to play could possibly accomplish.
This to me just looks like the system is trying to punish Irving for not being a good little boy and doing what he is told back when the wellness policy and most of the rules of the USA was leaning towards "get vaccinated or else." Well Kyrie was one of the few that stood up and stuck to what he thought was right. He defied the rulers, and now it simply appears as though they are going to punish him for as long as possible.
I suppose that kind of depends on whether or not you think that getting paid millions of dollars a year to NOT play the sport can really be considered punishment.