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| Spencer Moe and the Prince Albert Raiders wait for action. |
Coming into this week, both Manitoba and Alberta were engaged in strict lockdown measures to battle the pandemic that are at the moment slated to last until January 8, 2021 and January 10, 2021 respectively.
On Monday, the Government of Saskatchewan announced current pandemic restrictions would be extended to January 15, 2021 and added some new tweaks that come in on Thursday at 12:01 a.m. The tweaks include limiting all private indoor gatherings to members who live in the same household and limiting all outdoor private gatherings to 10 people.
On Tuesday, British Columbia Premier John Horgan was vowing there would be tighter enforcement for the strict lockdown measures in that province.
The measures that are in place in all four Western Canadian provinces have prevented games and competitions in the sports world from happening at all. Where athletic activities can occur, training has been limited to groups of eight.
New COVID-19 case numbers are still rising at a concerning rate in both Canada and the United States.
On Tuesday, the WHL announced that due to public health restrictions in place across Western Canada and the Pacific Northwest U.S., the major junior hockey circuit is not in position to begin its upcoming regular season on January 8, 2021.
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| All Brandon Wheat Kings head bump celebrations are on hold. |
“We continue to make every effort to get our season started, but our first priority has always been the healthy and safety of our players and everyone associated with the WHL,” said WHL commissioner Ron Robison in a release. “Given the public health restrictions that are currently in effect, we are not in a position to determine a new target date for our season.
“We will continue to consult with health authorities to determine when it is safe and responsible to get our season started.”
Of course, vaccinations for COVID-19 have started in Canada on a very limited scale. It is expected vaccination rollout for the general public won’t happen until at least April of 2021.
If all goes well on the vaccination front, there is optimism that things could be back to normal by September of 2021. Again, that assumes everything goes well.
Still, the world is well in the grips of the COVID-19 pandemic in the current day. According to Worldometer, which is pretty accurate in accumulating daily totals on COVID-19 cases and deaths, the United States went through a 24-hour period within the past two days experiencing 246,996 new COVID-19 cases and 3,486 deaths.
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| Kyle Crnkovic and the Saskatoon Blades are still sidelined. |
As a result, it is unclear what will happen to major junior hockey for the 2020-21 campaign or how all other levels of hockey and winter sports will get going in the 2020-21 campaign.
At the moment, the only junior hockey that will be played will be the action from the upcoming world juniors in Edmonton, Alta., which will be played in a bubble environment at Rogers Place.
Unless you are a big money professional circuit or the top tier of the NCAA, most winter sports in North America might be wise to throw in the towel for 2020-21 and start gearing up for the 2021-22 campaign.
Politicians can’t win in pandemic, other
notes
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| Politicians like Scott Moe can’t escape criticism. |
No matter
where on the political spectrum you sit, politicians who make decisions during
these COVID-19 pandemic times will be criticised for either doing too much or
not doing enough. No matter what decision is made, it seems both types of
criticism inevitably come.
It seems
like you don’t have to work hard to find people on social media crapping on
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The same goes for Saskatchewan Premier
Scott Moe.
Actually,
you likely can find all sorts of venom directed at any provincial premier in
Canada on social media.
Too much of
the venom is downright hateful and personal.
Of course,
there was one clown who fired off remarks that were racist towards Saskatchewan’s
Chief Medical Health Officer Dr. Saqib Shahab at a so-called “freedom rally” on
Saturday in Regina.
When you
see all the vile comments, it makes you ask, “Why would anyone get into public
service or become a politician?”
Even when
the COVID-19 pandemic hits a conclusion, I don’t think anyone would want to be
rushing to get into public service of become a politician due to the garage
that would come their way. No matter what you do, you are never going to get a
break on anything and people are going to take out a personal hate on you.
During the
pandemic, it seems politicians of all political stripes can only do wrong.
The
COVID-19 pandemic is definitely the worst time to be a politician.
- As of Wednesday night, the 50/50 jackpot for the Hockey Harvest Lottery sat at $297,520. The lottery is being used to raise money for the player scholarship education funds of Saskatchewan’s five WHL teams in the Moose Jaw Warriors, Prince Albert Raiders, Regina Pats, Saskatoon Blades and the Swift Current Broncos. Tickets can be purchased by clicking right here, and purchasers must be in Saskatchewan in order to buy tickets.
- As of Wednesday night, the December jackpot for the Saskatchewan Amateur Football Mega 50/50 lottery sat at $5,650. The funds from this 50/50 lottery will go to support the CJFL’s Saskatoon Hilltops and Regina Thunder and the WWCFL’s Saskatoon Valkyries and Regina Riot. One prize will be drawn per month, and the draw dates are December 31, 2020, January 31, 2021, February 28, 2021, March 31, 2021, April 30, 2021 and May 31, 2021. Tickets can be purchased by clicking right here, and purchasers must be in Saskatchewan in order to buy tickets.
- From what I can tell, the start date for the NHL’s upcoming season is still January 1, 2021. There have been speculation stories that said that start date has been moved to January 13, 2021 for a little over a week now. With that noted, I can’t find anything official from the NHL saying the start date has been pushed back. In reality, it doesn’t seem likely the NHL can actually start its upcoming season on that January 1, 2021 date.
- I haven’t done this in a while, so I figured I would add these again for a marker to look back on. According to Worldometer at the time this post went live 1,655,282 people have died so far this year in the world due to the coronavirus even with varying restrictions that have been imposed around the world. Also this year, Worldometer has reported 1,616,515 people in the world so far this year have died of HIV/AIDS, 1,298,066 died by road traffic accidents, 1,031,175 died by suicide, 809,776 people have died by water related diseases, 471,051 died by seasonal flu, and 297,221 mothers have died during birth. The skeptics of the COVID-19 pandemic always want to know the deaths from cancer it seems. Worldometer said 7,897,603 people have died of cancer this year.
- On Tuesday, Gregg Drinnan had some ponderings about the COVID-19 pandemic in his Taking Note blog. The ponderings made good points, but they were of the sad variety. Even though they were of the sad variety, they were still good points to ponder. That piece can be found by clicking right here.
If you have any comments you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com.
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