Fear The Chorizo

I think you could maybe change that to Americans. Americans are pretty selfish. Myself included. I fall into the 'pretty good about stuff' group, but I have also done/gone to some dumb places during all of this. Don't confuse selfish with free to make our own choices - even in the midst of a year where individual's options to make their own choices have been severely curtailed in the spirit of public health. Footage from China recently showing an entire airport being herded like cattle in incredibly crammed spaces to get tested because a couple of airport workers tested positive, plus those same people all being forced to quarantine for 14 days, makes me feel incredibly fortunate to live in the country I do. To me it's terrifying just how many people are comfortable trying to justify those iron-fisted, forced compliance "measures" to prevent a virus this infectious from spreading at all. In looking around the developed world, there isn't a right or wrong way for societies to try and limit the risk associated with the inevitable spread of this virus, and at some point it would be great for people to stop blaming others for getting infected. There is no failsafe approach to avoiding being infected with Covid-19 unless you want to crawl in a hole indefinitely and never come into contact with the public - any choice that differs from that is taking a risk. Countries and even individual states here in America that had really hard/prolonged lockdowns early still see spread as soon as any sort of reopening begins. If the only way for populous countries to limit the virus is to impose gulag-style lockdowns of its own people (i.e., china), that should be a non-starter in terms of actual policy. "You can't tell me what to do!"- tons of Americans during this. I shutter to think about how this current US population would have done during WW2. Apples to Oranges, but basically the half of the country that's crowing "you can't tell me what to do!" about COVID measures would be pissed at the rest of the country who would be crowing "you can't tell me what to do!" related to the military draft, war machine buildup/manufacturing, and personal sacrifices that would be required to avoid having to learn how to speak German and/or Japanese.

People easily forget how much flack Davante Adams got from Packer fans his first 2+ seasons in the league for drops and inconsistencies. The one thing MVS can hopefully glean from all this is the fact that getting that much grief from people means they also see his upside as a player if he gains some consistency.

Do you have a link or quote for this? In general this is not how vaccines work. There is one major exception that I can think of, but even that would reduce transmission. 1st couple of paragraphs from an article published yesterday... "As several coronavirus vaccines inch closer toward FDA approval, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert has called on the public to double down on public health measures. Dr. Anthony Fauci, in a virtual discussion with The Hastings Center on Thursday, said the eventual vaccine is meant to protect the individual from getting sick from the coronavirus, but may not prevent that person from spreading the virus to others. Fauci, when discussing Pfizer and Moderna’s results in clinical trials, explained that the vaccines are being evaluated to see if they prevent clinically apparent disease in the individual, and also to see if it prevents severe disease in a person who was inoculated. However, it is not yet clear what impact the vaccines may have on transmission. 'We have the same issue with influenza,' Fauci said, noting that the two coronavirus vaccines are far more effective than the seasonal flu vaccine. 'You can get vaccinated with influenza and you won’t get sick, but it won’t necessarily prevent you from getting infected – although you won’t know you’re infected because you’ll either get mild or no symptoms.' The same concept applies to the eventual COVID-19 vaccine, he said. 'The issue is that you’re not going to be completely protected against a degree of infection that you might not even notice that you might be able to spread to others,” he said. “Which is the reason why the message you may have heard me say over the last couple weeks in the media is that getting vaccinated with a highly efficacious vaccine does not mean that you’re going to abandon completely public health measures.'" https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/11/covid-19-vaccine-trial-complete-pfizer-and-biontech-update-their-promising-result of note in the above link, the statement "Nine of the 10 people who had severe cases of COVID-19 during the trial received the placebo, which indicates that even if the vaccine fails to prevent symptomatic disease, it still offers powerful protection from serious harm." I'm also digging to find parameters of the study that laid out the trials' classifications of COVID-19+ cases to be a combination of positive PCR test results AND at least 1 or more displayed symptoms - meaning completely asymptomatic cases were not logged as COVID+ results (for both placebo and vaccine test groups)

I believe Gov Walz (MN) has recently alluded to medical staff getting vaccinated over the coming weeks, too - with Mayo Clinic headquartered here that doesn't surprise me - some of the state and hospital system leaders have to have been briefed on timing and rollout of the vaccines that are about to get some form of FDA approval for distribution, potentially as early as today based on some news reports. The first big wave of vaccinations will go to the medical professionals to help maintain a sustainable level of care in larger urban population centers and other COVID hot spots. Obviously that will help, but likely won't have much impact on viral transmission among the general public over the next few weeks and months. As vaccine manufacturing ramps up into early 2021 we'll start seeing it distributed to elderly/vulnerable populations to try and really knock the hospitalization rates down even while community virus transmission continues (hopefully at a lower and much more manageable rate than it's currently occurring). For many of us not fitting into either of those categories, it's still going to be quite some time before we would get vaccinated - which is just fine by me. Dr. Fauci has recently emphasized the fact these vaccines are intended to eliminate or at least significantly reduce the symptomatic response (i.e., "sickness") caused by COVID-19, not to eliminate SARS-CoV-2 or prevent transmission. That's at least how it should be rolled out. It'll be incredibly disappointing if we start seeing stories about pro sports league and corporate vaccination programs taking place ahead of nursing home residents and/or essential working class staff are left waiting.

Though I agree with your larger point, doesn't this have to be asterisked with a disclaimer that we don't know yet how long that immunity will last? Those that I know personally that have been infected and recovered have reported that their doctors could only provide guidance that they were likely safe from possible re-infection for 3 months. Obviously, it's very possible that it's longer than that, but that's the current guidance, apparently. Absolutely, which is why these salons still do as much cleaning/disinfecting and following other guidelines (including continued masking) as possible. Having already had the virus likely decreases an individual's immune system response with subsequent infections - so the worker in the Salon then poses a lower risk of transmitting it to customers at a viral load level that would lead to a symptomatic infection of a customer that sends them to get tested.

One other thing I'll say on this fall's spike - it's undeniable that there is an alarming increase in rates of infection and hospitalizations/deaths across states and northern hemisphere countries as fall/winter sets in. But I also think the rate of spread hasn't sharply increased as much as the daily case count numbers show. What I mean by that is testing has obviously increased as the year has progressed, and while many states are seeing a surge in % positive results even with much higher testing totals, some of that could be correlated to seeing an increase in the rate of infections with higher viral loads that basically ensure a person gets tested due to obvious symptomatic response. In looking at the data, the midwest basically went from a perceived slow burn infection rate to uncontrollable spike once the calendar turned to October - that goes for all states no matter how they were managing it. For that to happen, there had to have been steady and undetected community spread occurring during temperate summer months that wasn't showing up in the number of cases, because viral loads were consistently low enough that many people didn't realize they got infected and had no reason to get tested absent symptoms. Kind of like the same thing that probably took place in the sunbelt states in Spring before hot temps drove them indoors in AC and their caseloads skyrocketed. For most of this year, the rule of thumb has been to take the total number of confirmed cases via lab testing and multiply it by 10X - that factor tends to even out the spring timeframe when very little testing was done and now, when I think we are currently catching a higher percentage of cases as they spread. Sticking with that 10x factor for WI indicates close to 3.5 million residents have already been infected, ~2.5 million in MN. Big caveat in that these numbers are based on cumulative infections reported, at this point I'm still not clear how well each state weans out multiple positive tests for the same people (medical staff, people testing multiple times to get cleared to return working, etc). While I don't think getting infected in April prevents people from getting it again in November given the fact there's evidence pointing to COVID antibodies not staying in immune systems indefinitely, I do think we are much closer to this no longer being a novel coronavirus for people. From what I gather with limited information provided by vaccine studies to date, they're looking to determine how effective the vaccines are to limit symptomatic responses to COVID, not necessarily preventing people from being infected with coronavirus at all. Because of that, the actual number of COVID infections reported, even for their placebo groups, are actually very low in the studies because they only counted those with a positive PCR test and 1+ symptoms as a COVID infection. Basically, the goal of the vaccine is not to eradicate the coronavirus whose infection causes COVID-19, but turn COVID-19 into a common cold or less in terms of immune system response....I think that's a very important thing for the general public to understand once a vaccine starts getting distributed in terms of how soon resuming "normal" activities should start taking place. If in one year's time we reach the point where the elderly/most vulnerable people have as much medical risk getting COVID-19 as they do when getting a cold due to the combination of a vaccine and viral spread over a couple years, I'll be ecstatic.

Salons in particular are a big test of masks because there is no significant social distancing possible. That could be the case presently, however I know of many small salon owners who got COVID this spring specifically in the twin cities area. In addition to my direct 10-11 salon owners/workers that I know, they indicated the majority of friends/colleagues they knew of in their field had gotten infected in that March-June timeframe earlier this year, too. At this point, businesses like salons and other small shops that can really control how many people are inside a space and really hone in on proper disinfection/air filtration, and who already have people working in the space that have some level of built up immunity due to a prior COVID infection aren't going to be infection vectors anymore - especially when compared to various in person activities that were largely curtailed or not happening in late winter/early spring at the start of this when weather dictated most in-person activity be held indoors.

Don't be naive. This study has been completed. Do you really believe if the study showed masks are effective it wouldn't already be leaked and front page headline on NYT? If you really believe that, cool. We all know why report hasn't been released, formally or otherwise. The Danish mask study was released/printed this morning, from what I can tell...basically the parameters tell us nothing significant to current conditions because: 1 - it wasn't designed to determine masks' effectiveness of source control (i.e., how well it limits spread from infected patients) 2 - results of wearing a mask to prevent your own infection were essentially inconclusive (ranging from a 46% reduction to a 23% increase in chance of infection vs wearing no mask at all) based on the study size and the fact the study period occurred when Denmark didn't have widespread mask use by the general population. In other words, the study group was exposed in community conditions that aren't where we currently are at as a country, with closer to 90% of people consistently wearing masks when out in public. There are items in the study discussion for both "sides" to run out and cling to, but the problem is that there's sides at all. Knowing the fact COVID can spread via aerosol transmission and can sustain itself in airborne particles for several days, particularly in dry/conditioned indoor air, means that wearing a mask in high-risk indoor settings doesn't really do much to protect you from getting COVID if there is virus present in the air. However, independent from everything else it does make sense that a properly fitted mask of any material would at least limit the acuteness of spread from an infected wearer in the form of COVID-laden water droplets. The problem is that alone isn't enough to prevent transmission - particularly in indoor spaces that recirculate air to the point that even keeping 6' or 10' apart from one another has little impact. My opinion regarding masks has long been that it creates a false sense of security for too many people, and that in turn negates any benefits widespread use of them offers - just look at the case count graphs in various states and countries that are timestamped with when various mask mandates went into effect for proof of that. Mask wearing far too often replaces many of the other social distancing/hygiene measures that are proven to be effective at limiting exposure. Because of human nature and the visibility masks offer, it's end result is a "can't hurt but doesn't help" measure that provides a sense of comfort to people in public that we're at least aware of the COVID transmission risk. In short, mask wearing has a positive mental placebo effect, but doesn't provide an actual health benefit because humans aren't robots.

This type of comment is pretty common in my field, generally it is what [predominately] older residents say to officials when they refuse to comply with mandatory evacuations prior to hurricanes. "I've been though blah blah storm in the past and was just fine etc etc." I feel bad for the first responders who have to fish out their drowned bodies after the fact. I feel bad for you not understanding how far off base this analogy is to the intent of the previous post. And the whole "two years" thing comes from the fact that this has already been going on for about 8 months in the US, even a rushed vaccine won't be widely distributed until closer to 1 year's time, and the vaccine itself won't magically make COVID disappear a month after the first few hundred million doses are given across a globe with ~8billion people on it. The vaccine will reduce the voracity of widespread outbreaks across the entire population that taxes medical systems, but the most at risk people (including the elderly) will be under increased risk of medical troubles from COVID for multiple years even with a widely distributed vaccine - particularly given the fact that it's likely COVID antibodies don't stay in the immune system indefinitely for people who have already recovered or have been vaccinated initially. We can still think 3 months from now a vaccine will make COVID go away, but that's not realistic. If people are really upset at elderly individuals wanting to see their families around the holidays knowing their time here is precious, and think it makes any sort of difference with the overall virus numbers considering how many other people make horrible decisions from an infection standpoint out in public on a daily basis, I don't know what to say.

Reading between the lines with what Gute said during his presser yesterday, he's expecting a flurry of cuts in March as teams are desperate to get under the adjusted cap, and he expects the Packers to have the financial flexibility to take advantage of that buyers market. That is all but a certainty - both for 2021 and 2022....in fact it wouldn't surprise me if things stabilize COVID-wise over the next year and the NFL can actually project typical revenues starting with the 2023 season related to gameday fans, Owners/players could easily agree to have the 2022 and 2023 seasons be uncapped years to avoid teams having to cut all veterans and have them resign for peanuts to keep playing. Next year's cap is likely to dip to $175M, and 2022's cap would likely be there or even less - there's no way their current salary cap model doesn't lead to widespread cuts, which is based on constantly increasing revenues in order for teams to give players ever-increasing contracts. That model falls apart when revenue dips or even stalls for a sustained period of time, like what we are going to see with the 2020-2022 seasons.

that holding negates a ridiculous throw and catch there

Throwing downfield with the wind is completely different than throwing into it. As evidenced by that last deep throw from jax dying and preventing a td

Its not nearly as easy when a random wind gust can alter where the ball lands by 10 yards.... 1st play from scrimmage in quarter 2 and it goes to the house...gee wonder which way the wind is blowing

2nd game at home in a row with 30 mph winds drastically affecting the passing game, too.

If GB gets home field advantage for the playoffs, could they opt to play their games against their opponent on the road if the forecast is going to be windy? Not even kidding...

That off-field stuff is great and all, but aside from one year that was blessed with a crazy easy schedule, MN has been consistently terrible on the field during the Fleck era. Those type of results for player coaches lead to them making an involuntary career change. They lost a lot defensively from their team last year, and the cupboard has proven to be bare behind it this season despite plenty of time to recruit talent while it was on PJ to recruit.

That PJ Fleck contract looks better and better as a badger fan every day.

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/30308543/golden-state-warriors-submit-plan-home-game-testing-allow-50-percent-fan-capacity The fact there's an owner for a sports team in California pushing this speaks to how dire the financial situation is for professional sports if fans aren't allowed back into venues to pay for tickets and watch games live. The Warriors would be spending a TON of money for this level of testing, but they realize it's the only way to resume receiving enough revenue to project any sort of longterm viability as an organization that just built and financed a new arena that is a massive moneypit at this point. It's easy for us schlubs to just assume TV revenue alone will keep teams and leagues afloat and anywhere close to making ends meet until society deems going out in public en masse is safe. The reality is that there will be entire leagues folding and more being contracted/reorganized significantly if ticket and day of game revenues don't rebound soon. Many of these arenas/stadiums help organizations make tons of $ without playing games - concerts, festivals, conferences, and other events to name a few. If fans in the stands for games ain't happening, those other things ain't happening either and it's a black hole in organizations' budgets that was initially viewed as a cash cow for teams, particularly those who recently built/renovated facilities and leaned on that projected revenue heavily for construction financing.

I am actually somewhat miffed that the Department of Health felt the need to say, basically, "A mask is not a cure-all. It is not advised to go do a mosh pit just because you are wearing one." Are people really that stupid? Umm...yes they most certainly are. Far too many people view wearing masks as a way to be lax with many of the other social distancing measures that are much more effective - like simply staying away from other people and frequent hand washing, particularly in indoor or crammed outdoor public settings. See any number of Biden celebration rallies or Trump rallies. Stupidity/ambivalence knows no specific political or social affiliation when it comes to this. And I've yet to see any study that says masks are effective at all at preventing infection through particle contact with eyes, which would be just as big a risk in an indoor setting with recirculated air as standing 3' away from someone with covid and breathing on each other for as long as you're inside. As for the typical single layer cloth mask or neck gaiters that most people wear actually protecting them from infection due to "filtering", I just don't buy it. Even if some of the particles are filtered with the mask material, those particles are then stuck in the person's breathing zone and inches from their eyes indefinitely, with an endless supply of warm, humid air. And there are far more smaller particles that cloth fabric simply doesn't filter out. Unless a vast majority of people are changing out masks every 15 minutes while in high risk exposure environments and constantly cleaning them/themselves to remove virus-laden particles, they aren't protecting the wearer from infection. Masks can absolutely limit how far an infected person projects virus directly from their mouth/nose, but even that doesn't prevent those particles from becoming airborne and circulated in a climate controlled environment.

In the absolute worst case scenario one could use a camping/picnic cooler and make a trip to Walmart every 2-3 days to pick up $30 worth of dry ice and easily maintain -80C. Someone at Omaha Steaks just had a great idea for an item that takes up limited cooler space but really completes their holiday meat basket package...Family Veal and Vaccs at your door!

I think 13-3 is where they wind up, with the #1 NFC seed - not concerned about those 2 Bears games because they are terrible offensively, particularly in the run game. The Tennessee and Colts games look like their toughest tests, and I see them dropping one of those games - or finding a way to win both and instead lose a game that on paper they should have no business doing so. Homefield advantage's biggest boost for this Packers squad isn't playing in Lambeau in January...it's just having to win one fewer game to reach the Super Bowl in a wide open conference.

Pump the brakes there, recency bias. Green was a near-2000 yard rusher, a legit passing option, and could take a broken play 4 yards behind the line of scrimmage and break a 20-yard run. He could also carry 3 guys on his back. Very different runners, and Jones is a really good player, but don't think he's on the level Green was, at least not in 2003. That near 2000 yard season was Green's 5th on 355 carries. Jones is currently on season 4 and has a career total of 525 carries coming in to this game. It's an eye test opinion, Jones can block, run, and route run and catch. I think he could surpass Green if given an equal number of opportunities in a healthy 16game played season...I'll go 15 because Green had his respiratory issues. I don't think Jones would have a prayer of staying healthy over 16 games if he was used as much as Green was - and I'd be irate if he got that many touches...not a slight on Jones, they're just different players that you can get the best from them using in different schemes. Green did most of his running damage from power running sets and formations, and Jones is ideal in this modern spread/misdirection style of offense.

Pump the brakes there, recency bias. Green was a near-2000 yard rusher, a legit passing option, and could take a broken play 4 yards behind the line of scrimmage and break a 20-yard run. He could also carry 3 guys on his back. Very different runners, and Jones is a really good player, but don't think he's on the level Green was, at least not in 2003. Ahman Green was an absolute monster for 3 seasons - his only drawback was early season fumbling issues due to sweating on those arm sleeves he wore. Guy to take it to the house any play and was a physical runner to boot. Jones is a better, more athletic pass catcher, but Green was no slouch in that department playing in his era.

Hoping Tyler Ervin doesn't get destroyed to end this game because GB doesn't have other options to help burn the clock running the ball

Yeah so injuries/COVID/super bowl hangover/free agent losses have firmly put the 49ers in NFL hell moving forward. They went from the deepest and most talented roster in the NFC to a team playing out the string in early November. Their salary cap situation gets worse and their roster gets thinner heading into next season, too. The other main reason they won't just bounce back once they're existing roster gets healthy is Jimmy G is not the answer at quarterback for that team. That's the NFL - this board stresses all offseason about find a way to have a better chance at beating the 49ers, and now they're going to be lucky to finish the year 8-8. I think at the start of this year, if we were all told the packers would be 6-2 after their first 8 games, we'd pretty much all take it. Looking at the rest of their schedule, the Seahawks are going to have a tough time staying in front of them for the #1 seed. And I'm saying this while also acknowledging this Packers team has obvious weaknesses and after watching them lose a winnable game against Dalvin Cook (not the Vikings, just Dalvin Cook) and have a horrid 2nd quarter lead to their doors getting blown off in Tampa Bay.