DENVER — For obvious reasons, 2020 isn’t turning out the way anyone planned. More than 100 days have passed since the last major-league team sporting event in the United States or Canada. Even the events that have taken place have scarcely resembled their form in a pre-pandemic world.
The events celebrating of the 2020 Pro Football Hall of Fame class in Canton, Ohio would be no different. Had the ceremonies for Steve Atwater and his fellow inductees gone forward, some crucial people would have been unable to take part.
Starting with Atwater’s father.
“If we would have had it — my dad, I doubt very seriously [that] he would have come,” he said Thursday afternoon in the wake of the Hall’s decision to postpone the induction of the 2020 class to August 7, 2021.
Atwater described the move as “the smart thing to do.”
But Steve’s father is far from the only person who would have been unable to celebrate had the proceedings gone ahead.
“I’ve always felt like the Pro Football Hall of Fame would do what’s best for the most people involved,” he said. “They have a lot of workers there, a lot of volunteers and a lot of the Hall of Famers who are older — I’m in that category too [and] there are some guys that are older than me — and I just don’t think that they would show up with the risk being so high of them catching COVID.”
Pro Football Hall of Fame president David Baker gave Atwater and his fellow 2020 inductees the news Thursday morning.
“I know the last time we had spoken a few months ago, he told me that there were five or six different contingency plans, ranging from moving it back to September, to later in the season, to doing a Zoom call, to doing it in the spring, all the way up to next [August],” Atwater explained.
Delaying it a few weeks or months might have left the Hall facing the same pandemic-caused problems that scuttled the scheduled August ceremonies. Holding it via Zoom is not worthy of such a momentous occasion — at least not for something without a firm deadline.
The NFL Draft needed to happen via video conference because the process of preparing for a season continued even through the weeks of shelter-in-place guidelines. But the Hall has the luxury of waiting until the ceremonies can be conducted in a manner befitting the accomplishments of the honorees.
“I think they made the right choice,” Atwater said.
As the months passed and the protocols for pro sports’ return involved metaphorical bubbles, events without fans and the potential for games in the fall played in stadiums with sharply reduced capacities, Atwater knew that postponement was a likelihood.
Still, he had to prepare as though the show would go on in some fashion. Thus, his speech is nearly complete.
“We really had to plan as though it was going to happen,” he said. “I kind of had a feeling that this would happen, but I didn’t know. I got done with my speech pretty early in the game. We had a professional speechwriter that helped me and my wife go through and get it together, so that’s been 95 percent done.
“With everything that’s gone on, I’m sure in another year, I’ll probably make some tweaks to it, but I’m glad that I have the basic outline of it together.”
Perhaps the most difficult aspect of piecing together his speech was the time limitations. Atwater indicated that the days of speeches that consume 25 or 30 minutes are over — in part to try and ensure that the ceremony doesn’t stretch beyond four hours deep into the night, as it has in recent years.
“I know in past years, many people when they got up to speak, they could speak for as long as they wanted,” he said. “They’re trying to make sure that we had our speeches at 10 minutes, tops, and that’s with everything included!”
Undoubtedly, Atwater will make that 10 minutes count, and it will be worth the wait — even though now it will be another year before he can slip on the gold jacket that will define his legacy and immortality in the sport.
Atwater also shared some more thoughts regarding the NFL and life during the pandemic.
SHOULD THE NFL PLAY?
As a veteran of 11 seasons as a player, Atwater has concerns about whether the NFL should play this season.
“To be honest with you, I don’t know that I would feel safe, because there are still quite a few medical specialists who are telling us that the coast isn’t clear. It’s still quite dangerous to do it,” he said.
“Knowing that I come into contact with a lot of other people, I certainly wouldn’t want to spread it to someone else. That would be my biggest concern — me getting it and not knowing that I had it and spreading it to someone else and then finding out later that you played a part in someone else not being here. For me, that’s the big deal.
“I know a lot of people — I don’t want to say that they don’t care about other people’s lives, but they don’t think that this coronavirus is as serious. I know a lot of people are saying that, ‘Hey, this only affects older people with pre-existing conditions,’ and that is the case for a majority of the cases, but there are some cases with youngsters. I know some 35- and 40-year-olds that have had it and have passed away from it. I just wouldn’t want anybody [with whom] I come into contact to be one of those statistics.”
HOW HE’S BEEN KEEPING BUSY DURING THE PANDEMIC:
Few people are more naturally positive than Atwater, who is a firm believer in finding ways to extract personal growth from the most challenging of circumstances.
“I’ve been exercising regularly and trying to be consistent and trying to stay in a positive state of mind. I believe that during rough times, if you’re not mentally strong, you can go crazy,” he said.
“I felt like I was going through that in the beginning, man! I just happened to be at home so much and wasn’t around all my friends and people who I’m used to seeing on a regular basis. I kind of had to get into my little groove here and just work on being better when this is all over, and I think I’m doing that.”
