Miami's Manny Diaz preaches personal responsibility for college football 'bubbles'

For a wide variety of reasons, college football teams cannot place players and other personnel inside completely isolated hubs similar to scenarios embraced by the National Women's Soccer League, Major League Soccer, the NHL and NBA for return-to-play scenarios this summer. 

Miami Hurricanes coach Manny Diaz nevertheless believes his players can live and exist in "bubble" formats. 

Diaz explained his thinking while speaking with ESPN: 

"There are people you've chosen to allow to get within 6 feet of you — whether that's at work at ESPN or when you go home or when you go to the grocery store. We all have a bubble, and that bubble is who we allow in close contact with us without a mask. Now, certainly, we can think of the NBA bubble or going to Orlando and being completely isolated — we can't do that. But we can determine who we allow into close contact with us, and for how long we allow them to be in close contact."

As noted by the Worldwide Leader, Miami athletes haven't produced a single positive coronavirus case over the last three testing rounds. Diaz said of his players' overall good behavior:

"We always tell our guys, we're only as good as our next test. We've had a good run now of negative tests, but it doesn't matter. It takes one decision — it might be one member of the team — and we've gotta keep coronavirus out of this building. You cannot catch coronavirus playing football, but you can catch it outside of this building and bring it into the building."

The data support Diaz's comments. A Rutgers coronavirus outbreak that caused at least 30 football players to test positive for the virus was linked with an on-campus party attended by members of the program. 

Meanwhile, MLB and the MLB Players Association confirmed on Friday that no team other than the St. Louis Cardinals was responsible for a positive COVID-19 test over the past week. That update indicates that baseball players living at home and traveling around the country for in-market games are, for the most part, following health and safety guidelines for avoiding situations where they could be exposed to the virus.