GAME
OVER Shutdowns from the COVID-19 pandemic have impacted nearly everyone in the sports world.
For Pam Chvotkin, the month of March means one thing: sports. It’s when the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball championships begin. Opening Day for baseball nears, and the playoff pictures for the NBA and NHL start to get clearer. A significant sports event is on TV almost every day. As an independent contractor working in sports television production, this time of year is typically Chvotkin’s busiest. Entering the month, she had booked her work schedule through August, including work as a production coordinator at the Final Four with CBS Sports Network and booth coordinator for ESPN’s Sunday night MLB games beginning next month. But by the time Chvotkin returned to D.C. from New York on March 13 after attending the Big East men’s basketball tournament, nothing would be the same. Not this year. Precautions taken due to the global COVID-19 pandemic have halted sporting events. The NCAA canceled its winter and spring championships, including basketball’s March Madness. The NBA is on indefinite hiatus with plans to re-evaluate next month, while the NHL hit pause. MLB pushed the start of its season back by at least eight weeks. Major League Soccer suspended its season for 30 days, and the National Women’s Soccer League canceled its preseason matches. Even the Summer Olympics in Tokyo are in jeopardy of being postponed. Chvotkin can be staring at weeks, if not potentially months, without a job. “Basically, no games, no paycheck,” Chvotkin says. “No events, no paycheck.” The sports shutdown has impacted nearly everyone in the industry, from freelance sports media members to part-time arena workers to professional tennis players who rely on prize money for income to college seniors who had their season abruptly ended. It’s forced fans to search for a way to fill the void of sports and reflect on the therapeutic role it can play. Social
Pablo Maurer
BY Kelyn Soong
leagues, recreational sports events, and local road races like the Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run have also been canceled. “Some people are scared,” Chvotkin says. “Nobody knows what the future holds.” the news didn’t come as a complete shock to Dashawn, a 21-year-old Greenbelt resident who works for the Washington Wizards’ ingame entertainment team. He had been following the news and figured the NBA might postpone or cancel its season. For the past two years, Dashawn, who asked to only be identified by his first name, has worked at every Wizards home game, in addition to several team-related events. He helps hype up the crowd by throwing T-shirts into the stands and providing an energetic presence on the court during breaks in play at Capital One Arena. Dashawn estimates that the gig provided about half his income. He also works at Buffalo Wild Wings in Navy Yard, and the cancelation of the rest of the NBA season and the temporary closure of restaurants in D.C. mean he’ll need to find other part-time jobs. “Gotta roll with the punches,” he says. Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE) and its chief executive, Ted Leonsis, owner of the Wizards, Capitals, Mystics, and Capital City Go-Go franchises, will pay the part-time employees who were scheduled to work events—15 at Capital One Arena and three at the Entertainment and Sports Arena—canceled in March. The part-time staff in-
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cludes ushers, ticket takers, events staff, and operations staff. Their work schedule is determined on the 20th of every month for the following month, and no schedule has been set for April or beyond. If the games or concerts are rescheduled, the workers would be paid again for those events. “It helps out a lot, but I’m still gonna look for other jobs just as a precaution,” Dashawn says. Scott Choinski has been eagerly anticipating the start of the baseball season. For the past three years, he’s worked at Nationals Park selling 50-50 raffle tickets. He’s gotten to know regular customers and enjoys the camaraderie with his part-time colleagues. He does the same job for the Wizards and the Washington NFL team. More recently, he picked up shifts with D.C. United and the DC Defenders of the XFL at Audi Field as an usher and ticket scanner. All together, the stadium jobs make up about 25 percent of Choinski’s income. Last year, he started working full time for FedEx in the quality assurance department. He uses the money made from the part-time shifts at sports games to help pay his bills. “If I was only working part-time at FedEx like last year, I’d be hurting,” he says. “The true effects of not working the games probably won’t hit me for another two to three weeks ... but it will.” on marCh 8, the Indian Wells Masters tennis tournament became one of the first major sporting events to be canceled due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Four days later, the Miami Open followed suit, meaning professional tennis players would be without two of the biggest tournaments of the year. That same day, the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) announced it would suspend the men’s professional tour for six weeks. The International Tennis Federation (ITF), which runs the Davis Cup and Fed Cup, postponed its events until June 8, and the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) suspended its tour through May 2. The French Open, originally scheduled to run from May 24 to June 7, will now take place from Sept. 20 to Oct. 4. For the first few days after leaving Indian Wells, California, Denis Kudla struggled to find purpose in practice. He was set to play in the tournament’s qualifying rounds when he saw the news. “It felt difficult,” Kudla says. “I was constantly on my phone, looking for next options. It was weird. Trying to reset and get back to being present, but at the same time, in the back of my mind, knowing I have time to improve, take off, get the body right, asking myself, ‘How am I going to approach all this?’” Tennis is different from team sports in that professional players don’t make a base salary. Most players earn their income through prize money, and no matches can mean no income. Kudla, who splits his time between Tampa, Florida, and Arlington and is currently ranked No. 111 in the world, knows he’s in a better position than most. In addition to accruing $2,995,987 in prize money over the course of 10 years