Like everything else in the era of coronavirus, your next to a professional Bay Area stadium or arena will be very different.
Forget the heel. Forbidden.
Your ticket, registered on a smartphone, may involve the exact time you can enter, but no less than two hours before the first launch, play, opening diagnosis, or kick-off. Your temperature will be checked before finally passing. through a new steel detector that does not require emptying pockets, which speeds up the process.
Once inside, take the seat assigned to you. Don’t worry about looking to disperse or locate your friends. Seats adjacent to your organization can be twisted. Don’t bring money for food, just cards, and you’ll find it. Alcohol sales are interrupted in the middle of the game to prevent enthusiasts from being sprayed and forgetting safety protocols.
With coronavirus cases reaching unprecedented levels, schools closed, new curfews designed to stop spreading, vacation rules that told students to stay home on Thanksgiving, and even a new Santa Clara County executive order on Saturday that prohibits professional sports until at least December 21. giants, athletics, warriors, sharks, 49ers or earthquakes are far away.
However, the groups have been reflecting and talking with local and state officials for months. Talks continue even in the darkest hours of the pandemic on the optimism that once spring rolls around, the weather warms up and vaccines are distributed, coronavirus cases will decline enough to allow enthusiasts to stand up – with modifications.
The previously indexed settings are theoretical. They are implemented in the stadiums of the smaller states that have begun to allow followers. Seventeen NFL groups and many schools across the country play in front of low-capacity payers. This has happened in California since the governor. Gavin Newsom declared an emergency for the first time in March.
The Giants are scheduled to play their first game at Oracle Park on March 30, an exhibition opposite that of the Athletics, and a club official expects some enthusiasts to attend.
“I hope that next spring, things will be much better than they are today,” said Alfonso Felder, executive vice president of the Giants administration. “We’ve noticed how the specific Bay Area has been to respond to times of crisis and get to a bigger place.
“The one in yellow in terms of level formula is promising. I hope we’ll be back soon. “
According to state guidelines, professional groups may have enthusiasts at 25% of their capacity in sites with security settings if their communities are within two least restrictive degrees for opening, yellow or orange, as long as local officials agree.
The Warriors recently learned that the city of San Francisco would be a rubber stamp. They have devised a comprehensive and costly plan to allow 50% capacity at the Chase Center, some 9,000 fans, when the NBA season resumes next month. pass the coronavirus tests before entering.
The San Francisco Department of Health said no, he told the Warriors he would work with them to authorize 25% of their capatown if the city returned to the least restrictive yellow level. On Saturday, San Francisco moved to the maximum restrictive purple level.
The capacity of 25% turns out to be a magic number for California fitness officers to ensure a smart distance, which would mean about 10,000 enthusiasts for giants and A games, 17,000 for the 49ers and 4,500 for warriors, Sharks and San Jose Earthquakes. Team.
Athletics can gain advantages from gambling in a giant stadium that would make the distance that Oracle Park, which has narrow corridors.
The A’s say initial planning has begun, examining the front and exit, distance, how food and beverages will be sold, and land cleaning. Like giants, As cannot settle for details until they are told which state and county the government is able to apply for and authorize.
The ban on transitional sports in Santa Clara County announced Saturday is expected to have little effect on enthusiasts attending the 49ers, Sharks and Earthquakes games, as they would not be allowed anyway until the virus is released. eliminated, probably this spring for the Sharks and next season for the 49ers and earthquakes.
In Florida, whose governor disapproves of the coronavirus restrictions, the NFL’s Miami Dolphins allow another 13,000 people to attend games at 65,000-seat Hard Rock Stadium, or about 20% of seats.
“We were convinced that we could bring other people here safely, in a remote environment, where they respect each other, wear their mask and enjoy a football game,” Dolphins CEO Tom Garfinkel said in a video the team sent to The Chronicle. . The video filmed before the start of the season in September.
In October, after banning enthusiasts during a truncated 60-game season, regardless of national and local laws, Major League Baseball experienced promoting 11,500 tickets to the Rangers’ new baseball stadium in Arlington, Texas, for 14 postseason games in a neutral location.
Thirteen played, seven in the National League Championship Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Atlanta Braves, and six in the World Series between the Dodgers and Tampa Bay Rays.
MLB called the experiment a success, with no evidence of a coronavirus outbreak related to the 40,000-seat Globe Life Field games. Commissioner Rob Manfred said he hopes fans can return to the ballparks this spring.
“We intend to allow clubs to operate in accordance with public fitness orders and current market actions in relation to stadium enthusiasts,” the league said in a statement sent to The Chronicle. the evolution of the pandemic required it. “
One challenge that groups have to solve is the habit of the association, the love is designed to wear mask and keep distance, which groups will have to respect, even with reduced capacity is not easy.
At the November 22 NFL game in Indianapolis between the Colts and the Green Bay Packers, audiences across the country saw a Colt score a landing and be assaulted by enthusiasts, some dressed in masks, others, as he jumped to the front row of seats to celebrate.
Fans without masks were also visual playoffs of the Texas MLB.
A fan who attended a game there, Todd Garton, saw enthusiasts avoid the mask but said they were a minority. Garón runs a pizza chain in the Dallas area and bought tickets for the 14 games imaginable. He gave the maximum but attended one and said the organizers did a smart job.
“I think the seats were very well distributed,” Garton said. “A lot of that alone among the little crowd. Even in the lobby, you were never around anyone. I never meant, “Hello, boys, lárgate. de me. ” I never felt uncomfortable. “
The MLB did not sell any seats within 20 feet of the field, a shock absorber to protect players tested for coronavirus from enthusiasts who weren’t.
The seats were staggered to separate the spectators and make sure they didn’t have to go through other equipment to get in and out. In a row, two teams of enthusiasts were sitting in each hallway. In the last row, only one. The organization allowed and had to sit in the middle of the section. The trend was repeated for each row verse.
In luxury suites, a profit engine for franchises, capacity has been reduced while the same old food and beverage buffets have been replaced by waiters.
The Rangers, who organized the event, would expand their protocols after organizing various school diplomas and football matches at Globe Life Field over the summer.
In this sense, Bay Area organizations gain advantages from being among the last to welcome fans. Felder, the leader of the Giants, said his organization was largely tracking what works and what doesn’t in venues that lately allow spectators.
“We need to take the most productive practices from other positions and create the safest environment imaginable for fans,” he said. “I think it’s going to be a big plus. “
One challenge will be that 10,000 enthusiasts can buy tickets at a capacity of 25%. The Giants’ seasonal ticket base is more than double. In Miami, Dolphins sell tickets according to seniority based on the length of time seats are removed through enthusiasts.
The call will be there. Even the summer coronavirus outbreak, many Bay Area enthusiasts on social media expressed a willingness to return to Oracle Park, Levi’s Stadium and Chase Center.
They may have simply felt like Garton, the Texas fan who attended a baseball playoff game in October.
“I’m an unconditional sports fan,” he said. I haven’t been playing sports at night since March killed me. I’m so excited to move on to that game. He answered everything he expected. .
Henry Schulman covers the giants for The San Francisco Chronicle. Email: hschulman@sfchronicle. com Twitter: @hankschulman
Henry Schulman has covered the San Francisco Giants since 1988, starting with the Oakland Tribune and the San Francisco Examiner before joining the San Francisco Chronicle in 1998. Su race spanned the World Series of Earthquakes in 1989 and the 3 Giant Championships. In 2010, 2012 and 2014, he covered Barry Bonds’ debatable career with the Giants, adding Bonds’ quest for success for home run records and his position in the drug scandal that improves baseball’s performance. talking about Giants, and it’s a popular follow-up on Twitter.