Ohio State Players and Parents Asked to Sign 'Buckeye Pledge' Coronavirus Waiver

SI's Pat Forde shares more on the 'Buckeye Pledge'

Student athletes at Ohio State University were asked to sign 'The Buckeye Pledge' which waives the university from any responsibility if one of its players tests positive for coronavirus. SI's Pat Forde shares more on 'The Buckeye Pledge' and how colleges will be going about bringing athletes back to campus.

Video Transcript:

Players are starting to come back to campus for college football practice, one thing that came out the last couple of days is that Ohio State's players and their parents were asked to sign a basically a coronavirus risk waiver. It was called the Buckeye Pledge, but it was basically a waiver saying that they will not intend to sue the university if any of them come down with the virus. It's an interesting document there. My question, I wonder whether any of the coaches or administrators are signing the same pledge? It seems like what's good for the student athletes could also be good for the coaches. Basically, what Ohio State's trying to do here is to get everyone to agree to a series of behavior restraints, so to speak, and try to be careful and be safe and healthy in terms of social distancing, wearing protective equipment, that sort of thing, when they're away from the football facility. 

[With] college kids, it's not always going to be that easy to do. But the question this all goes back to is, you know, is it OK to have the unpaid labor come in and take the risk of being on campus to be part of a team? We know that young athletes of that age group and demographic probably not likely to be seriously ill if they do contract the virus. And we have seen several players at several places test positive once they've returned to campus. But still there is some risk involved. And it's interesting, Ohio State and certainly other programs, but we haven't really heard all about asking players to accept some of the responsibility if something should go wrong from a pandemic standpoint.