Literature Review Background
The impact of COVID19 on the world’s health remains one of the essential limitations for numerous industries and organizations across the globe. All the industries suffered from the quick breakdown that forced them into a seriously altered ecosystem that no longer allowed them interpersonal contact and isolated the majority of actors (Parnell et al., 2020). The sports industry became not an exception to the general rules, significantly affecting how athletes and organizations interacted over time. Many professional organizations related to sports voted for postponing or canceling certain matches or even the whole season because of the threats related to human health (Cianfrone & Kellison, 2020). Not only this was one of the contributors to the follow-up governmental disruption, but it also established a completely new network for the online sports translations that are expected to be supported even after the COVID19-related quarantine would be over. These vivid modifications serve as a hint at the fact that modifications and cancellations should be perceived by the organizations, their sponsors, and broadcasters as additional opportunities for improvement.
The research problem touched upon within the framework of the current literature review relates to the questions that had arisen when COVID19 had been deemed to stay with the human population for a longer period than expected. In other words, the concepts of operational disruptions and fan expectation management should be addressed simultaneously, as there has to be a plan for future activities, especially in the case where the COVID19 scenario could reiterate unexpectedly. Therefore, the researcher is looking into the short- and long-term implications of the pandemic to provide the intended audience with enough insight into why the sports industry could be influenced by major influences similar to COVID19 in the future. The problem here is also that numerous sports organizations have not learned yet how they could survive suspensions without serious losses and engage fans in online activities while also meeting their expectations. This is eventually important because there is no certain evidence regarding the time that it is going to take the world to overcome the impact of the pandemic, meaning that the sports industry representatives would have to find and evaluate new opportunities and threats related to COVID19.
Accordingly, the rationale for the current literature review is that multiple challenges are affecting the sports industry to an extent where fan engagement and facility attendance are dropping irreversibly. This literature review is expected to address the sports industry as an important income venue for numerous countries all over the world and establish the research questions that could be answered with the help of quantitative data collection in the future. The upcoming sections of the literature review disentangle the specific impact of COVID19 on the sports organizations, athletes, and fans across the globe while also taking into consideration the potential of restoring sporting tourism linked to the Olympics. From the point of view of the sports industry, these findings would be essential because of the increased level of resilience and a critical analysis of the existing solutions that come with unique advantages and disadvantages. The peaking influence of the pandemic was the main reason for postponements and cancellations, and the current literature review provides an in-depth review of the challenges associated with it across the globe.
Literature Review Contents
During the 2020 pandemic sports were canceled and remained without a season months later. Consumers of the game like to discuss and interact with each other every season about who has the best team or which players will be MVP candidates in comparison to many other sports the focus is mainly on basketball and baseball as these two sports played the rest of their season with empty stadiums. Moreover, this topic is to find the similarities these two sports had during each of their seasons, also to find the differences between sports and their fans during the 2020 season.
Baseball Fans
Having a fanatic seating in the stadium enjoying the game is one of the most precious things that a true fan can ask for and based on the article “Talking baseball when there is no baseball” mentions how fans love the game and talk about the sport like they would talk about a closed friend or family member, despite the cancelation of the 2020 season many fans still take part in the conversation of the game and interact with the each other online. For instance, baseball fans run a social network called “Reddit” a group that focuses on a particular conversation where fans can discuss the game during the pandemic unlike the team’s official Facebook or Twitter page which is managed by team employees.
A quick look at the data set of subreddit posts would reveal seeming randomness, as the topics jump from pandemic-related ticket refunds to a discussion about a 2015 World Series game to posts about finding a box of old baseball cards in the back of a closet. For the most part, real consumers of the game buy tickets for an entire season, but will they receive a refund? Luckily, they do! Fans who have been canceled games due to the pandemic will get their money back or pass on their tickets to the following year as a baseball-only will be playing 60 games overall (not including postseason games) baseball allowed more than 11,000 fans to come into the stadiums for postseason games but all should follow protocol and keep social distance and wear masks while remaining in the stadiums to watch the game.
Fan engagement plays a big role in sporting events, they are a good reason why many players build their success and because of that playing in empty stadiums during the pandemic can also negatively affect many players. But, not all players are motivated by the fans, other players are driven by the adrenaline of the game and excitement, some players perform better than others. Based on the 2020 basketball season Miami Heat top prospect Tyler Hero started the season averaging less than 20 points per game, moving forward as the season progressed basketball season was shut down due to COVID-19 and continued their season in Walt Disney World, Orlando created by the NBA to protect its players from covid-19 pandemic during the final games of the season.
Despite baseball’s absence, articles on the sport continue to be written, and fans continue to engage online with one another. For example, star players like Mike Trout and Bryce Harper were prominently positioned, due to the large contracts both players signed that year.
The article “Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and sports and exercise” talks about the relationship between immunity and sports focusing on whether or not the pandemic will have a major impact on sporting events in comparison to all other sports baseball took a major hit canceling spring training and half of their season as well. But, regarding the topic of infection control during a global pandemic, its focus is not whether this virus hampers athletic performance; but lies in the assessment of the risk of a player getting infected if they participate in sports and measure on how to reduce the rate/risk of transmission. These factors led athletes to modify their exercise programs and train at home, most of which are not supervised by medical staff or coaches.
College Sports
The NCAA is the National Collegiate Athletic Association which manages all sporting events to help student-athletes to compete annually in college sports. The NCAA is categorized into three competitive divisions: Division I, Division II, and Division III. The article “The Impact of the Coronavirus Pandemic on a Major Event Legacy” explains how, after the cancellation of the Final Four, the NCAA conducted informal interviews with five key stakeholders from the NCAA and ABHC. The empirical material collected from these individuals represents the knowledge and awareness of several high-ranking officials who were directly involved in the planning of the Final Four in Atlanta.
To be sure, many other studies have been undertaken by scholars to both conceptualize and explicate, including several additional edited anthologies and journal special issues.
In comparison to professional sports, the NCAA also takes care of its student-athletes However, some rules must be followed before even starting team practices because, in comparison to professional athletes players aren’t allowed to leave hotel rooms or go home, they remain together and avoid physical contact with the outside world.
Effects of covid-19
During the COVID-19 pandemic, in most countries, supermarkets have remained open, but many other shops, restaurants, bars, music theaters, and indoor sports centers have been closed. As part of a COVID-19lock-down exit strategy, many government authorities are allowing a gradual re-opening, where sometimes indoor sports centers are last in line to be permitted to re-open. This technical note discusses the challenges in re-opening these facilities and the measures already suggested by others to partly tackle these challenges. It also elaborates three additional measures and based on the implementation of some of these additional measures, it suggests the concept of a certificate of equivalence that could allow indoor sports centers with such a certificate to re-open safely and more rapidly. Moreover, this also attempts to stimulate increased preparedness of indoor sports centers that should allow them to remain open safely during potential next waves of this virus as well as future pandemics. The situation of the Netherlands is taken, but similar situations are undoubtedly present in many countries around the world. Given the urgency of the situation and the historical lack of research on infectious diseases and sports, it attempts to provide a first overview of challenges, current measures, and additional measures supplemented with a potential practical framework. In addition the article “ Rebooting Content: Broadcasting sport and esports to homes during COVID-19” talks about The more immediate physical restrictions consumers experienced as a result of the pandemic created opportunities to use different types of sport media broadcasts to maintain relationships between sports and their fans. the more immediate physical restrictions consumers experienced as a result of the pandemic created opportunities to use different types of sport media broadcasts to maintain relationships between sports and their fans. The process of mediatization within the sports industry has accelerated, has been seen as a symbiotic relationship, and has recently been discussed in the context of a sports media content economy and “Sport/media complex”. Most recently, (Finn) investigated the relationship between media, motorsport, and society, and demonstrated how esports and new media have the potential to change the relationship between sport and its fans. Esports is defined as “a form of sports where the primary aspects of the sport are facilitated by electronic systems; the input of players and teams, as well as the output of the esports system, are mediated by human-computer interfaces.” This article differs from any other article because it is showing how the fans have kept themselves connected and busy throughout the pandemic. Previous research has called for the further examination of sports media content during off-season periods when building relationships with fans may be more difficult but when these periods provide an important opportunity for engagement activities. The socially restrictive response to the COVID-19 pandemic provides a unique opportunity to study how media and sports organizations adapted to the suspension of scheduled leagues and events in the United States. Although mediatization provides a theoretical framework for understanding the interrelationship between sports media and society, previous research has not examined the nature of this interrelationship during an extended period of almost no live sports broadcasts.
To conclude the pandemic was a global phenomenon that took over the world and shut down all sporting events, it closed down many jobs, many countries closed their international airports to stop the virus from spreading. To follow up with sports in which they were on hold for more than a month until it was a good time to come back and play but in empty stadiums with no fans in them. Consumers of the game were also affected by this as they couldn’t attend any games at all, baseball is by far the only sport that has allowed fans into the stadiums for postseason games only with limited seats available. I believe this topic is needed because it’s an event that took place very recently, and people need to know about it.
North American Leagues during COVID19
In their article, Ehrlich et al. (2020) suggested that the outbreak of the pandemic and the further suspension of North American leagues such as the NHL, NCAA, NBA, and NFL might have a devastating impact on the future of American sports. The idea that they shared revolved around the lack of professional practice and meaningful interactions that would ultimately lead to the reduction of the fan base (Ehrlich et al., 2020; Miles & Shipway, 2020). The estimations covered by the authors of this article are also in line with the claims from Ludvigsen and Hayton’s (2020) article, where it is stated that the losses inflicted by the pandemic would not be restored within the next several years. An estimated loss for the North American sports industry would be somewhere near 7 billion dollars, making it one of the costliest breakdowns in the history of North American sports in general (Ehrlich et al., 2020). The findings presented by these two authors suggest that further restrictions might make it harder for sports organizations to explore alternative solutions.
Sociological Implications of COVID19 for Sports Industry
In the article written by Evans et al. (2020), the sociological implications of COVID19 are reviewed. Despite the uncertainty created by the pandemic, they suggest that there may be several alternative perspectives on how organizations could meet fan expectations while also protecting their income level from a substantial decrease. This claim can also be met in Blocken et al. (2020), where the authors state that sports survival would not be achieved within an environment full of unfair competition and inappropriate pay rates. The need to conduct more sociological research is evident if sports organizations expect to prevent future unexpected incidents from affecting humanity to an immeasurable extent (Goldman & Hedlund, 2020; Maugeri et al., 2020). The growing impact of inequalities caused by the pandemic cannot be overlooked as well because it encapsulates the inherent meaning of the pandemic and leaves numerous athletes suffering from depression and anxiety due to the inability to contribute to their vocation and also respond to the fan demand.
Conclusion
Based on the findings from the current literature review, it may be concluded that the sports industry is most likely to remain affected by financial distress for quite some time. Despite the pandemic slowly fading into the void, the majority of sports events are still being postponed and canceled due to the covert threats associated with COVID19, averting many sports organizations from meeting the expectations of their fans. This is an important finding because it contributes to the idea that practically everyone involved in the sports industry is going to remain affected by the pandemic for an unknown amount of time. Many athletes are either losing their payments completely or receiving significant cuts because of COVID19 and the lack of sporting activity while sponsors are continuously looking forward to recovering their losses in a meaningful way.
Practically every sports league from all over the world had to slow down its operations to prevent the pandemic from spreading further, with even the 2020 Olympics being postponed. As of now, the literature does not propose any significant alternatives to the conventional sports leagues except for the online broadcasting intended to meet the fan expectations at least to a certain extent. The most important finding from the current literature review is that the sports industry should continuously research their alternative options to improve their readiness for future adverse events that could be either similar or even worse than the COVID19.
References
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