‘Hard Knocks’ COVID Edition Is Must-Watch TV
HBO's NFL docuseries Hard Knocks is back, and different than ever before.
Not only is the show following the training camps of two teams for the first time ever, but there's also the entire COVID-19 of it all.
The premiere episode is riveting television. It might make you confident about the NFL's future, but also let you see just how uphill battle the season is going to be.
HBO's documentary series Hard Knocks has become a ritualistic part of every NFL season. Not long after players start showing up for training camp, fans thirsty for a taste of the season around the country would get a glimpse inside one specific team's process, be it Rex Ryan's brash New York Jets in 2010 or Jon Gruden's Oakland Raiders in 2019. It's a rare chance to see how the NFL's sausage is made—and with the COVID-19 pandemic impacting just about everything this year, 2020's sausage is being made significantly differently. And the resulting TV is compelling.
Even aside from anything coronavirus-related, Hard Knocks changed things up in 2020, heading to Los Angeles and embedding camera crews with both the Chargers and the Rams. The opening episode of the team was light on the actual football, and heavy on seeing how these two teams and all of their personnel—players, coaches, staffers—are adjusting to the reality of dealing with what will be a different season than ever even attempted before.
From the episodes' opening segment, when Chargers head coach Anthony Lynn revealed to his team (via Zoom) that anyone could contract COVID because he contracted COVID, it was clear that this season of Hard Knocks was going to give viewers an inside look at something really interesting and pertinent.
Some parts of the episode looked like past seasons—team meetings, for example. But these meetings had slight ripples that made moments seem like a Black Mirror or Twilight Zone riff on a past Hard Knocks season. Whether this was Lynn cutting one of his players in his office, to his face, with both men behind their masks, or Rams head coach Sean McVay opting to wear a transparent face shield in front of his face rather than a mask, the Hard Knocks spirit of past was fully intact, but just ever-so-slightly warped.
Throughout the hour-long episode, viewers saw the precautions that were already put in place; McVay and the Rams staff built an entire facility and weight room outside. Players had their temperatures checked when entering just about every room, and in their car before even getting out.
The most intriguing part of the episode, though, came in a montage that lasted nearly four minutes of Chargers players getting their COVID tests; the juxtaposition of seeing even these big, physically intimidating guys who are going and bashing other guys on the gridiron for a living being nervous about a cotton swab going up their nose made for some really great television.
One of the Chargers' best players, cornerback Casey Hayward Jr., was particularly squeamish about getting his nostrils swabbed, and the crew stayed with him for a lengthier period of time. Heyward's nerves are representative, somewhat, of the whole situation. Doing what they've got to do to try this thing out—even if it's not exactly pleasant. "Shit." Hayward says when the swab is in his nostril, just before it concludes. "That wasn't the worst one I've had."
Hard Knocks did a great job in the episode showing that while strong protocols are being put in place and people are going to be expected to be responsible, the players are still having fun—the hour ends with players joking about a mystery patron using the portapotty for a bowel movement.
A criticism of Hard Knocks can frequently be that from season to season, the storylines feel the same, and you sort of have an idea of what's going to happen. This season, that criticism can be thrown entirely out the window; no one has any idea what's going to happen. And while it's stunning to see the various measures and testing that are being put in place to ensure that a season could happen (at least that one can start), it's clear that the battle being fought is still an uphill one. Getting through this is going to take a concentrated and coordinated effort—and the most interesting storyline of Hard Knocks so far is if everyone will be able to stick with it.
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