Graham Mertz’s Postive COVID Case Would Put Badgers At Disadvantage
Graham Mertz had one of the best debuts you’ll ever see from a quarterback. He went 20-for-21 with 248 yards of passing and five touchdowns. All of the hype around Mertz seemingly came true overnight. Whether that’s fair to him or not, it appeared that Mertz had the right stuff to be the first great quarterback at Wisconsin since Russell Wilson. Because the Badgers cannot have nice things when it pertains to their quarterback, Mertz tested positive for COVID-19 on Sunday. He will have one more test to see if he’s officially positive or if there’s potential for a false positive. If the former, Mertz will not be playing for 21 days per the Big Ten rule. This is a nightmare situation for Wisconsin.
First, let’s state the obvious before anyone gets mad at me. Obviously, the health of Mertz is priority number one. If he does have COVID, let’s hope it is a mild or asymptomatic case and that he has no long-term effects. This puts Wisconsin in a situation where they either have to rely on Chase Wolf or Danny Vanden Boom. Neither of them has an ounce of experience. While Mertz was in the same boat, he is a four-star recruit boy wonder. Wolf and Vanden Boom do not carry that distinction.
Due to playing all Big Ten teams, Wisconsin doesn’t have a soft spot in their schedule. And even if they did, it’s very unlikely that three straight games would be against cupcakes. There is zero room for error this season. The three games that Mertz would miss are Nebraska on the road, home against Purdue, and Michigan on the road. Those aren’t easy games. Nebraska got beat badly by Ohio State but they showed some fight. After the stink they put up to be playing this Fall, trust me, they do not want to go 0-2. Purdue and Michigan will both see an opportunity to beat up on a young Badgers team.
So now we wait for the results. We’ve seen the good side of this for sports fans where things are false and we’re playing football. We’ve also seen the bad side where this is only the beginning and things get really scary. Let’s hope for the former.
Charlie.