You’re doing fine in the red zone, Oklahoma

Sunday, August 23, 2020

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COMMENTARY

It’s crunch time. We’ve come all this way, and now we’re in the “red zone.” As plenty of people around here know, the red zone in football is a place where good things (usually) happen. In the red zone, you have your opponent on its heels, and you are in striking distance to achieve your goal. It’s the most thrilling part of the game, really.

As we found out this past week through a leaked report from the White House coronavirus task force, Oklahoma is a red zone. In this instance, however, the red zone is not a place you want to be, and our opponent — a virus — has us on our heels and is scoring points. It’s going to take a team effort to combat this, but it appears our coach, Gov. Kevin Stitt, has been withholding some of the playbook.

I’m not sure how long I can keep the football analogy going, but it’s important to understand this very serious situation in whatever way we can. Now that this information and the federal recommendations are out in the open, perhaps this will lead to more focused discussions among our elected leaders. I hope cohesive plans can be put into action, whatever the situation may be.

On the other hand, maybe it won’t lead to anything. I’m not so sure anymore. I guess as long as we don’t think “this is fine” about what we are doing currently, that’s a start.