We’re really doing this, huh?

The high school football season in Ohio may be facing fourth-and-forever ... into gale-force winds.

But damn it if schools aren’t going for it.

As much as we all love prep football — and as much as I ache for the students who would be robbed of lifetime moments and memories — sorry if a fall season feels as impractical as it is ill-considered.

Is no administrator willing to be the bad guy and take a clear-eyed look at our opponent?

Are we that blinded by the Friday night lights?

Here we are in the enduring grip of a hundred-year pandemic; the president of the Lucas County Board of Health strongly recommended that schools delay fall sports and hold virtual instruction until further notice; and the governor has advised us to avoid so much as backyard barbecues.

And still most schools are dusting off the blocking sleds and plowing forward. With notable exceptions — including TPS, which has postponed fall sports until at least Oct. 1 — practices began Saturday.

Again, I want a season — a responsible one with a real chance of reaching the finish line. 

I also want to ask: Are we kidding ourselves?

What degree of cognitive dissonance are we willing to stomach?

Here’s what puzzles: Several districts have announced plans to begin the school year with either an all-virtual or hybrid model of instruction, meaning students would attend classes at school no more than two days per week.

No matter your view of the coronavirus, how can you say it’s not safe for students to be in school, but OK for them to participate in a high-contact, sweat-swapping extracurricular activity?

As legendary former Southview coach Jim Mayzes told our Steve Junga: “No one wants to see kids be able to play football more than I do. But, if we’re only letting our students go to school two days a week because of social distancing, how in the world do we let kids play football?”

I posed a variation of this question to Dirk Conner, the football coach and athletic director at Bowling Green High School, where students will begin the year with online-only classes, but football remains a go.

Conner said he “understands the optics and how this might look,” but he wanted to make a few points.

For one, the obvious: Football is played outdoors, where the risk of spreading the virus is reduced. For another, his program, like others, has drawn up a pandemic game plan, from closing the locker rooms to keeping players as distanced as possible during practices. Conner also said the varsity and junior varsity teams will practice separately this season, assuring no more than 40 or so players will be on the field together.

“People probably don't realize this, but athletics is a much more controlled environment [than in school], especially at the high school level,” Conner said Tuesday. “We've got around 950 kids at BG High School. To send them back in the hallways every day ... let's say there are 25 kids a class, seven periods a day, you're looking at 175 kids. With crossover, let's just say 125 kids. That puts each kid we have with 125 other students every single day.

“The decision not to have school makes it in a way safer to have athletics.”

Another factor, Conner added, is athletic participation is a choice, unlike school. He said six athletes playing fall sports — including two football players — have opted out this season.

“We support them,” he said, “and totally understand their reasons."

All of that is well taken from a coach I respect. He wants what is best for the kids. 

Where I would disagree is that playing should be a personal choice.

With an explosively contagious virus, our choices are never just our choices, and I fear we’re making far-reaching health decisions with our hearts. Also, who’s to say the athletes will be fine? (Yes, the death rate among teenagers is infinitesimal, but the long-term effects of the virus remain unclear.)

I appreciate the desperation for a season. It’s hard to imagine the void an autumn with the lights dimmed would leave in our towns, let alone in the lives of the athletes. That shouldn’t be minimized. “Kids really need something,” Rossford coach Todd Drusback said. “I'm concerned with their mental and emotional states if they don't have sports.”

If I was a coach or parent of a high school player — or back in high school -— I’d feel the exact same way. 

Still, no sport is bigger than our communities.

And this is not a game that can be won with the usual instincts: putting your head down and taking it one day at a time.

As much as it pains to admit, if Major League Baseball is on the brink despite every-other-day testing and 113 pages of safety protocols, and outbreaks have already ripped through major college football programs despite the semi-bubble of empty campuses, what gives us the hubris to think we can pull off a high school football season with next to no testing — the cost would be a non-starter — other than the school exams students will often be taking at home.

It’s time to step back and look at the bigger picture.

It’s time for the Ohio High School Athletics Association — which has displayed less leadership here than an inflatable tube man atop a car dealer — to punt on the season, at least until the spring. (Same goes for Michigan.)

Football means a lot, but it shouldn’t mean everything.

First Published August 4, 2020, 8:51 p.m.