Will LSU Fans Get the Shot to Watch Football?

CLAY: I want to go ahead and X out the phones, because I want to request a specific caller. I don’t know how many of you have been paying attention to this, but I only want people in New Orleans or in the state of Louisiana to call in right now. And you’re gonna understand what I mean once you hear this next story. So last night, Buck — and I know you’re not a wild football fan — they had a Monday Night Football game in New Orleans.

The New Orleans Saints were playing against the Jacksonville Jaguars. And in order to get into the Superdome now where the Saints play, you either have to have a covid vaccine (a/k/a a covid vaccine passport) or you have to have a negative test that’s been taken in the last three days, or — and this was even wilder — they had a vaccine clinic, Buck, set up where if you got vaccinated, you could then go into the stadium.

Now, this defies all logic as it pertains to the vaccine because you might already have covid and your vaccine doesn’t start working the minute that you get it popped into your arm. So, this doesn’t really make any sense, but that’s what they were doing to try to encourage people to get vaccinated.

BUCK: Well, it’s just about getting you to do it, right?

CLAY: They’re trying to coerce you.

BUCK: They are coercing compliance, and so it’s not about “the science.”

CLAY: Yes. So now, right before we came on the air, LSU, the major university in the state of Louisiana, has announced that everybody going to Tiger Stadium… This is a hundred thousand seat stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. It’s a fabulous place to go watch a college football game. In order to enter, you will either have to be vaccinated or you will have to have a negative covid test, Buck, for all people ages 12 and up.

So this is the vast majority of people that would be going into the stadium, either visiting fans or local fans in Louisiana. So my question is, how many people out there who are LSU or New Orleans Saints fans are willing to change your opinion on covid in order to go to a game and/or how many of you have tickets and are now not gonna go? Because, Buck, remember they sold all the season tickets this year predicated on the idea, “We’re gonna have a full stadium; there’s not gonna be any vaccine requirement,” and then the week before the season starts they drop this on everybody.

BUCK: They gave a few days’ notice before my brother’s wedding that some of the venues and some of the places involved were going — and they did — to check vaccine passports and IDs. As everyone knows at a wedding, there’s thousands and thousands of dollars involved.

CLAY: Yes.

BUCK: This is expensive and you gotta get the venue and the permits and everything else, and there was no consideration given whatsoever. It was, “Sorry. This is our new rule.” The city wasn’t demanding enforcement until I think it’s September 13th, but they decided to go with it anyway and get ahead of it, because there are people for whom they just think anything that they can do — no matter how annoying, arbitrary, or useless it is — as long as it falls under this general rubric of Fauci-ite mitigation, as long as it falls into this bucket of, “we’re fighting the virus,” they’ll go with it.

And the fact that… I gotta assume, Clay, a lot of people that would want to go to NFL games or college football games who aren’t vaccinated, don’t want to get vaccinated and now something that matters a whole heck of a lot to them may be taken away from them because, as de Blasio says, carrots and sticks. And this is one of the sticks that the Democrat politicians are gonna whack you in the face with, everybody.

CLAY: And it’s also expensive to go get those negative covid tests. Mind you, there are hundreds of thousands of people who are gonna show up and tailgate outside the stadium, right? Massive crowds of people. It’s not as if they’re stopping the spread of the virus. In fact, they’re only impacting it for three hours inside of the stadium.

But outside, packed tailgates, packed bars, everything else, that’s still a go. So, I only want to hear from people from Louisiana, LSU fans as well as fans of the New Orleans Saints. If you have tickets, what are your thoughts on this? ‘Cause I think this is a big battleground that is coming. I know SEC and NFL fans pretty well, Buck, and they’re not going to take very kindly to this requirement.

BUCK: Is there anything that you think could be coming where you say, “All right. I might have to get the shot,” Clay, even though you’ve had covid? Is there something where you think it would be finally…? If you couldn’t fly on planes, would you get the shot?

CLAY: I think that’s it. I think that is the requirement where I would say, “Okay. Maybe I have to get the vaccine,” even though I’ve already had covid and there’s no benefit. In fact, it could be detrimental, according to some studies, to combine the vaccine with natural immunity.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

BUCK: You want to get to Chuck in Louisiana about his season ticket situation with LSU? Let’s do it.

CLAY: Yeah. Let’s see. I’m curious, Chuck. What’s your reaction so far as you can tell among LSU season ticket holders as LSU has become… I know Oregon and Oregon State have done it, but I don’t think that really surprised anyone. I think the idea that you have to have a vaccine passport or a negative test to go to an LSU Tiger game surprised a lot of people. Chuck, what’s the reaction you’re hearing?

CALLER: I’m not really hearing anything yet. But I just heard it earlier and I tried to call in to the ticket office, and I could not get in. So, I imagine that the reaction is not a favorable one from many people, because normally you can get hold to a ticket agent there in the athletic department.

But phones with quite tied up right now so I imagine people aren’t really happy. I think it stems from the fact that they either said or insinuated that we were gonna be in there full capacity, no restrictions, and here it is that a couple weeks before the first home game, people are being told differently, and so the reaction is gonna be poor, certainly.

CLAY: What were you calling the ticket office to say?

CALLER: I just want to find out what… I have eight tickets and several kids. So my concern was around the kids. I wanted some explanation. I hadn’t had a chance to look at email. I did, in fact, have an email that explained it, certainly understand. But my younger kids aren’t gonna wear a mask throughout the whole game outdoors, in Louisiana heat. So I want to know, “Hey, how’s this gonna be enforced, and what are the restrictions gonna be for kids?”

You know, my wife and I are in health care, been vaccinated. That was my choice. But I firmly believe like you guys do that it should be a choice for somebody and you shouldn’t be forced to do things that you don’t feel comfortable with, and this is a state university. Our elected officials are making decisions that maybe half the constituents don’t agree with.

So to hang people out there in the wind and not knowing exactly what’s gonna happen ’til the last minute, especially since the opening game is in Los Angeles and people have travel plans and they weren’t told in advance what’s gonna go on yet, there might be a lot of fallout. So I’m sure the local news will have it all covered later today. I’m anxious to see what they have to say.

BUCK: Chuck, thanks for calling in from Louisiana, man.

CLAY: Thanks for the call.

BUCK: We appreciate it. We’ve also got Andy in Louisiana, another LSU season ticket holder. What’s up?

CALLER: Yeah. Guys, no. I am absolutely livid about what is transpiring right now. I live in the city of New Orleans. I’ve been a season ticket holder for LSU tickets since 2005. I bought some Saints season tickets this year from a friend and they pulled the rug out on us from under there; so lost money there. And now, now LSU — like the first caller said — in February, they put out a statement saying there will be no restrictions.

So all of us season ticket holders sit there and read that and say, “Okay, here’s our money. Take it,” and then two weeks before the season starts they’re gonna do the same thing and they’re gonna pull the rug out from underneath us. So I don’t know why… You guys know this as much as I do, vaccines have now proven over the last couple weeks that they don’t work. So I don’t know why it makes a difference if I go inside that stadium with a vaccine or not.

And furthermore, the masks have shown — in the Tri-State area of Arkansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi — that masks aren’t working, either. So, yeah, it’s an outside venue. The vaccines aren’t working. There’s no reason LSU should be implementing this. This is completely political, and I’m sure me like the rest of the Tiger Nation is extremely livid over this whole situation.

BUCK: Thanks, so much.

CLAY: Andy, we hear you, man.

BUCK: Thanks so much for calling and joining us. I’d be livid too.