The COVID-19 could not stop all sport in the US and Michael Jordan was the most profitable

The coronavirus pandemic surprised everyone and turned 2020 into a human and economic tragedy, but what it failed to do was stop the development of sports competition in the United States, where all the major tournaments and professional leagues.

The same did not happen in the rest of the world, where 2020, which was to be the sporting year of the decade, with the events of the European Football Championship, the America’s Cup and the Tokyo Olympics, added in the usual annual calendar, the pandemic turned it into a demolished house of cards with postponements for 2021.

The opposite of what has been experienced in American professional sport, which although on March 13 suspended all competitions, returned to be one of the symbols of the fight against the deadly disease, which has been charged the lives of more than 340,000 people in the United States.

From June they began to reschedule sporting events with the new reality of not having fans on the fields, reduced the regular seasons of professional baseball in the Major Leagues, NBA, WNBA, NHL, football MLS, NWSL and multimillion-dollar economic losses ($ 15 billion) within an industry that is critical to the country’s economic gear.

NASCAR motorsport was the first to start meeting its rescheduled schedule, then IndyCar did, while mixed martial arts and wrestling were the first sports to begin competing in the called their “bubbles.”

Something that also made boxing, which would later become the professional sport that also allowed the presence of thousands of spectators when safety and health protocols were already established by federal and state authorities to combat the deadly disease. of the Covid-19.

NASCAR completed a historic season in both sports and political-social when through the only black driver in the competition, Bubba Wallace, began his fight against racism and got the The organization also ended the presence of the Confederate flag in competitions.

New NASCAR Cup champion Chase Elliott, just 24, the son of Bill Elliott, who also won the title in 1988, became the youngest driver to win the championship in 25 seasons.

IndyCar followed in the footsteps of NASCAR and with less prominence in the fight for racial and social justice, left champion New Zealand veteran driver Scott Dixon, 40, who won his sixth title.

While another veteran rider, the Japanese Takuma Sato surprised with the victory in the 104th edition of the legendary Indianapolis 500 Miles race, which also had to be postponed from its traditional Memorial weekend date. Day on August 23rd.

Then came the return of the tournaments of the professional golf circuit of the PGA Tour, which had to reschedule the legendary Augusta Masters from April to November, but which was a sporting success with the best world golfer, the American Dustin Johnson, as the new champion.

The PGA met its entire competition schedule, including the Houston Tournament, which became the first to once again have spectators on the field, 2,000 fans per day, and a brilliant champion in the Mexican Carlos Ortiz, who he won his first title on the circuit.

Professional tennis, which was the professional sport that suffered the cancellation of most tournaments that should have been played on the ATP and WTA calendar, managed to save the Masters and Premier 5 of Cincinnati to be played at the bubble headquarters of the United States National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, New York.

The tournament, which left Serbian Novak Djokovic and the reborn Belarusian Victoria Azarenka as champions, served as a prelude to the US Open.

With the absence of the legendary, the Swiss Roger Federer and the Spanish Rafael Nadal in the men’s field and the best tennis players in the women’s world, the Austrian Dominic Thiem took advantage of Djokovic’s disqualification after hitting a ball in a track judge to get his first Grand Slam title.

While the Japanese Naomi Osaka, after giving a whole recital of claims of racial and social struggle, in the grand final beat Azarenka to keep her second Open title.

He had previously completed the Return of the United States Professional Football League (MLS) Tournament, in the Orlando Bubble, with the Portland Timbers as champions.

The NHL, in several Canadian bubbles, was also able to define Tampa Bay Lightning as the Stanley Cup champion after beating the Dallas Stars (4-2) in the Finals.

The WNBA, at the IMG Academy Bubble in Bradenton, Florida, saw the Seattle Storm team beat Las Vegas Aces in the Finals and win the championship.

The Major Leagues, after completing a regular 60-game season and overcoming several outbreaks of coronavirus contagion, eventually burst into the new Texas Vigilantes field, Globe Life Field, with 11,000 fans per game had as to World Series champion at the Los Angeles Dodgers.

He would later reach another Los Angeles team, the legendary Lakers, in the Orlando bubble, proclaiming himself NBA champions with his new MVP award-winning winger LeBron James, and the pivot Anthony Davis, who gave the team its seventeenth title, tied with the Boston Celtics as the best dynasties.

The last title of the year 2020 played by a professional team in the United States during the coronavirus pandemic was the MLS, which won the Columbus Crew, without spectators, but in their field.

While out of competition, the pandemic allowed the figure of Michael Jordan to once again be the center of attention and the sporting character who generated the most money on television with the documentary “The Last Dance.”

The life of the billionaire Jordan’s excesses with mansions, cars, motorcycles, golf courses, betting, a majority shareholder in the Charlotte Hornets and an investment that did not go well, allowed his issue to generate excellent dividends in the former player, ESPN, Netflix, Nike, NBA and many more brands related to its image.

Jordan, according to Forbes magazine, is the athlete who has made the most money in history, with a fortune estimated at $ 2.1 billion.

The crossroads of the 2020 currency within professional sport in the United States was the death of legendary Lakers exbase Kobe Bryant, who died Jan. 26 in a tragic helicopter crash in which they also went losing the life of his daughter Gianna, 13, and seven other people.