Chris Paul airballs on new HBO COVID documentary

Point guard for the Phoenix Suns and eleven-time NBA All-Star Chris Paul did not see the pandemic coming. 

 “The first time I remember hearing the word ‘COVID,’ I was playing in New Orleans,” Paul said.“I remember the shoes I wore that game. On the outside, I wrote ‘pray for Wuhan.’” 

Just two months later, Paul and his then-teammates on the Oklahoma City Thunder were stuck in their locker room. Their anticipated match against the Utah Jazz had been postponed. Jazz center Rudy Gobert had tested positive for the coronavirus. By the end of the night, the NBA would suspend the rest of its season. The NHL, MLB, MLS and Summer Olympics swiftly followed suit. 

HBO Sports’ new documentary, “The Day Sports Stood Still,” aims to capture the coronavirus’ sweeping impact on professional sports. With Paul joining as executive producer, the film features interviews with Washington Mystics guard Natasha Cloud, LA Dodgers right fielder Mookie Betts and countless professional athletes around the world. 

“The Day Sports Stood Still” is a jam-packed 90 minutes that cannot decide which story it wants to tell about 2020. It oscillates between the crushing despair of the pandemic and clever jokes about the NBA bubble. 

The first half unfolds with alarmist graphics: a steadily climbing coronavirus death toll and a greyscale map bleeding red out of China. A few years from now, such harrowing depictions might be a sobering history lesson; right now, they rub salt in the wound. 

Marten de Roon, midfielder for the Italian club Atalanta, recalls how the pandemic tore through Bergamo, a city in Northern Italy. 

“The normal thing in Bergamo is the church bells ringing when somebody dies,” de Roon said. “Because there were so many people dying, the church bells were ringing, like, every half an hour.” 

Minnesota Timberwolves center Karl-Anthony Towns gives a vulnerable interview about his mother, Jacqueline Cruz, who passed away from the virus. In a video originally shared on YouTube, he recalls how Cruz “went sideways” in excruciating detail: the 103-degree Fahrenheit fever, the ventilator and the phone call notifying Towns that his mother did not make it. 

“I just wanted to use my story and the things I was going through to make other people understand how serious it is, maybe save their family, save themselves,” Towns said. “If I saved one life, that’s all I ever wanted to do in that video.” 

Towns’ candor about this traumatic life event merits enormous respect, especially given that Afro-Latino men are so rarely given platforms to express their grief. Yet, when hundreds of Americans continue to succumb to coronavirus every day, releasing a film with such graphic depictions of death constitutes poor judgment on HBO Sports’ part. 

The documentary’s second half switches gears, addressing the Black Lives Matter movement and the now-iconic boycott in response to the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. 

Paul, who is president of the National Basketball Players Association (NBPVA), refuses to sit on the sideline. 

“We (NBA players) want to see Black-owned businesses be championed,” Paul said. “Police reform, education, historically Black colleges and universities, right? Start talking about food deserts.” 

“The Day Sports Stood Still” is arguably at its best when Paul tries to navigate the NBA’s bureaucracy, deciding alongside fellow players how to use their leverage as a majority-Black league.  

“Sports has changed forever,” Paul said. “There’s no question about it because the athlete, whoever it may be, they understand their power.” 

Unfortunately, the incredible work that Paul and other NBA or WNBA players are doing is diminished alongside possibly performative shots of “Black Lives Matter” floor paint courtside. 

Somewhere on the cutting room floor of this clumsy documentary, there is a provocative movie about Black players, white team owners and Paul’s efforts to use basketball to protect his children from police brutality. But “The Day Sports Stood Still” is not that documentary.