Switchbacks coach concerned with health as pandemic delays season

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Coaching is a mobile profession, and Switchbacks coach Alan Koch has never been shy about relocating. But after uprooting his life to become the Switchbacks head coach, his life is effectively being put on pause. He's in a new city with a new job and suddenly he's stuck in quarantine.

"It's probably the first time in my life that I wish I was back in our house and working on the yard, or up in the roof cleaning the gutters," Koch said. "My parents will have a big chuckle hearing me say that and my wife probably won't believe me. We're just trying to buckle down as much as we can and hopefully will get through this with as limited challenges and as few people passing away as possible."

Koch and his wife have two daughters who live in Ireland and Canada, respectively. Koch keep tabs on the virus and how it could potentially impact his family. He also has to check on the players, many of whom are in same boat he's in.

"We went and recorded our players from all over the country, all over the globe, to be honest. They all moved here and they all bought into this project. We went on the road and we beat Oklahoma city in that first game. And now we've had momentum taken away from us."

The MLB and the NBA are discussing quarantining players in remote sites and playing in empty stadiums until this blows over. But if the USL wants to try something like that, there are lot of hurdles.

"We love to play the game whether we have nobody there or we have 50,000 fans there," Koch said. "There's so many other logistical things that have to go into that. I speak about revenue, and that's obviously a profit based perspective, but then you also have to assess health. At the end of the day, it's about the personal well-being of every person on this planet."