Well said. But what if containment was never possible even with lockdown? That's where I've now fallen on this all. I think COVID was circulating around our country WAY before we locked down and that exponentially more Americans have/have had COVID than we even remotely realize. Most that did, weren't even aware they had it. We are seeing testing samples come out recently which support that (the full jail test, the 300'ish people who popped positive in a meat plant and 100% of them were asymptomatic, etc). If that's the case, then general lockdown has no function other than spacing out WHEN people get infected, for the sole purpose of not overwhelming hospitals with the relatively rare demographic of persons who end up in ICU because of this virus. And it also means COVID will inevitably circulate regardless of how long we stay locked down. IF that is true (and I get that's a big "if" at this point), then the only logical approach is to isolate and protect the most vulnerable as much as possible. And if that is true, then this entire analysis of "we can't have sports because it will lead to exponential growth" completely falls apart.
So, again, what you said above may absolutely prove to be true. But it all rests on an assumption that may actually prove to be false.