Yesterday when Major League Baseball announced that they would delay the start of the regular season by at least two weeks, it already felt like that was unlikely. Players were asked to remain around the spring training facility despite spring training being suspended. Even as early as this morning, teams were working with the idea that players would remain around the facilities and have work done in the cages, weight rooms, and bullpen mounds – but no on-field activities while things were shut down. Some players reportedly weren’t keen on that idea, preferring to go back to their families.
This morning Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred and President of the MLB Players Association Tony Clark got together to work out what all of this meant for the players. As things progressed later in the day it was agreed upon that players could choose to remain in the area and use the spring training facilities, travel to the home city of their team, or travel to their home. This was first reported by Jon Heyman of MLB Network and confirmed by several other sources.
If players are leaving spring training sites, there’s almost no way possible that games are going to be played on April 9th. In theory, players could still remain on schedule, with the coaching and medical staff overseeing workouts at the facilities, to make that date work. But with everyone sort of going out and doing their own thing, and then coming back to resume spring training at a later date in order to ramp up to regular season games – the timeline just doesn’t work.
Tim Brown of Yahoo Sports is reporting that teams are basically taking this as an indication that the season won’t start at the earliest point of “a two week delay”.
That MLB/MLBPA directive — for players to leave — was given about an hour ago. Club sources are taking this as clear indication season will not start on April 9.
— Tim Brown (@TBrownYahoo) March 13, 2020
Kyle Boddy will remain in Goodyear
Some players will seemingly remain in Goodyear to use the facility to train. Kyle Boddy, the Cincinnati Reds Director of Pitching Initiatives and Pitching Coordinator will remain in Goodyear as well as a part of what he called a “skeleton crew” that will be at the facility to help work with the players.
What will the players do?
At this point in time, there’s been no word on what decisions any of the Cincinnati Reds players will be doing. But we do know what two teams players will be doing. The New York Yankees players voted unanimously to remain in Tampa and continue working out, as first reported by George A. King III of the New York Post. The St. Louis Cardinals have decided to shut things down (Lindsey Adler of The Athletic reports this one) and head home.
Adma silver and the NBA seem to be running the show at this point and Mlb, MLS, NHL, are following their lead. He said they may have an nba finals in July and i would expect that is when sports will resume. Maybe a half season of baseball for this year.
Lets think of the worst case situation here.
What if the entire season is lost.. I assume the players still get paid and that’s one less year on their contracts for every team. What about service time do the players on the 40 man roster get that? So many questions…. sigh.
I would just like to say that would suck.. What about players with opt outs. Do they get credit for playing this season. I honestly don’t understand why they can’t play the game without fans watching in the stands??? If a player show signs of sickness why not quarantine them just like anyone else for 2 weeks.
The Disease has hit my county I live in today in Wisconsin and I would swear it was the end of the world the way people were acting. 3 cases about 200,000 people in my county.
I hope our season isn’t lost for the Reds who went out and paid the players. Frustrated fan here.
As of right now there’s no word on player compensation. The MLBPA and MLB officials are actually meeting about that right now.
As for your county, or any county right now – be sure to remember that there’s an enormous and very important difference between “cases” and “confirmed cases”. Here in Ohio we have something like 15 confirmed cases. The head of the board of health in Ohio, though, says every bit of data they’ve got suggests the state has over 100,000 cases – but we aren’t testing anyone, really, because tests aren’t and haven’t been available.
Love how our president says there are plenty of tests to go around.
I hope and pray for all my fellow Reds fans that your families are safe and that they don’t have anything bad happen to them.
Same goes for the Reds players, and staff and leadership.
I just read on the UNC site that UNC Chapel Hill has been running tests on the virus and hopefully have some promising leads for finding a cure. I hope that a lot of our medical universities are doing the same. This has effected everyone, people whose jobs have closed down, parents with no where to send their kids because schools have closed. My wife talked to a client today who is due to deliver a baby in two weeks and now her 2 year olds preschool has closed. This is a time we need to pray that this thing can be taken care of quickly for the sake of the country and he world.
+!
Scott if they find a cure for a virus it’s a miracle. Vaccine on the other hand is feasible
Yeah I misspoke it is a vaccine not a cure. But hopefully that would relieve the issue.
George A. King, III?
Can he sing “You’ll be back”?
I’m not a doctor, but the cycle in China from onset to the beginning of a downcycle was eight weeks. Hopefully the U.S. can reduce that number with the strategy of eliminating large gatherings where the virus can be easily transmitted. As Doug said, it’s almost impossible to believe that games could begin April 9, particularly since spring training has essentially shut down. Late April is the best-case scenario in my not-a-medical-or-health-expert opinion. Sometime in May is more likely.
I think,eventually greed will prevail over altruism unfortunately. We are shutting things down basically to protect the very old and very sick. As this virus seems to be attacking them most. This is very noble and says alot about the goodness of our society. Eventually though the players and owners will want to start making money again. Protecting the nursing homes will be of less importance. It will be time to play ball then.
Nursing homes and the older people need to be taking care of first then you can maybe think about baseball not until then. We can do without baseball for awhile but we can’t do without are family or friends.