Tonight’s scheduled game between the Phillies and Yankees at Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Park has been postponed, The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal reports (via Twitter). The cancellation comes after a dozen Marlins players and two coaches tested positive for COVID-19 after playing in Philadelphia this past weekend. The Marlins’ scheduled home opener against the Orioles has also been called off.
Major League Baseball has yet to offer any official statement on the Marlins’ outbreak or on subsequent measures that will be taken. Phillies players, staff and clubhouse personnel have all surely gone through additional testing already, but the number of negative tests they’ll need to continue — and the period of time in which those tests must occur — isn’t known right now. At the very least, it’s safe to consider both the Marlins/Orioles and Yankees/Phillies series in jeopardy at this time.
ESPN’s Marly Rivera tweets that one potential option could be to push today’s game back to this weekend, when the Phillies are scheduled to be in New York for the Yankees’ home opener. Adding one or more doubleheaders to the two clubs’ remaining schedule this season and/or a makeup game on one of the rare off-days on the schedule could conceivably account for any games lost to the current outbreak, but such measures would obviously become untenable in the event that similar outbreak scenarios occur over the next two months.
The results of the Phillies’ testing will become crucial not only with regard to the resumption or rescheduling of the Yankees series but with regard to the feasibility of the 2020 season itself. The Phillies were the first team to have any type of outbreak, with as many as 12 positive tests among players and personnel back at intake. However, MLB Network’s Jon Heyman tweets that the Phils haven’t had a positive test since intake. Multiple infections now would point to a spread over the weekend series against Miami, which would serve as an even more foreboding red flag than the already ominous Marlins outbreak. Even if the league does continue on, it’s not difficult to imagine renewed apprehension among players and some additional season opt-outs.
And away we go…
Phillies need a day to get negative results
that’s not how Coronavirus works. You don’t test positive 72 hours after exposure. The Marlins likely had more players becoming contagious even as the series progressed. So a Phillies player on Friday was likely more safe than contact with the Marlins on Sunday.
It will take at least 5-7 days to then re-test the Phillies and see if any were infected.
That actually is how it works. If you have the virus you will most likely test positive around 48 hours after you get it. Symptoms may not pop up for 5-7 days, but you absolutely will get tested before then if you are doing daily tests.
and you wonder why cases are soaring… Other countries and places that practice stricter quarantines and shutdowns of places where infections are found have the right approach.
No. I literally had a coworker put in qine after being exposed to another coworker who tested positive. He got symptoms and tested positive 10 days later. It can take awhile to develop.
baseball has been doing daily tests. If it shows up so fast that daily test would find a case before a person becomes contagious how did nearly 50% of the active roster of the Florida Marlins become infected?
Shouldn’t that daily testing that finds cases before they become contagious have prevented that?
My doctor advised a 72 hour quarantine before taking a test when I wanted to visit my at risk mom last month saying it takes a good 2 days from infection to start showing up on a test, that 3 days is the best time.
They had a 3 game series against the Marlins, so they’re past you 48 hour window. Everyone here is throwing out different figures without any references. First it’s 72 hours, now 48, 7-10 days before symptoms show, now someone else says 5-7 days. All I know are businesses are staying open regardless if someone tests positive. They deep clean building, test those exposed, and move on.
According to the CDC, “Symptoms may appear 2-14 days after exposure to the virus.” According to WebMD, the average incubation period is about 5 days. Therefore, contrary to your statement, it IS possible to test positive 72 hours after exposure. If as it appears, the virus was spreading through the Marlins team during the weekend series, you are correct that the chance of a member of the Phillies being exposed to the virus would be greater on Sunday than Friday.
Kinda adds a new sense of urgency to avoiding the tag during a rundown, anirite?
They aren’t in quarantine. They probably had a dinner or event or even a bus trip with a sick driver or a hotel with a bad HVAC system.
Other countries don’t have a dumb leader and POS Doctor who cares more about throwing a first pitch than the health of Americans
Wrong – that is how it works. If someone is exposed they could test positive as soon as 48 hours but normally 72 hours or later
More than a day.
I’m amazed there are so many doctors on this comment board, and they all have the right – but different – answer.
Phillies entire team/staff should now be in mandatory self-quarantine. If this was an office building and you had nearly half the members of one department test positive the building/business would be closed and everyone would then be told to self-quarantine at home for like 7-10 days at least and get tested.
Governors and Mayors need to stop giving special exemptions to sports. These players have wives and girlfriends and children who can then become spreaders in their communities besides the player/staff themselves.
It was the Marlins who tested positive not the Phillies…Phillies are being tested today..
But they were in close contact with the Marlins. Tampa is spot on.
its worth noting that Miami’s contact within their team was much more extended, such as being in locker rooms and on the bench, then basepath encounters with the Phillies. so if any of the Phillies have it, the number so far is hopefully more limited, and its not even a given any do have it.
Well unfortunately the Marlins were on base quite a lot.
Blame it on Phillie. Prolly all those fans and their collective boodom.
Airtight argument when games are being played with no fans in attendance
That’s the power of the Philly fan: they can infiltrate the stadium with their negative mind vibes
I think they should require leagues play in a bubble environment to reduce any risk to communities but I don’t agree that we should have the government just protect everyone from taking risk across the board.
If your options are a $400 monthly minor league stipend or $500,000 taking the risk of playing baseball in a bubble I think over 90% of the population takes the risk.
I support your effort in terms of risk to community and overwhelming hospitals but not bubbles where people have choices, make life changing money and are working in a well run bubble which shouldn’t have much more risk than most communities.
More likely the plane ride or bus trip than playing actual baseball. Phillies already had a mini-outbreak. There are guys that can’t even get it again on the team.
Well it was fun while it lasted. I can’t say I’m surprised this is happening, they should’ve tried to find hub cities for the three divisions. Hopefully too many guys aren’t infected and they can try to reevaluate their return plan.
Yea. That was the only way this would work. Sadly it’s too late. It’s over. You can’t have teams sit out for a week. Just cancel this thing.
I would love to disagree with you, but I feel the same exact way…
NFL should be looking into this. Find colleges that are shut-down for the fall and use it as a hub for like 2 divisions. Players quarantine in the dorms that are shut down, use facilities that are shut down, etc..
Let’s be honest, if the MLB and NBA (if they end up having problems) can’t make it work, there’s no way the NFL will.
The one thing about the NFL v other major sports is the one game a week structure. If players agree to stay on the team premises for 4 months then it will be possible.
Maybe if everyone was a robot, it’s not possible to keep that many players, coaches, and other staff members in line for that long.
As a robot, I sometimes forget to think about typical human irrationalities.
Hey man. I played Basewars on the NES. I’d be down for some robot baseball. I imagine the Phillies pitching would be better with robots.
I imagine robots wouldn’t choke or underachieve so that would help the Phillies.
I still have that game. It’s on my entertainment center, right next to my original (from 1984) NES system.
Kind of like prison.
Do they leave 15 runners on base every game. No? Then they would absolutely help.
Tim Timmons needs to be replaced by a robot. That guy was absolutely putrid behind the plate Thursday.
If an outdoor, non-contact sport couldn’t get it right after 3 games, hockey, basketball and football have no chance.
Many, many people to blame for this, I don’t mean to pick on just him, but it enraged me to see Mike Trout laughing on the bench yesterday, talking AT teammates right after his homerun. This is the guy that was photographed wearing a mask while playing and told us all how concerned he was before the season.
Why on earth can’t he lead by example and put a damn mask on? How much does he need to be paid to wear a mask?
I think they could make it work if they kept the team in a bubble. They could stay at a hotel together, go to the stadium together, travel on charters together. There would have to be a pretty big effort to avoid outside exposure.
But just letting them wander around when they are not playing is bound to fail.
The bottom line is that MLB screwed the pooch entirely by going with this travel to other cities as normal plan and not creating a bubble setup like NBA and NHL did. This amount of travel given the current conditions was just never going to be tenable, and I would take the under on 30 days before the season ends up having to be called off.
The bubble setup would have been in Arizona and Florida. Two of the worst places in America. Would have been same issues. All it takes is one person no matter what. They would have still had to be trusted to quarantine and stay home as much as possible. The biggest issue is delay in testing.
They should have put every team in Toronto. Or Seoul.
Which would still be fine if it was an actual bubble setup like the NBA and NHL have, where they are locked to specific hotels/buildings/sections of the city, and not interacting with people outside of the bubble. We will see how the NBA bubble in Orlando works out, even though it is in a virus hot spot. The NHL set it up in relatively low infection cities (Edmonton and Toronto), so is probably less of a risk.
Problem outside of doing it at spring training facilities is there is no clock in baseball. While other sports have overtime, most games will adhere to a schedule. Bubble set up in baseball will not work otherwise.
Problem is NBA and NHL are only doing it for playoffs, not a whole season. MLB will be a test for NFL. Granted, NFL doesn’t play everyday.
But they are expanded playoff formats that will go almost as long as the MLB 60 game season does in terms of total duration.
I think an MLB setup could work in a city that has around 5 ballparks available assuming they could schedule 3 games per day (30 ballparks normally, but half are not in use at any given time). If it was in an EST city, they could schedule an 11 am, 5 pm, and 11 pm game start in each of the parks, and just prioritize the later start to west coast teams (for their TV markets). Even if they had an AL bubble and an NL bubble in two different cities, that would work if they could find 3 usable ballparks. It could be done, MLB just chose the worst possible option.
*But they are expanded playoff formats that will go almost as long as the MLB 60 game season does in terms of total duration*
To be fair, in the NHL they have 24 teams to start, but they have best of 5 play in rounds with 16 teams (with another 8 teams just playing 2 exhibitions.) That means after a max of 5 games, 8 teams will be going home, and then after the first round another 8 will go home. After about 2 weeks, there will only be 8 teams left.
The numbers will be much more manageable compared to trying to get all the MLB teams to somehow play 60 games.
And most importantly, the players bought in. The know that they are either out after a short time, or advancing towards a championship. Its worth the sacrifice. MLB players are not willing to bubble for 3 months.
Multiple players, such as Kershaw, stated they wouldn’t leave their families for months at a time. Trout is set to become a father next week, no way he’d have gone for it.
But yeah, that was the only reasonable chance.
Better stock up on TP and hand sanitizer.
I don’t understand the stock up on hand sanitizer – TP you will need if you are quarantined but hand sanitizer is unnecessary if you can just go wash your hands.
It’s why I was in favor of proposing five give series, with two days off a week.
One player acts irresponsibly, it affects the entire team. It affects the team you are playing. It can shut down a season.
Alright, new plan: everyone plays everyone in their division once before September 30th. Any teams that still have 25 healthy players remaining will play each other in an online Fortnite tournament. The winner will be crowned 2020 World Series Champion. No asterisk.
It’s the only reasonable solution.
Time to just blow it up and wait for 2021.
No
Why? There still won’t be a cure by then.
Maybe not a “cure”, but Moderna’s phase 3 trials kicked off today. US also has a contract ion place for December delivery of 100M doses of vaccine from Pfizer conditional on 50% effectivity and emergency use authorization from the FDA.
Nothing in time to save MLB this year, or likely the NFL, but I’m not particularly concerned about April 2021.
That’s my argument. Even Valentine’s Day (typical ST reporting day) is 7 months from now. A lot can happen. This thing can die down or the vaccine’s are more thoroughly proven with more time in trials.
This whole baseball season is like dipping your toes in the water but not going in. .It’s like just the tip, just to see how it feels. It never works. Either go in all the way or don’t go at all.
Are the games cancelled (not to be made up) or postponed (to be made up)?
The Phillies/Yankees is officially listed as postponed for now, but I don’t see how you can play tomorrow either. It just isn’t going to work and it’s not fair for certain teams to have to just sit out for weeks.
Hey remember all those “just cancel the season” folks who got mocked and insulted, angrily shouted at, and name-called?
I remember most of the “just cancel the season” folks doing most of the name calling.
How come no one’s saying it’s a hoax now? I was told it was a hoax a lot on this message board
I didn’t realize how much I missed baseball until it returned. Let’s hope this all goes well.
Goes well in my book is minimal illness.
True, Loo. We need the best of the worst case scenarios. The lesser of evils. Fingers crossed.
I don’t understand the rules. Are the players to remain in their hotels during the season? Are there curfews? Are they allowed to go out after game hours?
and can home teams go home to be w/ families? I believe that is a yes, but the protocols still seem sketchy, esp. the quarantine part.
Season ends today and degrom wins 2rd straight cy young…maybe cole in the a.l.
Hahaha. Good post. Technically you can give to it to DeGrom’s buddy Wheeler too.
Bieber for AL. 14 Ks and a win would be the best I’d imagine. Good one though haha.
Kyle Hendricks with the only CG SO in the NL…. gotta give it to the guy that went 9 innings instead of 5
Agreed. Wheeler looked really good too going 7 on 85 pitches. Probably could’ve gone 9 giving up just the 1 run, but it is my understanding he way on the 85 pitch limit front he start. Either way, great outing.
And Ohtani would be first starter in history with infinity as his season ERA. That counts for something.
Infinite upside
This certainly presents a challenge but hardly yet a reason to just cancel the whole season. line some of you are calling for Postponing the Yankees and Phillies was the right thing to do. Hopefully they can get their results back and can play tomorrow.
But this also emphasizes why strict adherence to the protocols is important. One player takes things lightly and he can infect a good portion of his team.
No one said this was going to be easy.
exactly. this can be worked around. the fact that the only outbreak we’ve seen in several weeks of players being together is a good sign overall, and the fact that its with Miami of all places makes it not as surprising.
The games were in Philly, not Miami. And Philly was the first team to really have more than a couple players/staff to be infected just a couple weeks ago.
Miami was probably back in town at some point recently before the season started though.
I’m betting this is from a group of players getting together in a small space with a contagious person and that secondary infections will be minimal.
Not based on much and not betting much but that bet means the Phillies players should be OK.
It was probably a Marlins plane ride or bus ride that spread it….. not actual baseball. If anything, they should have moved Marlins summer training out of Florida so they weren’t in the hot bed of it while prepping for the season. They have their taxi squad…. guys have been testing positive and then getting cleared to play in like 10 days. Not the end of the world. The season will go on.
lets all take a step back here. we dont need to assume the nuclear option here. we only know that the actual cases in bulk are affecting the Marlins. presumably under MLB policy if the Phillies players test negative twice in over a day then they are good to go. whether or not that is a good idea, that’s how it will probably work on the baseball side of things. i imagine these two series will just get shuffled to the end of the season. as long as no Phillies players test positive before the next series the league will probably okay them to come back. Marlins will have to bring in guys who are not positive, but that was always something to expect. dont expect the rest of the week’s slate who have not come in contact to be cancelled at this point, especially given the owners will probably deny that.
Perfect.
First common sense thing I have read on this post! More than 11 guys tested positive during summer training. Nothing got shut down.
Well.
This is not really the type of news I was planning to read. Man…a *dozen* players!? Ooof.
But – hey! – small game opener in Nebraska August 1st. Early season Canada goose in North Dakota on the 15th. Have my licenses & plans already. My hopes of listening to the games while I drive, or streaming games around the fire, & on one of my boats seem to be in a bit of jeopardy.
Good chance I’ll be reading & listening to a few more books this summer.
😉
So.
When does football season start?
About ten days before it ends?
Ugh.
You may not be wrong.
Organizations have to be smart enough to adjust as new information becomes available. Under that premise, new caveat for 2020 – teams must complete a MINIMUM of 20 official games to qualify for the playoffs.
Deciding to go with a schedule that doesn’t include off days was short sighted though the nature of the negotiations might have made that impossible to avoid.
Interesting none of this news is on MLB.com yet.
They’re too busy wording their spin…
MLB.com is just a PR branch of the MLB.
Could this be the failure that does in Manfred? This whole situation has been an embarrassment from start to finish.
If you think this is bad, I was just chatting (between our masks, of course) with my comrades Henny Penny and Turkey Lurkey, and they said that the sky is falling.
Can you beat that?
Why the Yankees are not in Baltimore for 4 games is beyond maddening.
id wonder if they try to squeeze in a later Yankees-Orioles series into that spell. im sure both ownership groups would have an interest in making that happen.
This really makes me excited to go teach in a classroom for $35k.
Imagine being a grocery store worker who makes even less. Teachers were very essential last I checked.
It’s over.
Just calculate which 3-0 team has the highest WAR and give them the World Series trophy.
That would be zero teams lol
Oh wow, really? I hadn’t looked yet. Surprising! I guess a 2-1 team will have to be crowned the winner — just like a Wild Card team winning it all.
The Padres were the last team eligible to do so late afternoon yesterday but they blew a late lead. So every single team is still within one game! Lol
Time for 7 inning double headers. And keep them.
Foreseeable. Makes you wonder a bit why MLB and the MLBPA didn’t just come to some sort of a cancellation agreement. This stuff is going to go on all Summer.
gee i wonder why…maybe they didn’t want to cancel it at all?
The one silver lining for the season to still be played, em if you can call it a silver lining during this situation, is that the season has been limited to regional divisions. This means that there will be at least some protection from the whole league getting caught by one outbreak since east only plays east, west only plays west and central only plays central.
And THAT’S why, when I’m looking for life-saving health information, I ALWAYS turn to the Major League Baseball Trade Rumors Comment Section!
I told you so.
Cancel it all.
Wow!
You told us that there would be an outbreak on the Marlins that would lead to the Yankees and Phillies being postponed?
Hat tip on being so amazingly prescient.
You did not say that
Turn out the lights. The party’s over.
The end is near
Soccer, hockey and couple other leagues did the protective bubble method, meaning players wont see their families for 3+months.
Perhaps MLB should have done the same thing. Florida and Arizona(mlbs bubble locations) has increased since so hard to say if it would affect the bubblr or not.
No it isn’t. The bubble is several orders of magnitude safer. Even if it’s in an out of control city.
Even the bubbles have cheaters and thus problems on occasion just as stay at home orders do without baseball. The problem is that if everyone is traveling the number of potential points of infection are in the billions. In a bubble the numbers are so low you can trace them.
It’s awesome and incredibly sad that baseball will be one of the first opportunities for Americans to get solid information on how the disease spreads.
They need to go into bubble mode for the balance of the season. Even if that starts with semi bubbles using the best available stadiums until they find 3 or 4 locations that can be made secure.
99.7%!
And a lot of the dopey Marlins were in the dugout without a mask on the entire series. Idiots!
They need a couple days to work on their synchronized kneeling – ya know, the important stuff in sports…..
Send the Feds into Philly to quell the virus. The three stooges could run this country better.
So if they do resume tomorrow, when is the makeup game?