Coronavirus

As if the already convoluted 2020 season bargaining situation needed further complication, another potential curveball was spun this evening. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, tells Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times that playing baseball in the month of October may pose unwarranted risks.

Here’s the specific phrasing attributed to Fauci, who is one of the most visible authorities on the coronavirus: “If the question is time, I would try to keep it in the core summer months and end it not with the way we play the World Series, until the end of October when it’s cold. I would avoid that.”

Fauci emphasized that he wasn’t able to offer any certainties, saying that “this virus is one that keeps fooling us.” There’s obviously still quite a lot of science to be done on COVID-19.

But he made clear that he believes it likely the pandemic will worsen as the weather gets chillier. “Under most circumstances — but we don’t know for sure here — viruses do better when the weather starts to get colder and people start spending more time inside, as opposed to outside,” Fauci explains. “The community has a greater chance of getting infected.” There’d be added concern, he said, because of the potential “overlap between influenza and the possibility of a fall second [coronavirus] wave.”

This makes for an especially intriguing development given the ongoing grappling between the league and union over how long the 2020 season ought to extend. MLB has cited the very same concerns as Fauci now highlights in arguing against attempting play deep into the fall. But even its proposals have been premised on a typical October postseason. The player side hasn’t insisted on playing into November and beyond, telling the league of late that it’s ready to play “when and where” commissioner Rob Manfred orders. But the MLBPA position has generally been to offer up as much play as MLB wants to arrange (with full pro rata salary).

While Fauci’s viewpoints don’t represent specific constraints on the staging of ballgames, they’re sure to factor into the fraught public relations battle between ownership and labor. He has generally been supportive of resuming play, at least without fans in attendance, and has made clear he’s a big baseball fan who would love to see a 2020 campaign. It’s notable, too, that several key baseball states — Arizona, Texas, Florida, California — have already begun to exhibit worrying rises in COVID cases even at the outset of summer.

Under the agreement the owners and players made in March, Major League Baseball has the ability to implement as long or short of a regular season as it wants. There are some notable conditions, though, including: The league must pay players full prorated salaries, it must act in good faith to play as many games as possible, and commissioner Rob Manfred would need approval from 23 of the game’s 30 owners. It’s in question whether he would receive that amount of support, Ken Rosenthal and Evan Drellich of The Athletic report (subscription link).

“There are definitely more than eight owners who don’t want to play,” one player agent told Rosenthal and Drellich.

It may be a moot point. Manfred is not required to force the start of a season, and according to Rosenthal and Drellich, it doesn’t appear his office will do so over fears of a potential billion-dollar grievance from the union. In a letter to the union Monday, deputy commissioner Dan Halem left the players with three choices: 1. Waive your right to file a grievance in regards to the March agreement; 2. Go to arbitration; 3. Keep negotiating.

A quick arbitration case may not be desirable to the union or even possible because of the money at stake and the number of witnesses who would be involved, per Rosenthal and Drellich. That means the only chance for a season may be for the owners and players to finally put their vast differences aside and hammer out a deal that works for both sides. It’s difficult to imagine that happening with the way talks have gone so far. Both sides have accused the other of acting in bad faith during their negotiations, which took yet another negative turn Monday when Manfred did a 180 from last week and expressed doubt in regards to a potential 2020 season.

Manfred’s comments led to a heated response from union chief Tony Clark, who said, “Players are disgusted that after Rob Manfred unequivocally told Players and fans that there would “100%” be a 2020 season, he has decided to go back on his word and is now threatening to cancel the entire season.”

Many of those players, including Nationals ace and influential union member Max Scherzer, joined Clark in voicing their disgust Monday.

8:31pm: These positive tests and the fear over a possible second wave of the coronavirus outbreak are key reasons why the league does not want to extend a potential regular season beyond Sept. 27, Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports. In a letter to top union attorney Bruce Meyer, MLB deputy commissioner Dan Halem wrote Monday: “Your recent letters have all expressed the concern, in one form or another, that players are being ’asked to take on extraordinary burdens and risks in the current environment. However, the Association’s proposals to play as many games as possible, as deep into the fall as possible, increases the health risks to players and staff, which is not something we are prepared to do.” Halem added, “We believe it presents a heightened and unnecessary health risk to your membership to play deeper into the Fall.”

7:02pm: Several Major League Baseball players and staff members have tested positive for COVID-19, according to an MLB letter obtained by the Associated Press (Twitter link via Jonathan Lemire of the AP). This comes on the heels of a weekend report which stated that a player and a pitching coach had tested positive for the coronavirus.

The identities of the newest players and staff members are unknown, and it’s not clear how their recoveries are going or have gone. Nevertheless, it’s yet another reminder of how difficult it will be to get a 2020 season off the ground. Owners are said to be focusing on health and safety protocols as the league gears up for a potential season, but considering the unpredictability and widespread nature of the virus, there’s a chance it will help stop the campaign from ever starting or even derail it should it get underway at any point.

Of course, commissioner Rob Manfred said Monday he’s not confident a season will happen, though that’s largely because of an ongoing battle over salaries between the owners and the players. However, if a season does occur, the health of all those involved is sure to be one of the main concerns across the game, and this latest development does not bode well in that regard.

With Major League Baseball and the MLBPA unable to reach an agreement for 2020 on salaries and the length of a potential season, the league has turned its focus to health and safety measures, Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports. The union rejected the league’s latest proposal over the weekend, and the owners held a conference call Monday to discuss their next course of action, per Nightengale.

Because the two sides haven’t been able to come together during negotiations, the 2020 campaign is likely to be a 50- to 60-game regular season, Nightengale notes. Commissioner Rob Manfred has the right to determine how many games will be played. And while there has been talk about an increase in playoff teams, the union is of the belief the postseason will remain the same in 2020 with six division champions and four wild-card winners.

Acrimony between owners and players aside, it remains in question whether we’ll get any kind of season because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Just this past weekend, it was reported that a player and a pitching coach recently tested positive for the coronavirus. It’s unclear how the league will proceed if the game returns and someone else involved tests positive. In the meantime, if the league and the union do reach an agreement on health and safety, Nightengale reports that a 21-day spring camp 2.0 with the majority of teams training in their home ballparks and then a shortened season should be on the way.

Scouts are dusting off their radar guns this morning. Major League Baseball has authorized a resumption of amateur scouting with some ongoing limitations, Kiley McDaniel of ESPN.com reports on Twitter.

Baseball’s eyes and ears are typically grinding out hours on the road this time of year. But they’ve been on ice along with the rest of the sport since mid-March.

For most fans, the real key here is that there’s baseball activity worthy of scouting at all. As McDaniel notes, the Perfect Game showcase schedule is slated to kick off this week. No doubt there’ll be hardball played around the country this summer, though some major events — among them, the Cape Cod League — have already been stricken from the calendar.

At the moment, teams won’t be permitted to assign more than a trio of scouts to any given event. Presumably, the primary concern isn’t with limiting large gatherings so much as preventing a scouting arms race.

International scouting is still not allowed, McDaniel adds on Twitter, though that could resume soon as well. Teams will now be allowed to comb through new video and data in assessing players abroad.

Despite those limitations, there’s loads of potential for teams willing to expend resources to get more and longer looks at potential targets. Much like the shakeup of the recent draft and post-draft signing period, the newly uncertain cost/reward structure of scouting in the coronavirus era will open opportunities for those clubs that best adapt.

An unnamed Major League pitching coach and a player on a 40-man roster have both tested positive for COVID-19, Joel Sherman of the New York Post reports.  As per Sherman’s sources, the player contracted the coronavirus relatively recently, but there is “belief that he has not infected anyone else involved in the game.”  As for the pitching coach, he is thankfully now recovered after contracting the virus “weeks ago.”

It’s quite possible we might never know the identity of either person, though given what we know about the spread of COVID-19, it’s safe to assume that far more team-affiliated personnel than just these two have gotten the disease.  Some people with COVID-19 can never experience any symptoms and thus don’t even know they have the coronavirus, which puts them at greater risk of unknowingly spreading the disease to others.  Since the league shutdown in March, teams have asked personnel to provide regular medical updates to staff, in order to best manage and treat any potential or confirmed COVID-19 cases.

As Sherman notes, these two positive cases only underline the difficulties faced by the league in figuring out how to keep all players, coaches, staffers, and other personnel as protected as possible during any games played in 2020, no matter how many health and safety procedures are enacted.  While there is no such way to ensure 100 percent safety, there is also the threat of a second wave of coronavirus cases later in the year or even before the summer is out, which could result in renewed wide-scale lockdowns and no baseball whatever.