Most everyone acknowledges that attempting to play MLB games this summer would be an extraordinary endeavor in the conditions of an ongoing pandemic ... it’s an ongoing challenge just to live a somewhat “ordinary” life without adding travel and additional limitations to the team equations.
My wife and I haven’t been out of the house or off our property for any significant amount of time since the country lockdown began in mid March ... we’ve only interacted with our daughter who also lives in the Clearwater area on limited occasions and only when she’s come to visit us at our residence. These past five months have been a complete reversal of how we have lived our lives to date. It’s been difficult but not “hard” ... most folks don’t know what a “hard” livelihood is ... we certainly don’t.
Others have not been as guarded ... the likely cause as to why our state (FL) has close to a half million reported cases of the virus and more than 6,500 deaths. Be it skepticism, disbelief or a feeling of superiority over catching the virus or just plain old stupidity a great many folks don’t comply to social distancing guidelines. A lack of governance consistency certainly also doesn’t help anything.
So ... if we “normal folks” can’t adhere to more restrictive rule sets for the greater good then an athlete or two “sneaking out” for a social gathering would seem to fall in line with that non-compliant mindset. It should have been expected ...
That being said there are repercussions ... the acts of a few impact far beyond. MLB is investigating how, what, when and who amongst the Marlins traveling group took part in their “night out” in Atlanta or even if there was such an endeavor ... that certainly is part of the puzzle but the bigger cog will be an ongoing adjustment of traditional MLB rule sets that will determine whether the 2020 season gets played to completion.
Yesterday it was agreed that seven inning double headers ( akin to what we’ve seen in the minor leagues for years ) will be used to make up lost games due to postponements. It’s also likely that the 30 man roster will be allowed for the entirety of the season rather than the initial plan of scaling it back after two and four weeks of play. In my opinion the parameters around the 40 man roster also have to be relaxed and an allowance of using the entirety of the 60 man player pool in a less restrictive manner needs to be put in place.
The Marlins are likely down multiple players for anywhere from ten to fourteen days due to the internal spread of the illness amongst them. They initially announced 57 players in their player pool and have signed or claimed off waivers at least five more players this past week ... the current roster rules allow for the replacement of “illness list” players in the player pool without restriction however placement onto the 40 man roster still has limitations in activation/deactivation albeit loosened in regards to “illness”. To finish the season adjustments may need to be made to the present parameters.
There’s also rumblings that more players will reconsider playing at all and opt out of the balance of the season ... from my perspective that’s very likely .
There’s no miracle cure to our collective situation ... cooperation and common sense are truly our only avenues to keeping the virus at bay, it’s not magically going away ...
So what we’ve seen transpire in Baseball this past week is no different than our society as a whole ... it’s a microcosm but also a reflection ... to move forward adjustments, compliance and unselfishness are the path ...
Baseball needs it’s players and teams to put down the sacrifice bunt to move the runner up and pass the baton to the next batter up ... to act on behalf of the team rather than self serving swings for the fences ... it’s not just baseball that needs that approach ... it’s our entire society ...
We can all play if we do so as a team ... just sayin
Happy Day, Happy Baseball ⚾️
