There was some good news late Monday night, but it wasn't necessarily what you might think. Sure, the plan for Major League Baseball to return as soon as May got all of the attention, but for a second, don't focus on the actual plan. The good news is simply that there was one created -- and floated publicly as a trial balloon -- at all.
This was shaping up to be a contentious year for MLB and the MLBPA, with the expiration of the CBA looming and the sport coming off a couple of Hot Stove seasons that were discouraging to players. The emergence of COVID-19 put all of that on the back burner, and the two sides have shown over the past couple of weeks that they're working hard to find solutions.
A deal was reached to continue paying players, and soon the sport took care of minor leaguers and game-day workers, at least to an extent. The best part of Monday's late-night report from ESPN's Jeff Passan was the reaffirmation that the sides are working to try and find a way to have some kind of baseball season in 2020.
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But ... there are plenty of problems with the reported plan, which still is in the beginning stages.
MLB pumped the brakes with a release Tuesday morning, saying it is "actively considering numerous contingency plans that would allow play to commence once the public health situation has improved to the point that it is safe to do so," but that the league has "not settled on that option or developed a detailed plan."
Here's a breakdown of some of what has been proposed, and some initial issues we see:
Isolation
Per Passan, "Players, coaching staffs and other essential personnel would be sequestered at local hotels, where they would live in relative isolation and travel only to and from the stadium, sources said." Passan later added that players could be sequestered for months and separated from their families.
Brett Anderson, a longtime big league starter, spoke out on this right away, but the most important reaction came from Eireann Dolan, the wife of Nationals closer Sean Doolittle.
It's one thing to convince players to return, but this plan would include hundreds of others, likely thousands. There would be people getting the fields ready, driving the players back and forth, sanitizing their rooms, providing meals, taking care of medical needs, washing the uniforms, and on and on. With no fans in the parks, you would need substantial TV crews in every park every night to make sure the product was broadcast across the country. You would need dozens of security guards to make sure, that, for example, someone didn't just walk into a hotel and find Mike Trout's room.
How can you guarantee that all of those workers -- the ones who won't be making millions -- stay safe?
San Francisco Giants
This is not nearly as simple as sequestering 30-40 players for a few months, and even that part is complex. Almost every player on the Giants is married and most have kids. Their veteran infield starters have 10 young children just between the four of them. Trying to put players in a "bubble" is a significant, significant hurdle, and there certainly will be push back from older players financially secure enough to survive a year without full paychecks.
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The Location
Arizona is the perfect place to start a shortened season, and people within the game have quietly been whispering that over the last couple of weeks. Drop down anywhere in the Phoenix area and you can be at 10 spring training parks within the hour, and Chase Field, right downtown, is a nice and massive facility. Places like Sloan Park (home of the Chicago Cubs) and Salt River Fields (the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks) rival some big league setups and would be beautiful homes for games played without fans.
If MLB returns in 2020 and puts the entire sport in one location, Phoenix isn't the best option, it's the only option.
But, while Arizona does have the infrastructure needed for something like this, it's not as if it's any different than the rest of the country, which has been largely locked down. The Arizona Department of Health announced Monday that there are 2,456 COVID-19 cases in the state, an eight percent increase from the day before. There have been 65 known deaths.
There are more than 1,400 known cases in Maricopa County, where all of these games would be played, and sources familiar with the Giants' plans have said recently that they're concerned about the initial reaction from the area and the fact that the peak could still be weeks away. There is no sign that the spread of COVID-19 is slowing in Maricopa County, but even if it does in the next month, there's another concern.
The average high in Phoenix in June is above 100 degrees. A few years ago, when the Giants landed for a summer series against the Diamondbacks, the pilot announced that it was 116 degrees outside. This is a minor issue compared to the very real health concerns facing Arizona and the entire country right now, but if you're talking about daily outdoor games and doubleheaders in June and July, you can't just ignore the weather.
Arizona has the needed facilities, but it's a much better spot for a shortened season in the fall.
Testing
MLB is hopeful that testing is viable enough that every player could be cleared, but that still is in question. As Passan wrote, "Most important would be a significant increase in available coronavirus tests with a quick turnaround time, which sources familiar with the plan believe will happen by early May and allow MLB's testing to not diminish access for the general public."
We, as a country, aren't there yet, or anywhere close. The last part of the sentence is the key one. It's hard to imagine MLB teams getting tested on a daily basis until it's abundantly clear that all medical professionals and first responders in this country have what they need, and as much as the game would benefit from returning and giving fans something to watch, you certainly don't want to be in a situation where it seems starting pitchers are getting tested when most citizens still can't find or qualify for one. NBA teams faced significant backlash early on for using their resources to secure additional tests.
Sports in this country won't resume until testing has dramatically increased throughout. If you're looking for a barometer of where this is all headed in the coming weeks and months, keep an eye on the progress made with testing.
Minor Concerns
Two ideas that have been discussed, per Passan: Players would sit six feet apart in the stands instead of in a dugout, and there would be no mound visits from the catcher or pitching coach.
This is is all well and good, and in line with government recommendations. But what about the batter standing a few feet from a catcher who is breathing heavily under his equipment on a 105 degree day? What about the first baseman holding a runner? What about the fact that every multi-pitch at-bat that ends in a grounder to short will mean at least four players touched the same ball? Will pitchers completely stop licking their fingers? Will hitters stop spitting into their gloves?
Baseball is not a contact sport, which makes it easier to return, but it would still be difficult to properly social distance.
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The Risk
MLB can take every precaution imaginable and there will still be a risk in putting players on the field. They are an athletic group that is at less risk than the general public of having serious complications from COVID-19, but there are players who have underlying conditions, along with plenty of managers and older coaches and umpires. There are people involved with every MLB team, including the Giants, who have asthma, diabetes or heart issues.
There is no guarantee that even a season played in some sort of bubble could keep all of these people healthy, and teams learned that before breaking camp. Several minor leaguers came down with the virus and had to be quarantined.
What happens if one of the Giants starts showing symptoms? According to Passan, "officials do not believe that a positive test alone would necessarily be cause to quarantine an entire team or shut down the season," but that flies in the face of what is generally being recommended to Americans on a daily basis at a time when 12,000 already have died from the virus.
There are a lot of questions, and a lot of reasons to be concerned. It's good that the league is asking these questions internally and trying to find solutions. They miss baseball as much as the rest of us, but it's clear there's a long way to go before any plan for a season becomes remotely feasible.