Chris Sale missed the start of spring training while fighting off a nasty case of pneumonia. He now wonders: Could it have been Covid-19?
The virus at the heart of the pandemic that has brought the world to a stop produces symptoms similar to Sale's back in early February -- temperature, cough, compromised lungs. And so Sale can't help but ponder the possibilities.
"Honestly, 100 percent yes, no doubt," he said during a conference call on Tuesday while discussing season-ending Tommy John surgery. "I don't think there's a test now, but I think they're working on a test now to see if you have antibodies for it, meaning you've had it. It's craziness to look at my symptoms and look at the symptoms of people who have the Covid-19 virus and some of the similarities. We may never know, but I'm definitely hoping not."
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Sale took a flu test, which came back negative. He thinks that if he somehow had contracted the novel coronavirus, he would've passed it on.
"As contagious as this virus is, I think that if I had it, somebody in my family and a lot of people at the park would have been infected by it," he said. "I don't want to make light of it and joke about having something like that, but it definitely crossed my mind and I asked people about it.
"I got tested for the flu and it came back negative. Obviously the test for the virus wasn't out yet. If there is a way to find out, I would love to find out, but I don't know. I think that might be a stretch."