MLB schedule revised again after positive COVID-19 tests by Phillies six teams affected by the Marlins outbreak

Major League Baseball had a COVID-19 crisis during the first week of its 2020 60-game season. Up to 19 members of the Miami Marlins, including 17 players, have tested positive in recent days.. On Thursday, in the last round of testing, two Phillies staff members tested positive for COVID-19.

In an effort to minimize the interruption of the season while the outbreak is contained, MLB has revised the schedule to isolate the Marlins and Phillies for a period of time. The Phillies, who did not face the Yankees in a four-game series at home originally scheduled for this week, will not play against the Blue Jays this weekend. The Marlins will also not play until Monday at the earliest. The Phillies and Marlins are slated to start a series in Miami on Tuesday.

The Phillies, Yankees, Orioles, Nationals and Blue Jays had their schedules changed after the Marlins’ outbreak.

“The health and safety protocols were designed with a challenging circumstance like the Marlins face in mind,” MLB said in a statement. “The response described in the joint MLB-MLBPA Operations Manual was immediately triggered upon learning of the pool of positive cases, including contact tracing and quarantine and testing of all identified close contacts. Marlins staff tested positive in the test he remains in isolation and they are receiving attention. ”

The Miami season ended until Monday, August 3, giving the club time to regroup and adjust its roster as necessary. “MLB believes it is wiser to allow the Marlins to focus on providing care to their players and planning their baseball operations to resume early next week,” the statement said. The Marlins are slated to play Tuesday August 4 at home against the Phillies, though a game may be added on Monday, according to Jon Heyman.

The Yankees and Orioles are spectators at the outbreak. The Yankees were scheduled to play four games with the Phillies this week (two in Philadelphia and two in New York), while the Orioles would play four games with the Marlins (two in Miami and two in Baltimore). The revised schedule has the Yankees and Orioles playing Wednesday and Thursday instead of sitting idle.

The Marlins were scheduled to play a three-game series against the Nationals this weekend. The vast majority of Nationals players voted not to travel to Miami for security reasons.. According to the revised schedule, the Nationals will not play this weekend while the Marlins are on hiatus. Here, for the sake of exposing everything, is the revised calendar:

Tiles
Tuesday, July 28	vs. BAL PPD	vs. NYY PPD	at TOR	at MIA PPD	in PHI PPD	vs. WSH
Wednesday, July 29	at BAL PPD	in NYY PPD	at TOR	vs. MINE vs. NYY	vs. PHI at BAL	vs. WSH
Thursday, July 30	at BAL PPD	in NYY PPD	at TOR	vs. MINE vs. NYY	vs. PHI at BAL	vs. WSH
Friday, July 31	vs. WAS PPD	at TOR PPD	at MIA PPD	vs TB	vs. BOS	vs. PHI PPD
Sat, Aug 1	vs. WAS PPD	doubleheader at TOR	at MIA PPD	vs TB	vs. BOS	vs. PHI PPD
Sun August 2	vs. WAS PPD	at TOR	at MIA PPD	vs TB	vs. BOS	vs. PHI PPD
Monday August 3	OFF	OFF	OFF	vs. NYY	at BAL	OFF
Tuesday August 4	vs. PHI	at MIA	vs. NYM	vs. NYY	at BAL	at ATL

Remember:

• All Marlins games have been postponed until Sunday (including series scheduled against Baltimore and Nationals)
• The Phillies-Yankees home and home series has been postponed
• The Yankees will play the Orioles in Baltimore on Wednesday and Thursday.
• The Phillies-Blue Jays series in Philadelphia has been postponed.

MLB will try to make up all postponed games later in the season through doubleheads and eliminating days off. If not possible, the MLB is set up to allow teams to end the season with an uneven number of games played, and determine the postseason field with winning percentage, according to Joel Sherman of New York Post.

That would not be ideal, but there are precedents. The teams ended with an uneven number of games around the 1981 strike, some teams played up to 111 games that season, while others played just 103, and the ranking was based on the winning percentage. In these adverse times, a similar strategy would be warranted this year.

As a result of the outbreak, the Marlins are shifting to a daily testing scheduleCEO Derek Jeter announced Tuesday. Players and staff are currently tested every other day. Here is Jeter’s statement:

We continue to take this whole situation very seriously. It is understandable that all of our players, coaches and staff have a hard time supporting this experience. After receiving additional test results from our Major League team this morning, we contacted the Commissioner’s Office with concerns for the health and safety of our team and our opponents.

We move on to a daily testing schedule while appropriately isolating and quarantining, along with enacting additional preventive procedures with our travel group. We look forward to safely returning to Miami, where we had a successful and healthy Spring 2.0 before we set out on the road and experience challenges. For now, we will stay in Philly and gather information to make informed decisions and prepare for our return to action next week.

COVID-19 leads to an incubation period of 14 days (the time from exposure to symptom development) with a median of five days, meaning that if any Phillies players and staff were exposed during the series of The Marlins over the weekend may not show up in the initial testing rounds. Players have been told that if they were exposed to COVID-19 when facing the Marlins, the positive evidence would appear between Thursday and Saturday, according to Jayson Stark of The Athletic. The surest approach would be to wait for other days and retest before allowing the club to resume play.

The MLB press release says more than 6,400 tests have been conducted since last Friday, July 24, and the Marlins are the only team with positive tests. He adds that the league had a 0.3 percent positive test rate on more than 32,000 tests as of opening day.

“The difficult circumstances of a Club reinforce the vital need to be diligent with protocols in every way, both on and off the field,” says the MLB statement. “We will continue to strengthen our protocols and make the necessary adjustments. The realities of the virus remain important, and we must operate with that in mind every day. We trust that Clubs and players will act appropriately, for themselves and for others. , and the data provides reason to believe that protocols can work effectively. “

As for player compensation, the March pro-salary deal only applies to how many games each team can play. However, Phillies, Orioles and Nationals players will get the full 60 games, even if they can’t play 60 as a team due to circumstances here, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. However, there is no information on the Marlins’ players.

Despite the outbreak, Commissioner Rob Manfred said Monday that the owners have not yet seriously discussed canceling the season.. The league believes it has established mechanisms (60-man roster, taxi squad, etc.) to handle an outbreak and continue playing. Now MLB is apparently ready to revise the schedule on the fly to make it work.