COVID-19 impact on MLB season

[Jimbo]

the cancellations are growing at a stunning pace. I won't be surprised if the first few weeks of the season aren't played in empty stadiums, something I didn't think was possible just last week.

 

Last week I was watching Biathlon events in Czech Republic taking place in an empty 40,000 seat stadium. So I knew it was a matter of time before North America would begin this. (An aside, it didn't stop spectators from lining up along the perimeter fencing of the grounds. So much for social distancing).

 

Last week began talk of cancelling the Tokyo Olympics. Now, it seems a plausibility.

 

Local events. My wife is scheduled to run a marathon in Milwaukee on April 11th. She's doing a training run right now. Hoping for her it doesn't get cancelled.

[rickh150]

It is even Possible that we do not see this Wisconsin team play again this season... how crazy quickly has the world changed in like 3 days.

[brooks_quichenick]

Just declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization. Really no reliable data yet to indicate how far reaching and how long the spread will be. Frankly, nothing that comes from the government of China is worth listening too. I think ground zero for reliable data is probably Italy, and it looks very bad there.

 

If I were a MLB owner, I'd be seriously concerned that this could kill attendance for the first 1.5-2 months. Europe should have been out ahead of this, and looking at the John Hopkins map...almost the entire continent is shaded in red. I didn't see any precautions taken by the US government early on to make me think it will be any different here.

 

https://www.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

 

I’m sorry, but China’s response to the outbreak has been lauded by the WHO as nothing short of incredible. China bought the rest of the world some time with their quarantine and sacrifice, and warned the rest of the world of the severity. Unfortunately that time has been completely wasted by the West and now here we are. It’s going to get really, really bad before it gets any better.

[TJseven7]

I highly doubt they cancel the season. I could see teams quarantined as much as possible and empty stadiums though. There are TV contracts to fulfill. Attendance is nothing compared to those.

 

Might be a crazy season though. Teams could get exposed and poof. 2 weeks of forfeits.

 

I don't watch American news because I see it as pointless. They don't investigate the same as other countries do. They care more about entertaining. What's sad is that by February 20th or so I was convinced that this was going to hit the whole world and that the economy would hemorrhage. By Feb 20th they were already saying on BBC and others. Long incubation time, 2% death rate (spanish flu equivalent) heavily slanted to people over 60, kids may be the secret host because they don't show symptoms as fast, its not contained and has a much higher rate of transmitting than SARs.

 

World has changed in 3 days... but we've been told for 3 weeks. Please don't give China too much credit. When it was first brought to their attention they dismissed it until it got out of control in China. If the 1st doctor who saw it and reported it was respected by the Chinese Govt, this would have been almost entirely contained in Wuhan. Sure once people started dying they went full force against it, but they were slow to react, then reacted with incredible severity. 23 days went by. The 1st report came 23 days before the quarantine on Wuhan. It was well on it's way by then. It also was their policy choice to open back up the viral mixing pot markets that they closed when SARs broke out. Fool me once, shame on you. This is 2 for them. Shame on them. Especially since they already had one and still... 23 days.

[igor67]

The inconsistent political responses in various locations would be less frustrating, but public health official and scientists have predicted this for years.

[JosephC]

Just declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization. Really no reliable data yet to indicate how far reaching and how long the spread will be. Frankly, nothing that comes from the government of China is worth listening too. I think ground zero for reliable data is probably Italy, and it looks very bad there.

 

If I were a MLB owner, I'd be seriously concerned that this could kill attendance for the first 1.5-2 months. Europe should have been out ahead of this, and looking at the John Hopkins map...almost the entire continent is shaded in red. I didn't see any precautions taken by the US government early on to make me think it will be any different here.

 

https://www.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

 

I’m sorry, but China’s response to the outbreak has been lauded by the WHO as nothing short of incredible. China bought the rest of the world some time with their quarantine and sacrifice, and warned the rest of the world of the severity. Unfortunately that time has been completely wasted by the West and now here we are. It’s going to get really, really bad before it gets any better.

 

I'm not criticizing how China handled the situation within their own borders, I just question all the data they've been feeding the world regarding numbers infected/numbers dead. There have been long running reports from credible news sources that have cast doubt over their numbers from the onset. See the following link for one example:

 

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=12304547

[Fear The Chorizo]

From the US's perspective, the main thing that would have helped prolong when the virus reached US soil in earnest in people that were contagius would have been restricting travel from Europe soon after it was restricted from China, not this coming Friday. Many of the current US hot spots have been tied to people traveling back from Europe who were unknowingly exposed to the virus there. Since the original travel restriction from China was widely panned as being too harsh, I doubt expanding the travel ban to a wider net of the globe was on the table realistically at that time.

 

The next few weeks are going to be tumultuous for sure, but I think the end result of this is people are going to look back a year from now and realize the measures taken really helped slow the diseases' spread (which I believe is inevitable no matter what takes place) to allow for the US medical system to effectively manage the outbreak and not be overwhelmed - that's about the best realistic outcome to expect with this virus. Until the US gets better data on what the denominator of this disease is, which I think is much higher than we realize because Covid-19 has likely been circulating untested through most of the world's population for much longer than the last month or two after testing outside of China began in earnest, the uncertainty will be the biggest driver in a tanking market and general public health concerns.

[JohnBriggs12]

The virus is already on the wane in China where it was a lot worse. The cancelling now and barring flights from mainland Europe is to buy time and prevent a bigger spike in cases and protect the leagues from lawsuits. They're buying time because viruses do not spread easily in warm, humid weather. PGA Tour is going on as scheduled in Florida. Games played outdoors in warmer weather are not nearly the risk of games played indoors.

Worst I could see would be opening day being moved back by a couple weeks and season being condensed to 150 games. I'm guessing we'll see Brewers opening the roof at a much lower threshold, say 52 degrees rather than 62 once they start.

 

Other alternative is keeping the teams in Arizona and Florida and playing the first few weeks of the season in open air warm settings.

[wildcat83]

WIAA now also announced boys and girls basketball state tournaments will be played without spectators. Only enough allowed in from each team to cover family.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

The virus is already on the wane in China where it was a lot worse. The cancelling now and barring flights from mainland Europe is to buy time and prevent a bigger spike in cases and protect the leagues from lawsuits. They're buying time because viruses do not spread easily in warm, humid weather. PGA Tour is going on as scheduled in Florida. Games played outdoors in warmer weather are not nearly the risk of games played indoors.

Worst I could see would be opening day being moved back by a couple weeks and season being condensed to 150 games. I'm guessing we'll see Brewers opening the roof at a much lower threshold, say 52 degrees rather than 62 once they start.

 

Other alternative is keeping the teams in Arizona and Florida and playing the first few weeks of the season in open air warm settings.

 

I happened to be in FL during the opening week. Would be kind of funny if I still end up going and the Brewers are down there for some reason although I'm sure they'd probably be in AZ. I'm nervous now though and my threshold for this stuff is pretty high. If the airlines came out and grounded our flight I wouldn't exactly be devastated.

[folly412]

Other alternative is keeping the teams in Arizona and Florida and playing the first few weeks of the season in open air warm settings.

 

Was brainstorming that idea. What do they do when the season starts? Sending everyone home seems like it could add rather than reduce risk. If they are able to isolate Arizona and Florida camps to the point where the virus isn't introduced, do they extend spring training? Play regular season games at spring training facilities and swap out April series between AZ/FL teams with later season series?

 

 

I happened to be in FL during the opening week. Would be kind of funny if I still end up going and the Brewers are down there for some reason although I'm sure they'd probably be in AZ. I'm nervous now though and my threshold for this stuff is pretty high. If the airlines came out and grounded our flight I wouldn't exactly be devastated.

 

Have a wedding to go to in a couple weeks. It's crazy and frightening how within a week our family's advice has gone from "just fly, you'll be fine and driving 12 hours is dumb" to "can't blame you for driving" to "you really shouldn't be traveling and going to a big gathering, please stay home".

[nate82]

It looks like MLB is considering delaying the start of the season or at least considering their options.

 

https://theathletic.com/1671443/2020/03/12/rosenthal-baseball-faces-many-questions-as-it-deals-with-coronavirus?source=shared-article

[Ennder]

I don't see much reason to cancel spring training since the players are already all together so are in somewhat of a closed loop. Once you start the actual season there is a lot more travel from city to city and interaction with people outside of the team is inevitable. I think it is probably likely we lose the first couple weeks of the season.

 

Having said that if they are going cancel 2-6 weeks of the regular season you kind of need to have a spring training again just to ramp up so maybe these games aren't worth playing.

[nate82]

 

Having said that if they are going cancel 2-6 weeks of the regular season you kind of need to have a spring training again just to ramp up so maybe these games aren't worth playing.

 

I think the best option would be to just play the first month of the season at the spring training facilities and rearrange the schedule so the teams stay in one state.

 

I doubt the owners will do this as this is a huge revenue loss for them though less than cancelling the first month of the season.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

I think this has progressed beyond what owners want. Is there honestly any chance right now that MLB teams are playing opening day in their home stadiums?

[Fear The Chorizo]

I think this has progressed beyond what owners want. Is there honestly any chance right now that MLB teams are playing opening day in their home stadiums?

 

I think there is, yes - still roughly 2.5 weeks before most MLB Opening Day games are scheduled. One option may be to simply push the first week of regular season games into early October to get as close to 1 month out from when many of these crowd gathering restrictions are being implemented. That would mean opening days are still happening in MLB parks, just that it's in early-mid April. I think they would actually prefer that to playing the first few weeks of meaningful baseball games in Spring Training locations.

 

There will be a tipping point where the "abundance of caution" mindset driving many of these restrictions/limitations on public gatherings gets overtaken by data and statistical evidence that people are more than ok to exit their bubbles. There will likely be some sort of phasing back to normalcy - perhaps restrictions on older people or those with medical conditions from attending public events/gatherings. I'm guessing that will probably take place around the time everyone runs out of toilet paper, the supply chain has had a chance to restock Costco, and Americans as a whole can no longer stand spending any more quality time with family stuck in their own homes.

 

Right now it's apparent that restricting/cancelling/postponing public events scheduled for the rest of this month is a good idea given the lack of information - two weeks from now that might not be the case for things scheduled in mid April moving forward.

[MadThinker88]

WIAA now also announced boys and girls basketball state tournaments will be played without spectators. Only enough allowed in from each team to cover family.

 

All tourneys (boys & girls) for basketball/ hockey/ wrestling have been postponed in Ohio (OHSAA)..

IE completely not played. Word came out in the last hour.

[MrTPlush]

Reports are Major League Baseball will soon announce the suspension of Spring Training games.

 

Also not shockingly they plan to suspend/delay the start of the season too.

[folly412]

 

There is a feeling of inevitability among executives that Major League Baseball will be suspending spring training as soon as today, sources tell ESPN.

[owbc]

It looks like MLB is considering delaying the start of the season or at least considering their options.

 

https://theathletic.com/1671443/2020/03/12/rosenthal-baseball-faces-many-questions-as-it-deals-with-coronavirus?source=shared-article

 

Lots of good points in this article. If they do shutdown today as expected, there will have to be another period of spring training to get pitchers back up to speed again. Might be a while before there are regular season games.

[JohnBriggs12]

Baseball has been stopped....including spring training. What a mess! Regular season up in the air.

[dpapo]

Live in the UK and they have a different view about banning fans at sporting events, closing schools, etc.. Basically, for the moment they are not banning large crowds from sporting events. They say that based on science, banning large gatherings like sporting events have only a minimal effect. One person may effect 2 or 3 other people, but much more likely to be family or friends then sitting close to someone at a sporting event. Also, banning flights from other countries also have a very minimal effect, especially with how much travel is done in today's society. And aren't closing schools at the moment as things are still are at the early stages, at least in the UK, and if you close schools now then you will probably need to close them for 13 to 15 weeks and kids will want to play for other kids and can pass virus that way. Or spending time with their grandparents instead of going to school and also causing massive disruption in the society that can occur by closing schools too early.

Overall, if you do a lot of these types of actions now at the early stages, then by the time the virus hits it's peak spread, people get tired and lapse doing the things they should be doing and it makes things worse in the long run. Try to delay and level the peak rather then trying to do it all at once that that can overrun their health services. However, wash hands, stay at home for 7 days if you have a persistent cough or fever and the type of recommendations that are given all around the world.

Now at some point, yes possible ban large sporting events, close schools, etc... UK government expert said it could be another 10 to 14 weeks to go for the possible peak and are about 4 weeks behind where Italy is at the moment.

Not everyone here agrees with what the current plan is and things could change at any point. Just thought I would put forth how another country is dealing with this virus. Seems like what the US is doing makes more sense, but not an expert so don't know what is correct thing to do is.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

Well, I got my early renewal incentive in the mail yesterday, so if they do cancel the season I'll get a refund and a new sweatshirt!

[dpapo]

Just to add what I just wrote. Another expert was talking on the news and said the type of closings large crowd bans, etc.. may be the best way to go is you ask a virus expert, but can also end up causing a higher spike. And if the number of cases doubles in a few days, England may have to change their plans. Trying to do a balancing act that may or may now work.

And should correct myself. It's England, not the UK that is taking this approach. Ireland has closed all schools for a couple weeks today. Scotland is banning large gatherings. Just seems like that is correct way to go to be safe, but England is taking a different approach for now.

[MrTPlush]

Rudy Gobert was not only careless at the press conference, but apparently was careless in the locker room touching teammates and varies belongings in the locker room.