The big story of the day Monday was the outbreak of COVID-19 cases on the Marlins, causing two MLB games to be postponed. With Ken Rosenthal doing a huge chunk of the reporting, several articles on the subject will be from The Athletic ($$).
First, he questions why the Marlins played baseball on Sunday, and that was before additional players tested positive. Now, basically half the roster has tested positive for COVID-19, and the probability that it is just the result of a few false positives is extremely miniscule. Manager Don Mattingly apparently discussed the situation with his team, and they chose to play via a group text message discussion. As was spoofed multiple times Monday, that might not have been the smartest decision.
After the postponement of the Marlins/Orioles and Phillies/Yankees, Rosenthal goes on to ask about the procedure from here. If a whole slew of players going down isn’t enough to cancel the season, what will? Multiple teams? A death? Contemplating these things might not be pretty, but we have to know. Meanwhile, the Phillies, including Didi Gregorius, who is high-risk, are contemplating things, and it’s really sobering to hear their words.
Dave Martinez levels with the media and says he’s scared, while David Price tweets that this is exactly why he opted out–he doesn’t trust the commissioner to have everyone’s interests at heart.
Meanwhile, Rob Manfred goes and refuses to call the situation “a nightmare.” Every time it seems there isn’t a spot lower for Manfred on the ladder, he manages to declimb another rung. He’s clearly not ready for the situation, as Emma Baccellieri points out.
The Angels lose. Shohei Ohtani, Justin Upton, and Albert Pujols look lost at the plate. Mike Trout seems to want to uppercut everything again. David Fletcher is good.
Anthony Rendon may be back tonight, but most likely he will make his Angel debut on Wednesday. It seems the 16-team playoff format will give us fans hope all season (if it lasts), no matter how many games the team loses.
Despite all of that, and despite the fact that the Angels appear (not that great) so far, MLB has no plans to cancel the season. It seems we can just do nothing but watch David Fletcher’s ascendancy into the best player in baseball.
Rendon in the lineup, 3rd behind Trout, ahead of Ohtani
Interesting that Joe put Upton ahead of Ohtani. Could be he’s trying to take less pressure of of Sho. He’s been trying to do too much it seems so hopefully hitting 5th will let him to relax and go back to the Ohtani of old.
Enjoy whatever games we get to see played, the odds of finishing the season do not look great.
who had July 31st in the pool? That’s my current guess.
I almost forgot theres 16 playoff teams. There’s still hope!!
Playoffs? I simply hope there’s still baseball this upcoming weekend.
good news about our 1-3 start (and how it would play out over 60 games)!
https://www.mlb.com/news/marlins-games-postponed-orioles-to-play-yankees
Miami postponed through Sunday, Yanks vs Phils postponed, Yanks and Orioles to play instead. We’re not gonna finish this season so if we were 4-0 we’d have been disappointed. Now it’s like a gift! I’d like Mike to get some hits and at least have some good stats by the time the whole thing closes down.
The Mandalorian racked up the Emmy noms, haha. Still need to see that
I’m not mad, i’m just disappointed.
Ha! Eventually I will…
It’s the best series I’ve seen since Agent Carter.
I found it was even better watching the 2nd time through!
Coming soon to the Angels? Mike Foltyznetweiqz?
https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/in-surprise-move-braves-to-designate-mike-foltynewicz-for-assignment/
I need to find out his spin rate.
His Scrabble rating is unbeatable
I think Marc Rzepczynski has him beat on that one, actually! The LL folks even called him Scrabble, haha.
He’ll need two jerseys to fit his last name on the back.
Apparently, he’s lost a ton of weight compared to last season. Might explain the velo decrease. 🙁
I’m not opposed to letting him try to figure out the bullpen. Maybe shorter stints can help with some of the velo and he can try again next year as a starter. He’s arb eligible next year
I understand he’s the grandson of Mr. Mxyzptlk.
With the news regarding the Marlins team, I think it’s time to think of the greater good and just cancel the season. It’s not good for anyone’s psyche to be thinking each day, “Will I get infected today? Did I get infected yesterday? Etc.” Whether the players admit it or not, that will take a toll on anyone who’s coming up to pitch and/or bat. It’s way different than just the mentality of coming back from an injury and getting into game shape and mentality. It also didn’t help that the season didn’t even last a week and there’s already a bad outbreak that has happened.
In case anyone else was like me and forgot to do this after our most recent loss:/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/4130974/turn-page_1_.0.gif)
We’re going to need a bigger book.
The Angels are wasting David Fletcher’s prime.
The Marlins situation, and the entire 500lb gorilla that is Covid, is weighing on Trout – it has to be. He has a baby due in a week. If it’s not a nightmare for Manfred, it is for Trout. I think that Trout’s worries are iweighing on the team as a whole. A bunch of players do not seem to be focused.
As for players who look lost at the plate, I would add Simba who has forgotten how to take a pitch.
Finally, we will need to see how many Phillies test positive before we can really evaluate the Marlins situation. If a bunch of them test positive, that may be the death knell for the season as it would establish that the virus can be easily passed player-to-player while playing baseball.
He can’t take his cell phone out on the field. He’s probably standing out there thinking “What if she goes into labor? What if she goes into labor?” over and over again.
Jess has likely leased a between innings billboard message in every stadium. To be displayed as soon as she heads to Hoag.
800lb gorilla has been dieting HARD … OMAD or Atkins?
I didn’t see the game, but couldn’t canning have stayed in another inning? Not yet 90, already down an insurmountable lead. Offense sputtering because all of the bats are spread out, and can be pitched around. Five inning games ain’t going to cut it
Interestingly, the offense isn’t as bad as people are saying. If I’m not mistaken I think we outhit the A’s. We had what, 7 hits? I think the A’s had 6. With 7 hits you have to score 3 or at least 2 runs. It is more the fact that we are horrible in RISP situations. And that is where the rubber meets the road; to win in MLB you have to execute in the big, high leverage situations. We are horrible at that. Friday night Ohtani gets caught off of 2nd — he can’t let that happen. Plain and simple. Then yesterday we absolutely imploded in that 4th inning. Simba simply can’t do what he did there — chasing the first pitch that was waaaay low. The game was riding on that AB. A hit there and we win. Even a sac fly gives us a decent chance to come back and win. They had Bassit on the ropes and just took horrible approaches. We are getting guys on (thanks mostly to Fletch and Goodwin and Trout) but the middle of the order is not coming through for us.
The offense is again very top heavy. Fletcher, Trout hitting with nothing from Albert or Upton has been way too common for way too long. Ohtani is lost right now but isn’t too far removed from productivity, Rendon should be back. Would’ve been great to add Joc.
La Stella reminds me of Major League 2 when the guy wants to go yard every swing and ruins his entire game.
I don’t know how stretched out Canning was, but with my fondness for him and belief that he actually pitched decently well, I would have left him in.
4 more Malins tested positive, 17 total for now. Today’s Phillies-Skanks game cancelled as well.
Malins, sounds about right /s.
My son was saying they need to test the whole plane that these players came in over from the DR. He was saying all the Dominican players in the league flew to the US on one plane.
How does that make those players any more at risk than the players taking planes within the US? We are the covid capital of the world, particularly the US South, and it’s not close.
It seems that when the players left the DR. They all caught on one plane together, because of COVID-19, and then split up to their respected training camps. My son was saying the league should track the players, but it is probably too late for that anyway.
One plane, many players getting sick, probably don’t want to get tested for anything(Nelson Cruz and others) to begin with. League wasn’t enforcing any testing in the DR, here, and MLB is letting 1998 happen on the field all over again.
Who adhered to the curfews? You can see all the bad oversight on a few teams. Some people just don’t understand the severity of their actions, or inactions, regarding COVID-19. Some are just better than the rest.
Players are tested for covid daily before being allowed to practice/play, and this Marlins outbreak happened several days after the season already started. Which means the positive players got it from either (a) breaking protocol or (b) community transmission without direct contact. Neither is good, but it’s at least explainable if (a).
That being said, cancel the darn season.
On the Baseball side of this our offense is just pathetic. But! the M’s are coming and that may bode well for our bats and if not it will be the end of the run for Eppler. While saddled with Albert he is also responsible for 5 years of the weakest pitching staffs, weak draft results and being the sole blame for Brad. Time to hire experience at the GM spot. Upton, has he got a case of just taking the money and going through the motions? Why is Albert in the line up? Is one of my favorites, Simba, still hurting and lost his bat? Does anyone know where last years Goodwin went? Where is Trouty and what did you do to him? Who’s on first. Which of Thaiss, Ward and Welsh will have the best season? Will the Angels really win 30 of 60? see you folks at game time.
l hope that there will be some that will agree with me when l write that the motives of Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred does not have the best interest of the Fans, Players and the game of Baseball in his sights. As a lifelong baseball fan l can say that l have been watching the last 4 game on TV. But this virus is actually bigger than the game. It is time to shut the game down if one more team has a group of players get sick. Toronto has to play in Buffalo New York because Canada has got the proper idea. There will be a vaccine by no later than the new year, Stats are not worth getting a virus that no one knows the long term consequences that will be with people who come down with it. Is it worth it if a player or umpire or coach or anyone else comes down with Covid-19 and then passes it on to a family member. l do not have an answer for the economy unfortunately, this is a tough call l know, but it is tougher to have a child get sick, or a mom or dad become ill, or a grandparent die alone in the hospital all alone. Masks alone does not protect you enough, but no masks has no protection for anyone. This infection cares not if you are a MLB ballplayer or a team employee as compromised individuals will become sick to extreme and even death. l hope you will not believe that l am over reacting, but l know what l am saying is as real as is the pandemic like Covid-19 is real and people are dying.
Death makes the game seem small IMHO.
Insurance money has the owner’s best interests and total attention. But like any good policies, they can only collect under certain circumstances, and they are making them happen.
AFLAC?
I’m afraid that the Marlins situation will be repeated among many MLB teams and will play havoc with scheduling. Player’s anxiety will surely affect their performance as well. Manfred is clearly incapable of handling this.
He and Goodell are one and the same in terms of spineless leadership. /smashcut to Manfred eating paste in his office.
His ascendency to leadership is a sentinel problem in this country in major corporations/entities. He of little qualification, devoid entirely of leadership traits, and completely incapable of properly leading in a normal situation, much less a crisis. No surprise we see this repeated in sports.
They don’t lead, they listen and have some to little input on the long term goals, and most short term goals.
They both have way too many bosses, but still easily suck on thier own.
It very well may repeat itself and I’m with you on scheduling. As of now it looks like 2 series will need to be made up by adding double headers and/or playing on precious rest days. And that is if this doesn’t repeat. Do this a few more times and the last couple of weeks of the schedule get impossible to configure.
The MLBPA pushed back against the bubble concept, many of the games biggest stars wouldn’t have gone for it. Instead they trusted each other to stay safe away from the ballpark and young men aren’t known for making safe decisions.