With the Major League Baseball season becoming more precarious seemingly by the day amid a slow but steady stream of new coronavirus cases among the teams, the league’s commissioner, Rob Manfred, issued something of a rallying cry.

“We are playing,” Manfred told ESPN on Saturday. “The players need to be better, but I am not a quitter in general and there is no reason to quit now. We have had to be fluid, but it is manageable.”

Those words bothered some players in the sport and some health experts outside it. Two outbreaks — 20 cases among the Miami Marlins and six among the St. Louis Cardinals, as of Sunday afternoon — less than two weeks into the season have wreaked havoc on the schedules of eight teams and raised questions about M.L.B.’s protocols and the role of the players’ individual responsibilities in stopping the virus.

In saying the games would go on, Manfred thrust the onus on the players.

“I don’t know Rob’s situation, and I don’t want to put my foot in my mouth on that one,” Chicago Cubs pitcher Jon Lester told reporters on Saturday. “But I do know we — not only the players, but families — are making sacrifices day in and day out. I don’t want to put my foot in my mouth. I guess I’ll stop there.”

Source: New York Times

Powered by NewsAPI.org