Tag: coronavirus

Red Sox to Hold Second Version of Spring Training in Boston, per Report

The Red Sox, along with the 29 other Major League Baseball clubs, will hold their second version of spring training in their home cities rather than in Arizona or Florida, according to USA Today’s Bob Nightengale.

This news comes one day after MLB ordered all regular spring training facilities be shut down in order to undergo a deep clean. That coming on the heels of several players and staff in the Blue Jays and Phillies organizations testing positive for COVID-19.

The Red Sox’ spring training facility, Fenway South in Fort Myers, Fla., had been open to players since late May. Alex Verdugo, Chris Sale, Jackie Bradley Jr., and Tzu-Wei Lin were among the players who returned to JetBlue Park after the complex underwent a deep cleanse of its own back in late March after a minor-league tested positive for the virus.

If Nightengale’s report is indeed true, it seems unlikely that the Sox would limit themselves to just using Fenway Park in this second version of spring training, especially considering the volume of players that would need to be on hand in this scenario.

When speaking with WCVB’s Duke Castiglione last week on this subject, Red Sox manager Ron Roenicke said that if spring training were to be held in Boston, “Some colleges have reached out with their facilities if we are in Boston and have offered their fields and the use of their equipment.”

Boston College, Northeastern University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are among the colleges with baseball teams in the area.

At this point in time, there is no start date for a 2020 MLB season, if there even is one. With that, there is no start date for the beginning of spring training, either. So there are still plenty of obstacles, both in terms of COVID-19 and finances, to hurdle before a concrete plan is set in motion.

Blogging the Red Sox Presents: An Interview With Chaim Bloom

When Major League Baseball first suspended spring training and delayed the start of the 2020 season back in March due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, I sent an email to Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom asking if I could send him a handful of questions pertaining to those aforementioned events taking place.

It took some time, but after sorting things out with the club’s media relations department over the last few weeks, I have in my virtual possession the written responses to the questions I sent him.

Rather than structure this article like a story you would typically see on here, I am instead going to enclose the “transcript” of the “interview” below. So please enjoy, and remember, these questions were sent earlier in the spring, before this year’s draft and before MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said he’s not “100%” confident there will be a season this year.

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Would you rather the Red Sox host spring training workouts in Boston or Fort Myers?

Chaim Bloom: This is such a unique year – it forces us to rethink everything that goes into spring training. There are certainly benefits to both places and we’re hoping to get a clearer idea of exactly what 2020 will look like before we firm up a plan. In the meantime, we’re working on parallel tracks to make sure we’re ready for whatever makes the most sense once we see the schedule as a whole.

How has it been preparing for this year’s draft with less material to go over than usual?

Bloom: The process to prepare for the 2020 draft really favored those staffs who had done their homework in the summer and the fall. When you have a hard-working staff with a lot of continuity, which we do, that’s one aspect we were well prepared to take advantage of. The biggest challenge for all 30 clubs was how to weigh those spring samples, which were either small or nonexistent. If a player changed dramatically from what he’d been, how much weight do you put on that? Is that who he is now – was it a real step forward or back – or was it just a small-sample fluke? Those types of discussions were some of the most interesting that we had amongst our staff.

Who in the front office or scouting department would be best at convincing undrafted players to sign with the Red Sox for up to $20,000?

Bloom: The decision to play pro ball is a very personal one for a lot of players and this year is no different. We certainly want to make the case to interested players that we’re the organization that can get the most out of them and maximize their potential. But we also want this to be a mutual fit, who see themselves as well-positioned to take advantage of what we have to offer. When those things line up, we will be set up well to have success in development.

Despite the current freeze placed on any sort of roster moves, have you had any conversations with free agents or other general managers during this period?

Bloom: Along with others in the front office, I’ve continued to speak to counterparts and contacts throughout the game, but not to discuss trades or roster moves. That’s just not appropriate right now and there have been many other issues to worry about.

As a spectator, how different would it be for you to watch Major League Baseball be played in empty ballparks? Would that impact the way you view or analyze a certain player since there would be no crowd noise to react to?

Bloom: It would be different, that’s for sure. I don’t think we know exactly how players will react. But I’d be hesitant to give too much blame or credit to the attendance (or lack thereof) when assessing how a player performs. There’s so much that goes into what these guys do that I don’t know how we could separate the signal from the noise. They’re pros and I have every reason to think they’ll be locked in when the time comes to compete.

Finally, how odd has it been to not have any live stateside baseball to watch at this point in the year? There are obviously more pressing issues at hand in this country, but as someone who has been part of a major-league front office in some capacity since 2005, this has to be kind of strange, no?

Bloom: No question. This is not an experience that has been fun for anyone in the game. We’ve done what we can to make the most of the time, but we’re all in this because we love baseball and when there isn’t any, it’s a downer. Having said that, we know that public health and the safety of our players, our staff, and our fans is and should be higher priorities. Those things have to come first, but we’re hopeful that we can provide some entertainment for our fans during this really difficult period.

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Thank you to Chaim Bloom and Red Sox vice president of media relations Kevin Gregg for making this possible. 

Red Sox Make Pay Cuts for Employees Making Upwards of $50K; Said One Staffer: ‘People Are Livid’

The Red Sox have begun implementing pay cuts to their non-playing staff, according to The Athletic’s Evan Drellich.

Per Drellich, these pay cuts are for those employees making $50,000 or more per year and are tiered in the following fashion.

“Salary of $50K-99K is 20%

$100 to $499K is 25%

$500K-plus is 30%”

As Drellich notes, the employees who make $100,000 are being treated in just about the same way those making upwards of $500,000 are, which has led to the following statement from a Red Sox staffer:

“People are livid.”

This news was apparently broken at a company meeting held by the Red Sox on Friday night, according to The Boston Globe’s Alex Speier. In this particular meeting, the club announced that there would be no furloughs or layoffs, just salary cuts for those employees making upwards of $50,000 as previously mentioned.

Earlier Friday, the Red Sox announced that 22 minor-league players had been released on Thursday, so it definitely appears that John Henry, Tom Werner, and Co. are trying to cut down on costs amid the COVID-19 pandemic that has put the 2020 baseball season on hold for the time being.

Red Sox Will Pay Minor-League Players $400 per Week Through End of August

The Red Sox will pay their minor-league players $400 per week through the end of August, or what would have been the end of the 2020 minor-league season, according to The Boston Globe’s Alex Speier.

This news comes a day after the club released 22 minor-league players amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Minor-leaguers have been financially supported by Major League Baseball since March, but that commitment only runs through the end of May.

From there, it will be up to the major-league clubs to extend the salaries of their minor-league players, and it appears that the Red Sox are one of several teams who will be doing so beginning next month.

Per Speier, “All minor leaguers in the Red Sox system who aren’t covered by a major-league contract — meaning who aren’t on the 40-man roster — will receive the $400 weekly stipend.”

As noted by ESPN’s Jeff Passan on Thursday, up to 1,000 minor-leaguers could be released in the next week or so. The majority of these cuts were expected to be made before spring training was suspended, but it is still a tough time for the sport nonetheless, as many professional baseball careers may be coming to an end sooner than expected.

 

Red Sox Release 22 Minor-League Players Amid COVID-19 Pandemic

The Red Sox released 22 minor-league players on Thursday, per a team release.

It’s worth noting that these cuts would have likely still been made before spring training was suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but with it looking more and more probable that there will be no minor-league baseball season at all in 2020, it’s very likely the minor-leaguers who were released on Thursday’s may have just seen their professional baseball careers come to a close.

The 22 players released by the Red Sox include 10 pitchers, three catchers, five infielders, and four outfielders:

Right-handed pitchers: Matthew Gorst, Dylan Thompson, Robbie Baker, Chris Machamer, Connor Berry, Eddie Jimenez, Zach Schneider and Mason Duke.

Left-handed pitchers: Alex Demchak and Kelvin Sanchez.

Catchers: Joe DeCarlo, Samuel Miranda, and Breiner Licona.

Infielders: Nick Lovullo, Juremi Profar, Korby Batesole, Andre Colon, and Nilo Rijo.

Outfielders: Edgar Corcino, Keith Curcio, Trenton Kemp, and Marino Campana.

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Among the notable cuts are Nick Lovullo, son of former Red Sox bench coach and current Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo, and Juremi Profar, the younger brother of Padres infielder Jurickson Profar.

Lovullo, who turned 26 last December, was drafted by Boston in the 20th round of the 2016 amateur draft out of Holy Cross in Worcester. He played 79 games across three minor-league levels last season.

Profar, meanwhile, signed a minor-league deal with Boston back in November after previously spending time in the Rangers farm system.

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These cuts come at a time where hundreds, if not thousands of minor-leaguers are losing their jobs all across baseball as clubs continue to cut costs due to the ongoing pandemic.

This is just an assumption, but I think it’s fair to say that what goes down in minor-league baseball this week is a precursor for what’s to come in 2021 and/or 2022. To put it simply, the infrastructure of minor-league baseball as we know it will soon be changing in drastic fashion.

Red Sox Pitching Coach Dave Bush Tells His Pitchers to Maintain ‘Normal Throwing Programs’ While Awaiting MLB’s Return

At this point exactly one year ago, Red Sox pitchers had combined to throw exactly 411 innings through the club’s first 46 games of the 2019 season.

Flash forward to 2020, and that number of innings pitched on the same date stands at zero, and it appears that it will stay at zero until at least early July.

First-year Red Sox pitching coach Dave Bush, who was appointed to the position last October in place of Dana LeVangie, would be learning the ropes of his new post under normal circumstances. Instead, due to the COVID-19 pandemic that has put Major League Baseball on hold for the time being, Bush, like many across the sport, have to find new ways to coach up his players.

In a recent conversation with The Athletic’s Peter Gammons, Bush, 40, said that he has told the Boston pitching staff to stick with “normal throwing programs” until they know when they can get back to a spring training setting and can “begin a supervised program for the season” from there.

This is the same sort of sentiment Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom echoed earlier this month in a radio interview with WEEI’s Ordway, Merloni, and Fauria regarding the pandemic-induced shutdown’s effect on players.

“Even if we have a spring training, however long that spring training is, guys will need to get ramped up well in advance of that to make sure they’re in shape and make sure they can safely get back up to ready to roll whenever the season does start,” he said. “We are so used to working backward from a specific start date and we can’t do that right now. So we’re trying to keep them at a level that is responsible where we’re not trying to get them at too high a gear and then ask them to hold. But we also want to make sure they don’t run out of time to get up to speed if and when we do get a specific start date. So we’re just trying to find that happy medium.”

The conventional version of spring training was suspended by MLB on March 13th. The majority of Red Sox players left Fort Myers at the time to return to their respective homes, but it appears that some individuals, such as Alex Verdugo and Chris Sale, have returned to work out at the Fenway South complex in recent weeks. More could return relatively soon, too, considering how Florida has been loosening its COVID-19-related restrictions across the state.

According to Gammons, MLB clubs are currently terrified of two things. The first being a potential second wave of the coronavirus and all the ramifications that come with it, and the second being “that the re-ramping-up process, coming four-plus months after the initial ramping-up process, will result in a rash of injuries.”

To add on to that, Gammons writes, “Two prominent orthopedic surgeons with significant baseball experience have predicted waiting lines at the doors of Dr. James Andrews, Dr. Neal ElAttrache and the many other physicians who have preserved so many careers.”

The re-ramping up process that Gammons mentions should be a concern for pitching coaches and general managers across the league. I can’t say for sure, but it seems like these guys went into ‘prepare for the season mode’ around the same time they are accustomed to and then all of a sudden were told to go into ‘offseason mode’ just like that. I’m no pitching guru, but disrupting someone’s routine like that has to have negative connotations, right?

For now, it will be fascinating to see how Bush continues to coach his pitching staff without being in the same physical location as them.

Red Sox Could Play Games at Empty Fenway Park This Summer, per Boston Mayor Marty Walsh

Boston mayor Marty Walsh is open to the idea of the Red Sox playing games at Fenway Park this summer under two conditions: no fans would be allowed in the stands and the City of Boston would have have to sign off on “advanced health and safety protocols that protect not only the athletes, but also everyone else reporting to the workplace,” per The Boston Globe’s Michael Silverman.

Speaking with Silverman in an over-the-phone interview earlier Friday, Walsh emphasized the safety of all parties involved in this challenging process.

“Yes, as long as the players and the teams and the support staff and all the people that are associated with it are safe and feel comfortable,” he said, “Obviously, their health is important to me as well, many of them are constituents of mine and even if they’re not constituents of mine, I obviously want people to be healthy and safe. That’s going to be the biggest challenge that they’re going to have to figure out and meet if they’re going to move forward here.”

Walsh mentioned how he had recently spoken with Red Sox team president and CEO Sam Kennedy. The two talked about MLB’s plan to get baseball back this year, although no specific dates to get the sport back have been set to this point in time.

Still, the league and its players association are hashing out negotiations about a potential return to baseball in 2020, and if an agreement is reached sooner rather than later, the City of Boston would have to ensure that MLB’s COVID-19 protocols meet its own.

“We want to see the plan,” Walsh said. “We’ll have our public health experts take a look at it and make sure that they feel like everything is covered that needs to be covered moving forward here…They’re personal teams and they have employees, and we want to make sure the teams and the employees are taking care of everything and looking through it all so that we can make sure if it does open it’s open in a safe way and the virus doesn’t spread.”

This applies to the Bruins and Celtics, whose respective seasons were abruptly suspended in March, as well.

Opening Fenway Park and the TD Garden back up to its tenants does not involve letting fans back in anytime soon, however. This is mainly due to the fact that we are still pretty far away from getting a vaccine.

Despite how unfortunate that may sound for fans across the city, Walsh is still looking forward to the return of professional sports. whenever that may be.

“I think if baseball could come back like we’re seeing in Taiwan and South Korea, I think that’s good for people to have a distraction,” Walsh said. “I think sports is one aspect of that. People have different reasons for distraction and sports is one, and I think it would help a lot of people’s psyches as far as having baseball and sports back.”

To get sports back at all though, one would assume that the City of Boston would have to open back up first. And until more information is gathered on the ever-changing coronavirus, that still might not be for quite some time.

Former Red Sox Star Mookie Betts Buys Groceries for Shoppers at Tennessee Supermarket

Under normal circumstances, former Red Sox star and current Dodgers outfielder Mookie Betts would be about seven weeks into the 2020 season with his new club.

Instead, due to the COVID-19 pandemic that has put the MLB season on hold for the time being, Betts, like many across the country and world, are stuck at home for the most part.

While it’s still unclear how many games will be played or how much players will be paid this year, which is important in Betts’ case since he will become a free agent for the first time this winter, that is not stopping the 27-year-old from spreading some goodwill during these uncertain times.

According to WSMV-TV’s Chris Harris, Betts “surprised shoppers at the Kroger in Bordeaux, Tenn. by buying their groceries.” The Nashville native also “treated the staff at the store to pizza to thank them for all the hard work they have been doing as essential front-line workers.”

A very generous gesture from a very generous person. Remember, Betts supplied several trays of food to the homeless community outside of the Boston Public Library in the hours following Game 2 of the 2018 World Series at Fenway Park.

He has also used his other passion, bowling, to raise money for various causes in Tennessee and New England in recent years.

MLB Owners Approve Proposal for 2020 Season, League Will Present Plan to Players’ Union Tuesday

Major League Baseball owners have approved a proposal from the league for the 2020 season to present to the MLB Players’ Union, according to The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal. The two sides are expected to meet sometime on Tuesday to discuss said plan.

This marks another step towards potentially getting Major League Baseball this year, and as ESPN’s Jeff Passan states, “now is when it starts to get serious.”

Of course, where things go from here depends on how the players’ union feels about all this.

For starters, “Because games, at least initially, will be played without fans, the players’ would be asked to accept a further reduction in pay, most likely by agreeing to a set percentage of revenues for this season only.”

This idea of revenue sharing is apparently a ‘non-starter’ in any proposal the union gets from the league, per The New York Post’s Joel Sherman. Other hurdles include “making players comfortable with protocols/personnel/equipment that play can resume safely,” as well as where teams will play their games.

More specifically, according to Rosenthal, “Teams unable to open in their cities [due to the COVID-19 pandemic] temporarily would relocate, either to their spring training sites or major-league parks in other parts of the country. The same would apply to spring training 2.0 if the league decides to use mostly home parks as opposed to returning to Florida and Arizona.”

The problem with this is that “Not all clubs agree they should train in their home parks, believing spring locales offer a less densely populated, more controlled environment.”

Regionalized schedules consisting of anywhere between 78-82 games and expanded playoffs have also been discussed, while a universal designated hitter and expanded rosters could also be implemented if there is indeed baseball in 2020.

That final part, for now, is still up in the air, though. And although I can’t say for sure, it would appear that the players’ union has final say on the matter. We should hear more about where the MLBPA goes with this on Tuesday.

 

2021 World Baseball Classic Cancelled Due to Coronavirus Pandemic

The 2021 World Baseball Classic will be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to ESPN’s Enrique Rojas.

Per Rojas, a source told him, “The tournament was canceled. It is not the priority right now,” while another source said, “Basically the only thing missing is an official announcement.”

The fifth installment of the international baseball tournament was scheduled to take place from March 9th until March 23rd of next year in the United States, Taiwan, and Japan.

16 countries — Australia, Canada, China, Colombia, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Taiwan, Israel, Italy, Japan, South Korea, the Netherlands, Mexico, Puerto Rico, the United States and Venezuela — had already qualified for the 2021 WBC since they all participated in 2017.

However, with the tournament increasing its number of participating teams to 20, two additional qualifying tournaments were set to take place in Arizona in March, but they were cancelled due to the ongoing pandemic.

The cancellations of those qualifying events came about three weeks before the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo were also postponed.

As Rojas states, “Because the [WBC] is part of the current Collective Labor Agreement (CBA) between MLB and its players union, which expires in December 2021, rescheduling the tournament must be negotiated.”

USA Today’s Bob Nightengale is reporting that the next World Baseball Classic will either be held in 2023 or 2025. More specific details will likely come into focus once Major League Baseball and the MLBPA agree on a specific date in future negotiations.