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While we can’t be sure when baseball will return if at all, Major League Baseball is reportedly putting a plan in place in case the window opens for a season to be played in 2020. Matt Spiegel of 670 AM The Score in Chicago has put together a possible outline while citing “a well informed source” that does business with MLB executives. Here is what it would look like as laid out by FanGraphs’ Jay Jaffe.
Citing “a well informed source that does business with multiple MLB execs,” Spiegel reported that MLB is discussing the possibility of a 100-game season that would begin July 1; eliminate the All-Star Game, which is currently scheduled for July 14 at Dodger Stadium; eventually pick up the post All-Star Game schedule; and run through October 15. Instead of hosting the All-Star Game, Dodger Stadium would serve as a neutral site for a warm-weather World Series, with Anaheim or San Diego serving as a second site if the Dodgers — whom FanGraphs projected to be the best team in baseball, with 97 wins and a 97.6% chance of making the playoffs over a 162-game season — make the World Series. The scenario assumes that the ALCS and NLCS would still take place at the venues of the qualifying teams, a risk given the possibility that those series could stretch to November 3. Of course, “many questions remain, & talks are fluid,” according to Spiegel.
Given the current situation, that scenario would feel like a home run if it could be pulled off. While there are plenty of hurdles that will have to be cleared first, this does seem like a workable plan provided teams could return for an abbreviated spring training sometime in June.
Braves News
We could all use a good pick me up now and The Athletic’s Jeff Schultz does a good job providing it by putting together a Top 10 list of the greatest sports memories in Atlanta history. Hank Aaron tops the list and the Braves are well represented throughout.
In a wide ranging interview with The Athletic’s David O’Brien, former Braves catcher Evan Gattis discusses the Astros’ sign stealing scandal and says that he and his former Houston teammates “cheated baseball and cheated fans.”
“I get home (from Florida) and reality sets in in my neighborhood,” he said. “I feel bad for everybody around here who has business and are having to lay people off. Or maybe they’re one of the people who’ve gotten laid off. I talked to a buddy of mine (Wednesday) from Louisiana, and his company has had to lay off a number of people because in an oil industry, the prices are what they are and they can’t take on jobs. It’s tough, man. Our situation is bad, but there’s a lot of people doing a lot worse than we are.”
In this week’s Starting Nine column, Cory McCartney examines Braves legend Dale Murphy with a series of facts, stats and stories that you may not have known about the 80s icon.
It was easy to get overshadowed as a Braves pitcher in the 90s but here is a closer look at left-hander Kent Mercker who no-hit the Dodgers 26 years ago this month.
MLB Pipeline has a put together a list of each team’s most hyped first base prospects of the past 20 years. No surprise, but Freddie Freeman is the Braves representative and is one of the best players on the entire list.
MLB News
Good news for Dodgers fans if there is baseball played in 2020. DirecTV will include Sportsnet LA in their channel lineup this season giving nearly all fans in Los Angeles access to the games for the first time since 2013.
ESPN’s Buster Olney reports that former Astros GM Jeff Luhnow and manager A.J. Hinch will not serve any suspension time beyond this season. So if the 2020 season were to be canceled, both Luhnow and Hinch would be eligible to return in 2021.