WEBVTT - Miami Marlins Season on Pause After Team Suffers COVID-19 Outbreak

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<v Speaker 1>It's Wednesday, July. I'm Oscar Ramirez from the Daily Dive

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<v Speaker 1>podcast in Los Angeles, and this is reopening America. Baseball

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<v Speaker 1>has been having a rough go as they began their

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<v Speaker 1>sixty games season amid the pandemic. MLB has paused season

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<v Speaker 1>for the Miami Marlins after an outbreak of COVID nineteen

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<v Speaker 1>among players and staff. One big issue for them is

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<v Speaker 1>the misalignment between the playing schedule, testing schedule, and protocols

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<v Speaker 1>for what happens in between. Louise Radnovski, sports reporter at

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<v Speaker 1>the Wall Street Journal, joins us for more. Thanks for

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<v Speaker 1>joining us, Louise, Thank you for having me. I wanted

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<v Speaker 1>to talk about baseball in the time of coronavirus. They

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<v Speaker 1>just got their sixty game season under way and it's

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<v Speaker 1>already run into a whole mess of problems. The Miami

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<v Speaker 1>Marlin season was paused by Major League Baseball admit an

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<v Speaker 1>outbreak of COVID nineteen. I think they had fifteen players

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<v Speaker 1>and two staff members have tested positive. I think it's

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<v Speaker 1>been paused at least through Sun Day as of now.

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<v Speaker 1>That could all change, and you know, we'll have to

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<v Speaker 1>see if any more players on the Marlins or any

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<v Speaker 1>other teams that they might have come in contact with

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<v Speaker 1>test positive. But this is kind of exposing a lot

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<v Speaker 1>of holes in their return to work strategy. Louise, you

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<v Speaker 1>wrote a story about how the scheduling is all off

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<v Speaker 1>on everything. They're playing schedule, the testing schedule, and then

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<v Speaker 1>the protocols for what happens in between. Tell us about it.

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<v Speaker 1>I think it's helpful to compare what's happening in baseball

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<v Speaker 1>to something that people have seen in action for a

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<v Speaker 1>number of weeks now, which is the bubble model. Baseball's

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<v Speaker 1>protocols are somewhat the opposite of the bubble. They're playing

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<v Speaker 1>a very long season, shorter than usual, but still very

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<v Speaker 1>long season relative to the one month that folks, for example,

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<v Speaker 1>in the nationalton Sucker League, we're in a bubble in

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<v Speaker 1>Utah playing a long season. They're playing a lot of

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<v Speaker 1>games in that season very close together. They're moving around

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<v Speaker 1>a lot, and they're also testing. They're not testing as

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<v Speaker 1>frequently as folks inside the bubble or testing, which is

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<v Speaker 1>every day in some cases, is using a laboratory that's

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<v Speaker 1>very close by that they can drive the results to

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<v Speaker 1>and get relatively quickly. They are shipping in stead in

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<v Speaker 1>baseball their results to labs in Salt Lake City or

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<v Speaker 1>in New Jersey, and it can take up to forty

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<v Speaker 1>eight hours for results to come back. They're also testing

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<v Speaker 1>every other day. So what you had in the case

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<v Speaker 1>of the Marlins and actually in the case of the

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<v Speaker 1>Washington Nationals on the very opening game of opening Day,

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<v Speaker 1>is a situation in which you can have players going

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<v Speaker 1>out onto the field without knowing what their status is

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<v Speaker 1>at that time, including in the case of the Nationals,

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<v Speaker 1>knowing that one of their teammates had tested PUGS tests

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<v Speaker 1>taking two days earlier, that they just learned the results

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<v Speaker 1>of the morning of Thursday, when Opening Day was due

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<v Speaker 1>to start. And what happens with all of this it

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<v Speaker 1>makes us complicated contact tracing assignment for people, especially just

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<v Speaker 1>going with the Marlins situation. They've played already in three cities, Miami, Atlanta,

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<v Speaker 1>and Philadelphia over the past ten days, and they have

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<v Speaker 1>to go back to see where it all started. What

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<v Speaker 1>you have, even the bubble, is a scenario in which

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<v Speaker 1>if somebody tests positive, you know relatively quickly you can

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<v Speaker 1>isolate them. And what you've seen in the bubble is

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<v Speaker 1>there have been some number of positive tests and the

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<v Speaker 1>number has fallen over time to zero. What you've seen

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<v Speaker 1>in four days of baseball is the exact opposite. You

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<v Speaker 1>learned two days later that somebody tested positive, and by

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<v Speaker 1>that time the team could be an entirely different city

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<v Speaker 1>to the one they were in before, playing an entirely

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<v Speaker 1>different team where the team that they've just played has

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<v Speaker 1>gone on to play another team as well. So that's

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<v Speaker 1>soulmaking for a very troubling scenario. If you believe that

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<v Speaker 1>the field is where transmission is occurring, even if it's not,

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<v Speaker 1>then you've got a scenario where the clubhouses really come

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<v Speaker 1>under particular scrutiny. And neither scenario is good. In some ways,

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<v Speaker 1>this outbreak being confined to one team is the better

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<v Speaker 1>of two scenarios for baseball. You know, in a sixty

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<v Speaker 1>game schedule, how do you catch up? There's already been

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<v Speaker 1>a bunch of postponed games. The teams are gonna have

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<v Speaker 1>to play multiple games in a day possibly, or you know,

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<v Speaker 1>throughout the week or whatever. Can it become too unwieldy

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<v Speaker 1>for MLB to catch up? From an infectious disease standpoint,

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<v Speaker 1>The important part of catching up is how you hold

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<v Speaker 1>things in their tracks to stop the food spreading further.

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<v Speaker 1>So while baseball is wondering things like how do you

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<v Speaker 1>catch up with calendar, I don't call a question of

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<v Speaker 1>how you catch up with the contact tracing and the

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<v Speaker 1>testing schedule going forward. What's clear is what's being improved

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<v Speaker 1>with Marlin's does give the folks who are working on

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<v Speaker 1>the infectious disease side some opportunity to stop assess where

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<v Speaker 1>people are at before they move further, which just makes

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<v Speaker 1>us an even harder target to pin down in terms

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<v Speaker 1>of finding out who's infectious who's not before they have

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<v Speaker 1>a chance to infect many other people. Obviously, the logistics

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<v Speaker 1>are a nightmare when it comes to something like this

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<v Speaker 1>so many games. Obviously the teams might be a little

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<v Speaker 1>bit bigger than a NBA team, But why did they

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<v Speaker 1>choose not to go with some type of bubble situation.

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<v Speaker 1>The size of the roster was a huge part of it.

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<v Speaker 1>They didn't think that they could find the location or

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<v Speaker 1>local is necessary that were big enough to put all

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<v Speaker 1>of those people in a closed system. On top of that,

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<v Speaker 1>they were looking at doing that for months as opposed

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<v Speaker 1>to weeks, which is also a difficult thing to sustain

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<v Speaker 1>for period of time. Even with the cooperation of the

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<v Speaker 1>people in the bubble and what they didn't have with

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<v Speaker 1>that corporation because players didn't want to leave their families

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<v Speaker 1>for months at a time to be sequestered. Has there

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<v Speaker 1>been any reaction from the Marlins from MLB at large

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<v Speaker 1>just saying something more than just these pauses. Well, what

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<v Speaker 1>we've heard from MLB is that they don't think that

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<v Speaker 1>this is a terrible situation. In fact, specifically of the

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<v Speaker 1>phrase used by the commissioner on MLB Network on Monday

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<v Speaker 1>night was that this isn't a nightmare scenario. They think

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<v Speaker 1>the protocols that they have in place are effective and

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<v Speaker 1>that they are doing what they need to do to

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<v Speaker 1>keep players as safe as possible, which is not a

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<v Speaker 1>standard of nobody gets infected. It's a standard of we

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<v Speaker 1>believe we can control or limit outbreaks, not necessarily even

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<v Speaker 1>to one team. There is a scenario they en physition

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<v Speaker 1>which the team uses so many players to infection that

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<v Speaker 1>they become non competitive and that team might have to

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<v Speaker 1>drop out of competition. But they don't see a scenario

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<v Speaker 1>in which right now this is going to lead to

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<v Speaker 1>them shutting down the season, And they don't see that

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<v Speaker 1>the protocols that they presumably continue to intend to use,

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<v Speaker 1>are going to cause that kind of problem later in

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<v Speaker 1>the season. Well, it was always going to be a

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<v Speaker 1>crazy season, so we'll just have to keep monitoring and

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<v Speaker 1>seeing what develops with the pandemic and these players. Luis Radnovski,

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<v Speaker 1>sports reporter for The Wall Street Journal, thank you very

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<v Speaker 1>much for joining us. Thank you for having me. I'm

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<v Speaker 1>Astar Ramirez and this has been reopening America. Don't forget

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<v Speaker 1>ever today's big news stories. You can check me out

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<v Speaker 1>on the Daily Dive podcast every money through Friday. So

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<v Speaker 1>follow us an I Heeart Radio or wherever you get

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