14 Marlins players and coaches test positive for Covid - MLB season in jeopardy

[FredJacket]

According to ESPN, the Cardinals now have 13 players and staff (7 players, six staff) who are positive for COVID-19, after the number was 4 over the weekend. Looking less like the issue is players not obeying all of the rules and more like the MLB procedures don't prevent spread.

The good news is that no players from opposing teams of the Marlins or Cardinals have tested positive yet. The bad news is that in my opinion, the MLB is going to have to figure out why inter-team spread is happening so much or the season is in jeopardy.

I think I agree with you (in general)... but the bolded part is impossible to know. The red herring of casinos and night clubs is a frustrating distraction. Maybe that happened... I'm sure if it did... there is no way to isolate the spread to those specific activities. The MLB did "investigate" and concluded there was some stuff the Marlins were doing (not sure about Cards) that was not in compliance. The only push-back I've seen from Marlins management is the that the night club/hotel bar stuff was overblown. How much of all this is PR and damage control by all parties... who knows? I suspect....just like the rest of the country, some individuals/teams are taking things seriously and it contributes to lower likelihood of spread. I also suspect a few individuals/teams (for whatever reason) are not taking care to do thing as safely as possible. These guys are spending everyday together in close quarters.. so, there it only takes a small lack of attention to spread it once it is active within a team. The question I keep coming back to is .... is it even possible to prevent spread given the nature of the MLB's setup. (i.e. players not in a bubble and traveling). I don't really know... and since I don't really know exactly how the teams with breakouts were behaving... it is impossible to know if this is fixable or not. It appears MLB thinks it is fixable or they would have shut the season down... the other option which is crazy; but possible (I guess) is MLB's main plan is "hope" ...hope that despite a plan/system in place that cannot contain spread, they will proceed.

 

[RonJohn]

I think I agree with you (in general)... but the bolded part is impossible to know. The red herring of casinos and night clubs is a frustrating distraction. Maybe that happened... I'm sure if it did... there is no way to isolate the spread to those specific activities. The MLB did "investigate" and concluded there was some stuff the Marlins were doing (not sure about Cards) that was not in compliance. The only push-back I've seen from Marlins management is the that the night club/hotel bar stuff was overblown. How much of all this is PR and damage control by all parties... who knows? I suspect....just like the rest of the country, some individuals/teams are taking things seriously and it contributes to lower likelihood of spread. I also suspect a few individuals/teams (for whatever reason) are not taking care to do thing as safely as possible. These guys are spending everyday together in close quarters.. so, there it only takes a small lack of attention to spread it once it is active within a team. The question I keep coming back to is .... is it even possible to prevent spread given the nature of the MLB's setup. (i.e. players not in a bubble and traveling). I don't really know... and since I don't really know exactly how the teams with breakouts were behaving... it is impossible to know if this is fixable or not. It appears MLB thinks it is fixable or they would have shut the season down... the other option which is crazy; but possible (I guess) is MLB's main plan is "hope" ...hope that despite a plan/system in place that cannot contain spread, they will proceed.

I wasn't trying to say that the players are all following all the rules, just that the MLB procedures are allowing rampant spread within a team once a person on that team is infected. I believe they are checking for symptoms every day and checking for the virus every other day. Even with all of those checks the virus was able to spread through 60% of the Marlins players after some of those players were infected.

I think the soft bubble can minimize risk, but it doesn't eliminate risk. The players are still in contact with their families at home. I haven't seen that their spouse or kids are being limited. Spouse eating out with friends, or kids going back to school could be avenues for the virus to get to a player. Then at that point it is obvious now that the temperature checks and virus screening every other day are not working.