MLB owners have approved a proposal for the 2020 season to present to the Major League Baseball Players Association, according to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. The meeting between the two sides is expected to take place on Tuesday.
Even if the players approve of it, the plan would also require sign-off from medical experts and around-the-table confidence that testing for the coronavirus would be widely available for players and essential staff.
Owners have pitched a regular season beginning in early July and consisting of approximately 80 games, down from the customary 162 games. According to Rosenthal, that number might not be exactly 80 games, with 78 and 82 as other possibilities.
Teams would also be playing a majorly regionalized schedule, facing opponents from their own division and only in the same geographic division of the opposite league. For example: an NL East club would only face teams from the NL East and AL East, preventing long travel.
For a better visual: four three-game series against each division opponent and two three-game series against each non-division opponent might make a 78-game season.
Major league teams would open in as many home parks as possible, with even New York — the city hardest hit by the coronavirus — hoping to do so by early July.
The Toronto Blue Jays might also open by then, though travel between the U.S. and Canada that is deemed as nonessential will be restricted through at least May 21, rendering all travelers to Canada subject to a mandatory 14-day quarantine.
MLB teams that can’t open in their respective cities could opt for temporary relocation, going to either spring training sites or major league parks in other parts of the country. The same could be said for spring training prior to the season, using mostly home ballparks as opposed to returning to Florida and Arizona.
Some, however, believe spring places offer a less dense, more controlled environment.
Expanded playoffs would see an increase from five to seven teams from each league, with the best record receiving a bye in the wild-card round and advancing to the Division Series. The two other winners and the wild card with the best record would face the bottom three wild cards in a best-of-three round.
USA TODAY Sports’ Bob Nightengale notes other details such as a universal designated hitter and a historic 50/50 revenue-sharing split between teams and players.
MLB suspended the start of its season after the NBA shut down their regular season two months ago, and the league is now aggressively trying to come up with a plan to get things going again.
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