After COVID-19 postponement, Cardinals and Brewers could play 7-inning double header
The St. Louis Cardinals’ scheduled Friday afternoon game against the Milwaukee Brewers at Miller Park was postponed due to two positive tests for COVID-19 among the team’s traveling party, Major League Baseball announced.
The Cardinals and Brewers remain scheduled to play Saturday’s 6:10 PM game.
Friday’s game has been rescheduled as part of a double header to begin at 1:10 PM Sunday. Those two games would be the first in MLB to be scheduled for seven innings in length under a new agreement approved Thursday by MLB and the Players’ Association.
“I think you should go into tonight and into tomorrow assuming the game (Saturday) will be played,” Mozeliak said. “If for some reason we couldn’t, you would hope that would be addressed in a proper time, but I’m not overly concerned. At that point tonight, we’ll let results speak for themselves.”
A Cardinals team official said the team was isolated at their Milwaukee hotel. Officials with the club, headed by assistant general manager Moises Rodriguez, are in the process of conducting contact tracing as required by MLB following notification of a positive test.
Following a substantial outbreak among the Miami Marlins, in which as many as 17 players tested positive, MLB removed both the Marlins and Philadelphia Phillies from play for a full week. Mozeliak said that the league did not provide a firm brightline in terms of the number of positive tests which would trigger a series cancellation and declined to speculate on whether MLB could sustain its season should another widespread outbreak occur.
“It’s not a position for me to answer,” Mozeliak said. “I don’t know. And I’d rather...hope it doesn’t happen.”
The positive tests for the Cardinals come in the midst of the team’s first trip away from Busch Stadium since assembling for Summer Camp in early July. MLB testing protocols call for reporting of results within 48 hours of testing; the positive tests for the Cardinals, then, would have been detected from samples taken in Minnesota on the first leg of a scheduled three city trip which was set to continue to Detroit.
Minnesota hosted Cleveland at Target Field on Thursday in the first game of a scheduled four game series. It’s unclear whether that series would be similarly delayed; Cleveland would have shared the same facilities as those occupied by the Cardinals during a period in which players were positive for the coronavirus.
Mozeliak said that members of his staff had been in contact with officials from both clubs and had disclosed all relevant contacts and other tracing information.
While the Cardinals had a scheduled off day on Thursday, Mozeliak -- who said that he is “so far, so good; no signs” -- confirmed that some players did go to Miller Park in order to work out. The clubhouse and facilities there were cleaned and sanitized as per MLB protocols.
Prior to Friday’s test results, the Cardinals had not had a confirmed positive test result since four players tested positive during intake screening. All four - pitchers Génesis Cabrera, Alex Reyes and Ricardo Sánchez and infielder Elehuris Montero - have since joined the team’s alternate training site in Springfield, Mo.
Contact tracing will include players at that site because the Cardinals, for the first time this season, had players rejoin the big league team from their satellite location. Infielder Max Schrock is traveling as a part of the taxi squad, and pitcher Jake Woodford was added to the active roster after Miles Mikolas was placed on the injured list with a right flexor strain.
Mozeliak said that he expects to add players from that camp to the roster in Milwaukee for Saturday’s game. Those players are expected to make the nine hour drive north, but Mozeliak was unable to confirm who or how many would be joining the club. “I’m not making roster announcements because I don’t know what our roster’s going to look like tomorrow,” he said.
MLB’s plan to play the season outside the so-called “bubble” environment which has been undertaken by the NHL and NBA has come under scrutiny in recent days, as multiple teams have been affected by shifting schedules.
The Baltimore Orioles, New York Yankees, Toronto Blue Jays and Washington Nationals have all had games rescheduled as a result of outward schedule ripples from the pause of the Miami and Philadelphia seasons.
“I guarantee you, guarantee you, this is just another loud wake up call,” Mozeliak said. “What we saw early in the week through Major League Baseball was very real, and now when you have something that hits your home clubhouse, people are aware.”
This story was originally published July 31, 2020 at 11:06 AM.
