Rosenthal: Latest details on baseball’s plan to return

LOS ANGELES, CA - OCTOBER 16:  A silhouette of Milwaukee Brewers players on field during batting practice before Game 4 of the NLCS against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodger Stadium on Tuesday, October 16, 2018 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Alex Trautwig/MLB via Getty Images)
By Ken Rosenthal
May 9, 2020

Nothing is official. Major League Baseball will discuss its plans for the 2020 season in a conference call with owners on Monday. If the owners give their approval, the league will present its proposal to the players’ union on Tuesday.

As previously reported, even a formal plan would be subject to change; the details are pending ownership and union approval, and the unpredictability of the COVID-19 pandemic might force the league to adjust locales and schedules before the season begins and after it is in progress.

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Any plan also would require sign-off from medical experts and confidence that testing for the virus would be sufficiently available. But here is a rough outline of some of what the league would like to do, according to four people with knowledge of the league’s intentions:

• A regular season beginning in early July and consisting of approximately 80 games. The number might not be exactly 80 — 78 and 82 are also possibilities.

The schedule would be regionalized: Teams would face opponents only from their own division and the same geographic division in the opposite league. An NL East club, for example, would face teams only from the NL East and AL East.

A 78-game schedule might look like this: Four three-game series against each division opponent and two three-game series against each non-division opponent.

• Teams would open in as many home parks as possible, with even New York — the major-league city hardest hit by the coronavirus — potentially in play by early July.

Toronto also might open by then, though nonessential travel between the U.S. and Canada is restricted through at least May 21 and all travelers to Canada are subject to a mandatory 14-day quarantine.

Teams unable to open in their cities temporarily would relocate, either to their spring training sites or major-league parks in other parts of the country. The same would apply to spring training 2.0 if the league decides to use mostly home parks as opposed to returning to Florida and Arizona.

Not all clubs agree they should train in their home parks, believing spring locales offer a less densely populated, more controlled environment.

• Expanded playoffs similar to the idea first reported by the New York Post in February, with an increase from five to seven teams in each league.

Under this plan, the team with the best record in each league would receive a bye in the wild-card round and advance to the Division Series. The two other division winners and wild card with the best record would face the bottom three wild cards in a best-of-three wild-card round.

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• Because games, at least initially, will be played without fans, the players would be asked to accept a further reduction in pay, most likely by agreeing to a set percentage of revenues for this season only.

The idea behind such a plan, from the league’s perspective, would be to protect the players and owners against the economic uncertainty created by the virus.

The players agreed in March to prorate their salaries in a shortened season. Those salaries cover the regular season only, while postseason shares are based upon gate receipts. If the players agreed to a set percentage of revenue, they also would share any additional national TV money generated during the postseason.

Without the players making such a concession, league officials say they will spend more on player salaries than they would earn in revenue for every incremental regular-season game played without fans. The union believes the opposite to be true and that postseason TV and other revenue will further enhance the league’s financial position.

The salary issue remains a source of friction. If the owners say it is not economically feasible to play games without fans, the union almost certainly would ask to see financial proof. The teams do not provide the players with full access to their books.

A number of other considerations, financial and otherwise, will enter the discussions between players and owners. An expanded roster of as many as 45 to 50 players is expected. The parties also would need to determine medical protocols — for instance, how they would react if a player becomes infected with the virus.

The final details are to be determined. But a preferred blueprint is in place.

The Athletic’s Evan Drellich contributed to this story.

(Photo: Alex Trautwig / MLB via Getty Images)

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Ken Rosenthal

Ken Rosenthal is the senior baseball writer for The Athletic who has spent nearly 35 years covering the major leagues. In addition, Ken is a broadcaster and regular contributor to Fox Sports' MLB telecasts. He's also won Emmy Awards in 2015 and 2016 for his TV reporting. Follow Ken on Twitter @Ken_Rosenthal