NEWSLETTER
Continuing the thread of optimism about baseball stretching back to last week, we now have a public official who can see baseball returning – and in Chicago, to boot.
But, as you’d expect, having fans in attendance remains unlikely:
JUST IN: Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Monday she can envision the Cubs and her beloved White Sox playing baseball at Wrigley and Guaranteed Rate Fields sometime this summer. But, it’s likely to be an eerie, lonely, made-for-television affair. https://t.co/yER6ficoZG
— Chicago Sun-Times (@Suntimes) April 27, 2020
As most around MLB talk about various “plans” for a possible MLB return, focused on playing in Arizona or Florida or Texas, the Mayor is suggesting the games might just wind up taking place back at home ballparks, like Wrigley Field and G-Rate.
Mayor Lightfoot is in communication with the owners of the Chicago Cubs and White Sox about what the season might look like, but she concedes that the decision won’t come from her, instead deferring to MLB. (Apparently Lightfoot also excluded individual governors from these decisions, but I’m quite sure they will have input.)
And when it comes to having fans at those games, she says that it’s unlikely. Despite the Yankees’ president’s hopes otherwise, I think that is fair.
So the question is, does playing at Wrigley Field make fan-less games better than if they were just played at a hub location in some other part of the country? Eh, I say yes. Sure. A little. But the important point is that I’m sure the players would greatly prefer it, since it would allow them to be at their normal in-season homes with their families. Given the reluctance of players to quarantine in a location for games without their families, the ability to play fan-less games at home stadiums could actually be a really big deal.
That said, until and unless national travel smoothly returns this year, you can’t really play games at home parks. So unless Chicago became a “hub” for a revamped plan, there won’t be games at Wrigley Field this year without totally clear travel.
For more on the return of baseball, read up on Jeff Passan’s perspective that it *IS* happening this year.
