The first week of testing under MLB’s health and safety protocol has not gone smoothly. Some teams had to cancel camp today because tests from FRIDAY still weren’t back, and Kris Bryant revealed today that he went five days between his intake test and his first protocol test. Not acceptable, and worse, it risks the whole enterprise if there’s an outbreak or a loss of confidence that players and personnel can be kept safe.
Today, MLB acknowledged issues, and offered explanations (or excuses, depending on your perspective):
Here’s the statement from the league on the testing issues. Regardless of the reasons behind them, when players are speaking up the way they have today, there is trust to win back. The only way to do that is button up the protocol and ensure nothing like this happens again. pic.twitter.com/wgYgrHzYDd
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) July 6, 2020
For the most part, MLB is pinning the blame on the holiday weekend and unforeseen logistical issues. Given the harried pace of putting things together – thanks in part to the months-long fighting about the financial aspects of the season – it’s not surprising that there were “unforeseen” problems … tied to a holiday weekend that was always on the calendar. But it is definitely disappointing and concerning.
All we do now is see if MLB corrects these issues immediately, and also wait to find out if there were any unnecessary exposures in the meantime.