#MLB season threatened by coronavirus testing mess: Sherman

Acknowledge what MLB is trying to do is difficult wrapped around laborious engulfed by challenging.

In the span of a few weeks the league has had to construct a health and safety protocol with, most vitally, testing of on-field personnel done every other day. The lab is in Utah. The teams are spread over 30 sites in North America. The number of tests is roughly 14,000 per week. A collection company must retrieve all those samples and get them promptly to the lab.

This would challenge the medical community or the U.S. armed forces to pull off this kind of relentless, coordinated effort.

And there was no trial period for MLB to see how this plays out like, say, having pitch clocks in the minor leagues or robot umps in independent ball. This had to be up and running and flawless immediately because of the potential for this to be a life-or-death endeavor.

We know now that MLB will not be perfect. That caused disruption and embarrassment Monday and threatens far worse for getting this season played since trust in the testing process is central to players having the faith to take risks and play.

At least three teams had testing delayed over the holiday weekend. The Nationals and Astros — last year’s World Series participants — cancelled workouts Monday as they await results from tests taken Friday. The A’s pushed back their workout until the evening at the earliest as they await their results.

“We will not sacrifice the health and safety of our players, staff and their families,” Nationals GM MIke Rizzo said in a statement. “Without accurate and timely testing it is simply not safe for us to continue with Summer Camp. Major League Baseball needs to work quickly to resolve issues with their process and their lab. Otherwise, Summer Camp and the 2020 Season are at risk.”

Rizzo made that statement on the same day MLB was planning to release its schedule, which was going to be highlighted by a July 23 Opening Day game in Washington between the Yankees and Nationals — Gerrit Cole in his Yankees debut against Max Scherzer and the defending champs. That is if all goes well. But now all has not gone well.

The Athletic reported the A’s also had incurred holiday weekend delays in getting test results sent promptly to the lab and results delivered. In a copy of a text obtained by The Athletic, A’s GM David Forst says the excuse for the delay provided to the team had to do with shipping on the holiday weekend. Forst, in the text, strongly criticized MLB and the company designated to retrieve and deliver samples.

Oakland officials already were concerned that the team was at a competitive disadvantage being unable to get its full squad working out, and this exacerbates that issue.

But the largest concern is more than who shoehorns the most preparation days in during this condensed spring training. This is about trusting a process in which absolute trust is the only acceptable position.

Eight veteran players already have opted out of playing this year. Many others, including stars such as Mike Trout of the Angels and Buster Posey of the Giants have admitted teetering, wondering if they are doing right to be in camps when the dangers are so real. Lack of faith in the testing process is the kind of factor that could convince the uncertain to abandon this attempt.

And, really, if the sport cannot get the testing done like clockwork, it cannot move forward. Not in this environment with COVID-19 cases rising in this country.

MLB and the Players Association never had a better reason to bond against a common enemy — the virus — as it did in trying to restart the game this year. But so much time, passion and rhetoric went into fighting about money that there then was a rush to open camps to find time for even a 60-game season.

But the true threat to that 60-game season — or any season for any sport in 2020 — has not evaporated. The virus is still out there. MLB must make fixes quickly and competently and with full transparency to regain the confidence of those who are in clubhouses and on the field.

Or else they will have failed the test.