Major League Baseball has submitted a proposal to the MLB Players Association about potentially holding at least part of the 2020 playoffs inside a multi-city “bubble” environment, Joel Sherman of the New York Post reports (Twitter link). It isn’t yet known if the entire postseason would be played at neutral sites, or if the best-of-three first round series would remain in the home ballparks of the higher-seeded teams.
As initially reported by The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal (via Twitter), the league has been in talks with the union about how to manage and conduct games at these “controlled sites” in order to limit city-to-city travel and thus limit the chances of a COVID-19 outbreak in October that would delay the entire postseason. While details are “nothing close” to being finalized, as Rosenthal notes, MLB began preparing an operations manual regarding such a postseason scenario earlier this month. As outlined by ESPN.com’s Emily Kaplan and Jeff Passan, the baseball’s plan would bear a strong resemblances to the NHL’s staging of the Stanley Cup playoffs in Toronto and Edmonton.
While the NHL is holding all games at two arenas, however, baseball’s plan may seem to involve five different stadiums and civic areas. Southern California (San Diego and the two L.A. ballparks) and Texas (Arlington, Houston) still seem to be the favored candidates for these sites, as noted in the Kaplan/Passan piece, with Rosenthal adding that National League’s postseason teams would play in Texas while the American League teams went to California. The World Series would be held in Arlington at the Rangers’ new ballpark.
It is quite possible that the framework of this plan would be changed over the coming weeks, and as talks develop with input from the MLBPA. As of today, however, we are exactly one month away from the last day of the regular season. One would think negotiations would need to progress pretty quickly to get a bubble environment launched by the start of the playoffs on September 29, though the possibility of the first round being played at home ballparks does allow some extra flexibility.
Padres should play in their own park
I mean I’m a Padres fan so that would be awesome, but it’s definitely not really fair. If you put the NL bubble in Southern CA then the Dodgers and Padres have a leg up on everyone.
Angels aren’t going to make the playoffs so no AL team would have an advantage. Makes sense to put the AL teams in the NL cities and vice versa
I hear you about the leg up though I think that’s gonna have to be the case unless the MLB goes somewhere that doesn’t have an MLB team but has a large enough field. Charlotte, North Carolina?
Players are not going to agree to a bubble in a minor league facility. It’ll be at MLB parks for sure
If a bubble, I realize weather is a factor, but the NE is the most stable area with respect to the pandemic and between NY and Philly you have three stadiums too.
Great plan.
Should have done so for the season.
NY/NY East
MIN/MIL Central
SD/ANA West
Could have gotten away with playoff games is NY/ANA/SD
Agreed – if they were going to do it for the postseason they should have done it for the regular season
East Cracker Jack Stadium.
Midwest Texas including where Cowboys play.
Central a city with a Dome.
West California.
I have to wonder at the idea that Milwaukee will be a bubble site.
Far too many teams and players to do a bubble for the regular season. They had a plan using spring training sites in AZ and FLA but that was shot down by the players. Also two of the worst states for COVID. A bubble for the playoffs makes more sense and is far more doable than the regular season. Hopefully the players agree. Still, Texas has been one of the hot spots so there is some risk bubbling there. But they have two dome stadiums to use and that at least means no rain outs.
A bubble stadium/site would impact baseball far more than other sports due to the differences in stadium configurations.
I vote for Frisco with how the ball is flying out this year and Denver. Let’s get weird with this thing.
People in the Bay Area hate San Francisco being called Frisco.
Maybe he means the AA baseball team in Frisco?
sh——e full of druggies sounds better?.
People not in the Bay Area hate Frisco being called San Francisco. See what I did there.
When I moved to the East Bay for one college year, I was warned in advance to never say “Frisco”. That was forty years ago. Another thing that hasn’t changed.
I second that for Denver.
Plus, we could have snow delays!
Denver doesn’t get snow until December/January. It’s rare if they get any before that.
Great. Now we’re gonna go back and forth and delay the postseason and end up with a one game playoff between the best records in each league.
Playing in the home stadium of the higher seed is the best way to do it. Otherwise, what is the benefit of getting a higher seed?
They could do it like the NCAA tourney. Having seeds 1, 4, 5, and 8 play in the #1 team’s stadium and have 2, 3, 6, and 7 play in the #2 seed’s stadium for the first two rounds in each league. Then the 4 winners could play a Final Four of sorts at a neutral location.
Wait, so not only can the Rangers trade their assets for prospects, load up for 22′, and tank for Kumar… but we can also be home for the WS? Besides the stupid 3-0 mess, this might be a nice year for Texas.
Hopefully the MLBPA has seen how bone-stupid its opposition to bubble sites has been. I wouldn’t count on it. If there is a stupid position to take, the MLBPA, the player agents, and their media cheerleaders will all locate it.
Ownership and the commissioner’s office sure know how to be just as bone-stupid, as you put it.
I like the idea of playing in a warm climate or a domed stadium where they can play without frozen fingers.
Can’t wait to hear how this blows up
Time for Clark to try to one up Manfreds incompetence by finding something to complain about this
It is now time for America’s favorite new game show, Hold My Beer. Since no one won last week, both losing contestants will return tonight. Welcome back, Loser Rob and Loser Tony.
Shocking. Major League Baseball is actually trying to do something smart. I guess the old adage about the stopped clock being right twice a day is true after all.
kreckert, Don’t be silly. Everyone knows there is no clock in baseball.
They should pick a neutral site like Las Vegas or Charlotte.
Without a crowd, is there even a home field advantage this year? And by bubble, do they mean that everyone stays in hotels near the stadium. If so, there’s definitely no home advantage. Just put them in the locations that have the best arrangements to keep the players safe. And there’s no need for home and away. Just play all the games in that location.
Well, there is in that each stadium has its own personality that the home team may be more used to. Colorado players are more used to breathing the thin air in Denver. Tampa players are more used to their godawful roof. Cubs players are more used to dealing with the ivy in Wrigley. Home field advantage is far more than just fans.
Just watch them not pass it, and then the WS matchup is Cubs-Yankees lol.
Has anyone asked Governor Nuisance how he feels about the idea? Heck, you can’t even get a haircut here unless you’re sitting outside in the parking lot…..in 100*+ weather. Geniuses in Sacramento.
We live in a goofy state, I don’t get the haircut thing.
A playoff bubble makes zero sense. You’re not going to have 16 teams enter a bubble only for half them to be gone after 3 games or less. Once you reach the division series any COVID cases will mess up the entire postseason, bubble or not. Keep some level of normalcy and have WS games played at home parks.
So you think any COVID cases will ruin the postseason and your solution is to send teams to many different locations? There is no normalcy in 2020. Trying to find some is just a fool’s errand.
Each leauges playoffs is 3 series not counting the play in round. They will be fine without a bubble.
Play all the games in Phoenix. Plenty of Cactus League fields and a dome too.
I agree. They can also get all these games in quicker by removing travel days.
Baseball also needs to man up on playing through covid. If two or three people on a team positive then sit em out and keep playing. As soon as u make a playoff team forfeit due to covid- mlb will loose all integrity they have left. 18-45 year olds (according to numbers released in NY) have a .0001% chance of dying of covid. So play ball.
Bubble needs to absolutely be done and done correctly. Baseball already looks like the red-headed step child of the sporting world for how they’ve handle the coronavirus. If they get lax or have improper protocols and have to shutdown a team in the playoffs, the sport will never heard the end of it.
are we going to play the playoffs or is there going to be a social cause that needs to be protested?
I hear ya…..not upset with anyone protesting but it’s pretty shallow when it’s 1 game with no fans at the game and then u make up the game the next day. U sacrificed two innings lol wow. Good for u
I can see why they chose the stadiums out west but I think they should of just chose stadiums with domes like Houston, Miami, Arizona, Milwaukee or Toronto,
That’s going to kill east market fan bases if they start a bunch of the west coast games late. The past couple years (I’m a teacher) I know a lot of kids that either haven’t been able to watch teams play, or only get to watch an inning or two because the start time is so late and the games take so long in the playoffs. Is it better to start early and have west coast miss the start of the game, or start late and have the east coast miss the end of the game?
Use New York for one league, LA for the other. NY has Citi Field and Yankee Stadium within minutes of each other, LA has Dodger Stadium and Angel’s Stadium. You really only need 2 fields for each league because you can do 2 games per day, per stadium, a 12/1pm and 7/8pm game. Just set rules for the clubhouses and time teams can take to be in/out of the clubhouse. IF you need to delay the later game, you can. Worse comes to worse if a day game needs to be suspended, you suspend it to get the night game in.
After the first round, you alternate days the teams play. LCS and WS would be back on a normal schedule.
That makes enitirely too much sense to be done. New York/New Jersey are heading down in cases while rest of country rises, yet. Texas and California are choices?
Other areas that have multiple major league stadiums are Oakland/SF and Chicago.
If you want throw in minor league stadiums, NY can add Brooklyn and Staten Island single A stadiums, which would need some refurbishing, but field wise, are major league size.
The NHL managed 24 teams in 2 bubbles, and MLB can’t put 16 in 2 also?
Can’t wait for the Dodgers to lose the Series not because of trash cans, but Covid.
And…. this is why nothing can be accomplished. Imagine Mantle or Williams phoning the union about not playing in SD because it would be unfair. This generation is doomed….