Sports have been shut down indefinitely across the country in response to the coronavirus outbreak, and while it’s still difficult to tell when it will be safe to resume play, many leagues are hoping to either continue or start their seasons by late spring or early summer.
Major League Baseball officially delayed the start of the regular season by “at least” two weeks on March 12th, and it seems likely that the delay could be stretched for a significant period of time. According to power agent Scott Boras, though, a full 166-game season is still entirely plausible. The only catch? The final out of the 2020 World Series could occur on Boxing Day.
Boras told the Los Angeles Times that he has proposed two schedules to MLB, for a 166-game season that would begin in June, and a 144-game season that would begin in July. In the more optimistic plan for a full-season, the normal playoff structure would be preserved, and the World Series could stretch to December 26th.
The World Series had been completed in September or October in every season until 2001, when the 7-game Diamondbacks-Yankees series ended on November 4th. The 2009 Phillies-Yankees series again ended on November 4th, the latest calendar date a World Series game has ever been played on.
Per Boras’ plan, playoff games would be held at neutral domed sites, or at parks in southern California.
Via the Los Angeles Times:
“Under the Boras plan, wild-card games would be played Dec. 3, the division series would be Dec. 5-9, the league championship series Dec. 11-17 and the World Series on Dec. 19-26.
There would be no days off in postseason series, and games would be played in Los Angeles, Anaheim, San Diego, Miami, Seattle, Arizona, Milwaukee, Toronto, Houston, St. Petersburg, Fla., and Arlington, Texas.
‘All the players I’m talking to want to play all the games, and we can map this out,’ Boras said. ‘We’re just trying to let [MLB] know we have the ability to do it, that there’s a logical way to do it.'”
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