‘Greater than any one game of baseball’
James McCann discusses MLB’s contingency plan — and getting an assist from former Cub Ben Zobrist
White Sox catcher James McCann is remaining sharp during baseball’s coronavirus shutdown with an assist from former Cubs utilityman Ben Zobrist.
“Here in Tennessee, facilities are shut down and all nonessential businesses are shut down completely,” McCann said Friday during a conference call. “But thankfully Ben Zobrist, who lives in town, has a barn with a cage. I’ve been able to pretty much go there by myself and hit off a tee, a machine and stay in as best shape as possible.”
McCann, an American League All-Star last season, is quarantining with his wife and two kids at home in Franklin, Tenn. He has hit, thrown and worked out to some degree as he awaits baseball’s next step while the game is on hold because of the pandemic.
“Everyone wants to get back as quickly as possible, but the biggest thing we’ve done well as a union and a league is step back and realize the current situation is greater than any one game of baseball,” McCann said. “You’re talking about life and death for thousands and thousands of people, and as much as we love the game and want to be on the field, there are priorities, and keeping people healthy and safe needs to be a priority.”
Baseball is mulling several contingency plans for 2020. Earlier this week, multiple reports featured a plan that included all 30 teams playing in the Phoenix area. That plan reportedly could include sequestering teams in hotels for up to 4½ months away from their families.
McCann said he wants to play more than anyone, but a lot of details need to be hammered out when the time is right.
“Being married and having two young kids, I’m not a huge fan of leaving them for, potentially, five months,” he said. “I don’t know that that’s the right answer.
“As much as you try to isolate players, you also have hotel staff of where you’re isolating guys, and you have chefs and different people who are preparing food. There are just a lot of details where I have a hard time seeing how that comes to fruition. But I think as players we have to be understanding of the situation. If the public is taken care of, (if ) there’s plenty of tests to go around and we have a handle on it, then I’m all for us trying to figure out a way to play.”
Another plan surfaced Friday in a USA Today report in which teams would go back to the Cactus (Arizona) and Grapefruit (Florida) league sites. That proposal features major realignment, with the Sox possibly in a division with the Dodgers, Angels, Indians and Reds.
“If we get to the point where we have a handle on the coronavirus, if that’s what makes most sense, I’m all for it,” McCann said. “I hate to say I don’t want to go play in Chicago or on the road in different cities, but at the end of the day some baseball is better than no baseball. And if that type of schedule for this season allows for it, all the more power for a way to make it happen.”
Does McCann think there will be baseball this year?
“I guess the best way to word it is we are the mercy of the virus,” McCann said. “I’m definitely an advocate for making sure that not only are we as players and our families and coaching staff and everybody doing what’s responsible but also setting an example for the public that we are not rushing back to play a game just because we feel like we have to.
“We need to make sure we are part of the solution and not causing more of a problem.”