Texas park opening to 100% of its capacity

The Texas Rangers are on track to become the first team in Major League Baseball or any major U.s.-based sports league to have a full-capacity crowd since the coronavirus pandemic started altering the sports landscape a year ago.

On the same day Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s order took effect allowing businesses in the state to operate at 100% capacity, Rangers CEO Neil Leibman said Wednesday that the team hopes to be at that for the April 5 opener against the Toronto Blue Jays.

“We’re very confident we won’t be a super-spreader event,” said Leibman, who is also the team’s president of business operations. “With all the protocols that we’re following, we’ll be extremely responsible and provide a very comfortable environment for somebody to enjoy the game without worrying we’re going to be a spreader event.”

The pandemic could still alter the team’s intent to host a capacity crowd at the 40,518-seat Globe Life Field, which the Rangers opened last year without fans in the stands.

Local officials are still able to impose “mitigation strategies,” such as reduced capacity, if virus hospitalizations exceed 15% of all hospital capacity in their region over certain periods.

Even with his order, Abbott has encouraged the public to continue practicing social distancing measures and wearing masks, though they are no longer mandated.

The Rangers will require fans to wear masks for games, unless they are actively eating and drinking at their seats, as was the case for the postseason major league games played at their $1.2 billion stadium in Arlington, Texas, in October.

After the Rangers played all 30 of their home games during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season without fans, MLB allowed about 28% capacity at the retractable-roof stadium for the National League Championship Series and World Series that were played there exclusively. Abbott was on hand for the World Series opener, where he got to deliver the “Play Ball!” message before a crowd of 11,388.