Virus messes with lineup
Organization unsure when starting OF will return from COVID-19
The Arizona Diamondbacks play a waiting game after Kole Calhoun’s positive COVID-19 test. Thus far, the outfielder is not showing any symptoms.
Right fielder Kole Calhoun is the most high-profile Diamondbacks player yet to test positive for COVID-19. According to manager Torey Lovullo, Calhoun is asymptomatic, which is an encouraging sign for the club on both personal and professional levels.
But with more than two weeks to go before their season-opener on July 24, the Diamondbacks are as unsure as everyone else about how long they might be without their starting right fielder.
This they know: Calhoun will quarantine. He will be retested. Once he tests negative twice on tests administered more than 24 hours apart, he will be eligible to return after being cleared by team doctors and by baseball’s joint committee consisting of representatives from the league, the union and two physicians.
What they don’t know is how long any of that will take.
They are hoping, of course, that their positives — Calhoun is one of three on the 40-man roster known to have contracted the virus — remain asymptomatic, though that can change. Even then the road back is filled with unknowns.
“It’s different because in almost every injury case that we’ve had,” Diamondbacks General Manager Mike Hazen said, “there’s a defined period, within weeks, of a return.”
A hamstring injury might take six to eight weeks, a fractured hand four to six weeks. But Hazen noted an
“Everybody needs to be prepared for opportunity. We are getting our arms around what that opportunity could look like now.” Mike Hazen
D-Backs general manager
important distinction when talking about returns from injury compared to returns from coronavirus.
With an injury, the team can estimate when a player will be physically cleared to perform and how long it will take him to get back into playing shape, thus providing a rough framework for when he can return to game action.
“We think it’s going to be around a 10- to 14-day window” following a positive test, Hazen said, “though I can’t speak to that firsthand yet. …
“If they’re going to be down for that period, some of our guys have been able to maintain some level of activity after a period of time because they have been asymptomatic and able to get back into activity a little early. That’s the most determinant factor of when a return is coming: Is it down for 14 days and then start, or down for seven days and starting and returning on Day 14. Those are different outcomes. I don’t know which is more likely or going to be more consistently accurate.”
Calhoun and right-hander Junior Guerra are the only two known players from the Diamondbacks’ 34man group at Chase Field to have tested positive. The club has had several others in the organization test positive but has not revealed their identities with the exception of reliever Silvino Bracho, who is on the 40-man roster but was left out of the 60-player pool because of an arm issue.
There are secondhand anecdotes going around the baseball world of players needing three-plus weeks to test negative despite having mild or asymptomatic cases. Hazen said he expects that within a month baseball will have a better idea of the timeline of a typical mild case.
Pitchers figure to be the group that will be the hardest to keep sharp, Hazen said. They can’t throw bullpen sessions in quarantine, not unless they have a mound at home.
“And,” Hazen said, “unless you have a catcher who is also positive and isn’t afraid to catch you. We can’t just send a staff member or a bullpen catcher over to catch those guys.”
For now, Hazen’s biggest takeaway is that the message he delivered to his satellite squad at Salt River Fields will ring even more true as more players test positive.
Last week, Hazen stood on a field and told the 20plus players there that just because they were left out of the group that came to Chase Field does not mean they will not play this season.
“Everybody needs to be prepared for opportunity,” Hazen said. “We are getting our arms around what that opportunity could look like now.”
As far as that goes for Calhoun’s replacement, Lovullo pointed to a few options during a call with reporters on Monday night, including Jon Jay, Trayce Thompson and Josh Rojas.
He said the team had no plans as of yet to move a player over from Salt River to replace the players who tested positive.