MORE BASEBALL
Cubs first base coach Craig Driver tests positive for COVID-19, team confident it is isolated case.
PITTSBURGH — The Cubs feel confident a positive COVID-19 test on their coaching staff is an isolated situation.
First-base coach
Craig Driver tested positive, the team announced Saturday, and he did not travel to Pittsburgh because he hadn’t been feeling well. Mike Napoli filled in as the firstbase coach during Thursday’s victory against the Pirates and again Saturday night.
Cubs manager David Ross said Driver is a little under the weather but in good spirits.
“We feel pretty good about where we’re at,” Ross said before the game Saturday. “I don’t know that I could say that about (Friday), if we would have had to play, but we got all those tests back as the day went on. So it made us feel really good about where we’re at.
“I definitely think that’s something that is an eye-opener for sure. There’s been a couple eye-openers to start the season around baseball that should hit home and (make us) understand that this is still a very serious pandemic that we’re in and we have to continue to stay diligent in all that we do.”
The experience has been mentally taxing for the Cubs.
Tier 1 personnel, comprising players and staff, have been tested every day since Wednesday. They also were tested on Friday’s day off as an additional precaution.
Ross called the situation stressful and said he was “hoping for the best but expecting the worst.” All tests have come back negative, and everyone will be tested again Sunday.
The Cubs are trying to get at least 85% of their Tier 1 personnel vaccinated, which would loosen the team’s COVID19 restrictions.
“I mean, really, the goal is 100%, right?” Ross said. “Like, let’s be honest, the goal should be 100%. So that’s what we’re shooting for.
“Again, each person has their own views and things, but we’re just continuing to try to educate and encourage them as much as we can to be vaccinated.”
Cubs second baseman David Bote said conversations about the vaccine are “absolutely happening” among players. Those talks have been “super respectful,” Bote added, among different perspectives, whether someone does or does not want to get the vaccine or if he’s still on the fence.
Bote believes having those conversations is good and healthy.
“Having doctors that are here that can really help talk you through it, guys who you trust, guys who help me with my family, to have those people that I can talk to and, like, let’s get everything else away, political or anything else like that,” Bote said. “What is it, what can it do, pros and cons, and then you have to make the best decision for you and your family.
“That’s what it comes down to. Each person is going to be different. Everyone has that right to do so.”
Bote appreciates how the trackers the players wear help identify potential close contacts to a positive test quicker. It helps ease the mind knowing whether there was a potential exposure.
“Just another thing of, like, you can do everything right and still get it, stuff like that,” Bote said. “So it’s just what we’re dealing with the last (two) years, and it’s just part of it. So you’re just finding a way to be aware of it and move on the best you can.”
Contact tracing by the Cubs determined no one in the traveling party was a close contact to Driver. Thursday’s game was not in jeopardy of being postponed, Ross said.
With the positive test seemingly contained to Driver, Ross views the lack of spread as a mix of luck and the team following protocols.