Moves point to COVID issue
When Don Mattingly explained how he told Joe Dunand on Saturday that he was making his MLB debut on Saturday against the San Diego Padres, the manager was careful with his words.
“It was more like, ‘Hey, get ready to play. I’m not really sure what’s going to happen, but some stuff’s going down,’ ” Mattingly said. “It’s almost like at that point you’re not really telling him you’re in the big leagues. You’re telling him that you might be in the big leagues.”
Without directly saying it, Mattingly was referring to the second of three roster moves that took place over the final three days of the Marlins’ series at San Diego that signaled transactions related to COVID-19.
Three Marlins players — Brian Anderson on Friday, Jon Berti on Saturday and Richard Bleier on Sunday — were placed on the injured list without a formal injury designation.
Just like the past two years, teams do not have to disclose if a player is placed on the COVID-19 related IL, which is used when a player tests positive,
shows symptoms of COVID-19 or has been identified as a close contact of someone with the virus.
However, reading between the lines of Mattingly’s comments and the Marlins’ corresponding transactions to these three moves provide an understanding of the team’s situation at hand.
Players on the COVID-19 related IL do not count against a team’s 40-man roster, similar to players on the 60-day IL. There is also no minimum time that a player has to spend on the COVID-19 related IL
The Marlins selected the contracts of Dunand on Saturday and Erik Gonzalez on Sunday to fill active roster spots. Doing so, however, brings the
Marlins’ 40-man roster total to 41 players unless at least one of the three players that are without injury designations — Anderson, Berti and/or Bleier — is on the COVID-19 IL.
It’s a similar process to what the Marlins went through when they dealt with the coronavirus outbreak early in the 2020 season.
“You want to be through with it, but we don’t seem to be able to get past it,” Mattingly said Saturday without directly mentioning COVID-19 when asked about dealing with the “stuff going on,” as he initially described it. “It keeps rearing its ugly little head.”
When asked again postgame Sunday if there was any concern in the clubhouse about the situation continuing to spread, Mattingly, again not directly mentioning COVID-19, said, “I don’t know if it’s anything we can really talk about, but you pay attention.”
Other teams — but not all teams — have talked about it, though, when it has impacted their team.
The Philadelphia Phillies, for example, announced Sunday that starting pitchers Zach
Eflin and Zack Wheeler were going on the COVID-19 related IL. The Boston Red Sox have done the same as well, announcing Friday that pitcher Rich Hill and utility player Kike Hernandez were going on the COVID-19 related IL. Hernandez was cleared to be reinstated from the list a day later.
So, what comes next if a player does land on the COVID-19 related IL?
A vaccinated player must receive clearance from MLB’s Joint COVID-19 Health and Safety Committee to be reinstated. That can happen once the player is no longer deemed infectious, which can be as early as a few days. Unvaccinated players cannot return until they submit two negative PCR tests.