Hunter doing fine after battle with COVID-19

PHILADELPHIA » It’s been 36 days since Tommy Hunter was diagnosed with COVID-19. And even though his symptoms were gone in three days, the confusion around the disease still lingers.

“It reminded me of that movie Twister where at the beginning Helen Hunt’s like, have you seen a tornado miss that house, miss that house, miss that house, miss this house and then hit your house?,” Hunter said Sunday before the Phillies’ 11-6 loss to Miami. “That popped into my head as something that stuck with me. Like, this is crazy. None of these other people are getting it and we got it.”

Hunter’s ordeal with the disease was pretty physically benign he said, a headache and what felt like a sinus infection that was gone in less than a week. His wife had a worse bout and his kids, ages two and four, also tested positive but were largely asymptomatic. What was more perplexing to the Phillies reliever is how the virus hopped without much rhyme or reason around the people in his life – not to Hunter’s father or to neighbors whose kids played with Hunter’s kids or to a couple Hunter and his wife had dinner with.

Or how the testing works: Hunter tested positive, then negative, allowing him and his family to leave their rented house in Florida and return to Ohio … only to get another seven positives tests before another negative.

“It was a weird situation, frustrating to say the least,” Hunter said. “Having to take your kids to go get more tests and then holding your twoyear-old’s head down while they’re sticking that stuff up there and then blood just

squirting out of your kid’s nose. It’s not an ideal situation. There’s a lot of stuff that you dealt with that a lot of other people have dealt with. You keep going forward.”

Everyone is doing well now, Hunter said. He stayed around Clearwater after Phillies camp was shut down in March and was able to keep up his throwing regimen, mostly into a net. He didn’t get into an intrasquad game until July 17 and has been playing catch up.

But the early results are good. He tossed a clean eighth in Saturday’s win over the Marlins, working around a walk and a hit.

“Catching up a little bit but I feel like I’m ready,” he said. “I feel like I’m going to be able to compete at a pretty high level. Like

I said, I think it’s going to get better.”

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The Phillies will tentatively get an extra series in town this week. Instead of a three-game weekend set at Toronto, the Blue Jays will come to Philly and be the home team. This was announced before the Phillies’ postponed game against the Yankees on Monday.

The Blue Jays are unable to host games in Toronto due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, with MLB’s exemption request denied. A bid to play in Pittsburgh was rebuffed, so the Jays will play their home games in Buffalo. While Sahlen Field is readied, the Blue Jays will hit the road and be the “home” team on the scoreboard in Washington Wednesday and Thursday, and in Philadelphia Friday, Saturday and Sunday. First pitch the first two games are 6:37 with a 3:07 getaway Sunday.