The Chicago White Sox, Washington Nationals and Pittsburgh Pirates all announced Sunday that two of their players have tested positive for the coronavirus and are in isolation.
The St. Louis Cardinals also announced that another one of their players tested positive.
The White Sox did not identify their two players, but said they are asymptomatic and that contact tracing for both was conducted. They are being monitored by team medical staff and will receive follow-up testing in the coming days.
The team said both players requested privacy, meaning the team isn’t able to comment further.
Nationals manager Dave Martinez said two players out of 60 tested turned up positive for the coronavirus on their team.
Martinez said the two players took their tests Wednesday before reporting to Nationals Park and that some are still awaiting their results. Reliever Sean Doolittle minutes earlier lamented not having his COVID-19 test results back from Friday and implored baseball to “clean this up.”
Doolittle, who was part of Washington’s World Series-winning team last season, said he is still debating whether to play this season, weighing safety concerns and physical and mental health.
“I think I’m planning on playing; but if at any point in this, I start to feel unsafe, if it starts to take a toll on my mental health with all these things that we have to worry about and just kinda of this cloud of uncertainty hanging over everything, then I’ll opt out. But for now, I’ve prepared for the last three months like I’m gonna play. I feel ready to go,” he said.
The 33-year-old said the Nationals still haven’t received the respirator masks they were told were coming and expressed concerns about the situation.
He followed up his comments with a series of tweets:
But we need help to make this work. Faster test results, PPE for high risk individuals and players/staff with high risk family members. The individual efforts have been great so far but we can’t rely solely on individuals. The efforts have to be structural as well.
— Obi-Sean Kenobi Doolittle (@whatwouldDOOdo) July 5, 2020
Pirates manager Derek Shelton said Sunday that reliever Blake Cederlind and outfielder Socrates Brito have tested positive for the coronavirus.
In a video conference call with reporters, Shelton thanked the two players for allowing him to use their names when announcing the news.
“Very much appreciated,” Shelton said, according the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “Very much respect the other people that we have who don’t feel that it’s necessary to talk about, but I think it is [important] for people to realize that it is real in the game.”
The two players will be isolated and the team will conduct contact tracing, Shelton said. He said he could not discuss whether either player displayed symptoms of the illness, citing HIPAA regulations.
Cardinals third baseman Elehuris Montero tested positive for COVID-19 but is asymptomatic, according to president of baseball operations John Mozeliak. On Saturday, Mozeliak announced that left-handers Ricardo Sanchez and Genesis Cabrera had tested positive.
Players who test positive will be allowed to return to baseball activities after they test negative twice and pass other appropriate COVID-19 protocols.
A few test results are still pending, according to Mozeliak.
The Oakland Athletics are also waiting for test results. The team’s first full-squad workout was pushed back from Sunday following the July 4 holiday given the club hadn’t received results from position player intake testing done Friday, according to general manager David Forst.
“We all know that being flexible and adjusting to the unknowns is going to be part of everything we do this season,” Forst said.
Manager Bob Melvin is eager to get everybody on the field together at the Coliseum while understanding he must be flexible during this fluid time.
“It feels like we’re five days behind with position players,” said Melvin, who has slated the first live batting practice during a longer workout Tuesday.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
