Another Miami Marlins player has tested positive for coronavirus, bringing the total number in their traveling party to 18, sources confirmed to ESPN.
Major League Baseball had already postponed all of the Marlins’ games through Sunday after the team’s recent outbreak.
“It is most prudent to allow the Marlins time to focus on providing care for their players and planning their Baseball Operations for a resumption early next week,” the league said in a statement.
The Marlins have remained in Philadelphia, where they played last weekend, and have been undergoing daily testing. Sixteen players and two staffers have now tested positive.
No Philllies players or coaches tested positive, but a visiting clubhouse attendant did.
The postponements announced Tuesday were among a series of scheduling changes involving four other teams as a result of the fallout from the Marlins’ positive tests. The Athletic was first to report this latest positive test.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told the ESPN Daily podcast that he actually thinks MLB has “handled it well, to be honest with you, in that they’ve done virtually everything that you could do to try to get the main goal… was to protect the health and the welfare of the players and of the personnel associated with the team.”
He added: “When I had discussion with some of the officials of different teams, as well as of MLB in general, we went over the different kinds of protocols that they would need…the testing and the things. One of the things that came up as a big concern, is what happens if a cluster of players get infected and how are you going to handle that? Would that wind up not only shutting down the team? Would it then impact on other teams that would be playing? So it was a consideration.
“I think we’re going to have to take it on a day by day, week by week basis.”
