When the Cincinnati Reds began spring education in 2020 and reports began circulating about a fast-spreading virus called COVID-19, the club’s players realized the same thing at the same time.
“I’m looking,” Reds reliever Lucas Sims said, “and a couple of guys who were still there (from last season) were saying, ‘I’m pretty sure we had this. ‘It already happened to us last year. ‘
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They will know for sure.
But the only known MLB team to experience a COVID outbreak this season may also have been the league’s first, long before baseball knew what COVID-19 was.
And if the September 2019 outbreak that temporarily decimated the active roster is due to COVID or anything else, then you may be guilty of mitigating the effect of that outbreak, which brought four pitchers to the COVID casualty list. on two days over the weekend.
In fact, before the organization had heard of COVID-19, general manager Nick Krall and other team officials instituted a strict new policy ahead of spring training 2020, barring players with health issues from accessing the facility.
“We cracked down on that,” coach David Bell said. “Basically, if you don’t feel good, you don’t come to the stadium, and if you don’t feel good in the stadium, you leave. “
“It’s very different than how I grew up in football,” added Bell, a third-generation elementary league player he selected in 1990 and played 12 years in the primary. “They just put you in an IV and you stayed. You would never think of leaving.
“But we learned from all that. It was our season that year.
Sims is one of three Reds players left over from the 2019 outbreak that eliminated so many players so temporarily that it contributed to an 8-20 season finale. Joey Votto and Curt Casali were also part of that team.
“Everyone who was there suffered from a little bit of PTSD,” Sims said. “It was bad. I was in the bullpen and we were running, and not because of usage or anything else. We just needed them to help us. “
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The timing of this outbreak couldn’t be worse, with the unexpected young Reds in a playoff race stuck in a four-way tie for the last National League wild-card spot after their weekend farewell tactics with the Chicago Cubs with 23 games remaining.
And without a starting pitcher on the roster he will arrive in the major leagues on June 4, thanks to Graham Ashcraft’s toe injury and a COVID IL that includes starters Hunter Greene, Brandon Williamson and Ben Lively.
Lever reliever Fernando Cruz is in COVID IL.
No one knows if the existing outbreak has run its course, or how the fourth-year policy may have helped slow the spread, which also affected staff and even some workplace workers.
“Prevention is better than cure,” Sims said of the policy that was presented to the team at the start of spring training in 2020. “What happened in 2019 sucked. And the time when everyone is in poor health right now is rarely Very ideal, right in the middle of a hunt.
“But it’s just a little bit of adversity. . . You simply advance the exercise.
Bell said the team has requested non-essential personnel from the clubhouse as the team deals with the outbreak.
“We even sent some of the coordinators who work for the organization,” he said, “which is a shame because we like to have them around. We just went out to take all kinds of precautions like that.
The Reds made 19 changes in a 33-hour period between Friday morning and Saturday night. Greene stayed in San Francisco on Sunday after staying there as a precaution to expose his teammates when they returned home Wednesday night after facing the Giants.
Right-hander Carson Spires joined as a COVID backup and took over as the starting lineup Sunday in the Reds’ 15th primary league debut this season.
Top pitcher Connor Phillips is expected to be No. 16 Tuesday against the hot-out Seattle Mariners.
It’s no wonder that guys like Sims, who saw the effect in 2019, mention PTSD and start wondering if they were the first baseball team to deal with a COVID outbreak, long before the Miami Marlins and St. Petersburg Cardinals. Luis during the pandemic. 2020 season shortened.
“I think it may have been just that, honestly,” Sims said. “Some boys were suffering. Someone ended up being hospitalized for double pneumonia. We lost one during the season, we lost another for a few weeks. “
“Also in Seattle. “
It was in the Seattle domain that the first cases were identified in the United States, months later.
But players must remain optimistic.
“It’s a resilient group,” Sims said.
They even won their next two games with returns in the ninth inning, in the last drink of Friday’s doubleheader and then Saturday night, after 3 of the COVID moves were made between doubles program games.
Most impressively, the shots allowed the Cubs to score a total of three runs in those two games.
“The mentality doesn’t change,” second baseman Spencer Steer said. “We still have work to do, and that’s winning baseball games. “
Sims said, “You want the 26th, or the 28th (in September), or whatever. I don’t even know who is active right now. “