Opening Day
Today MLB Network is playing two recent Opening Days in which the Giants got dramatically pantsed, if you're into that
Three weeks ago, this was still going to be Opening Day.
The coronavirus had already started, of course, and the course was set for the season’s postponement. But there was no sense in the US that the crisis was going to be serious, much less dire, much less maybe-a-couple-million-people-will-die-if-the-president-makes-the-wrong-call level.
No, we were having normal thoughts and conversations about the Giants roster. Who’s gonna be the fifth starter? Who’s gonna be the closer? Will the entire infield rebound? Who’s gonna be this year’s Mike Yastrzemski? How many games could this team even win, anyway?
Two weeks ago, the writing was on the wall. The NBA had already postponed its season after Rudy Gobert tested positive. Italy was two days into its lockdown. MLB waited a few hours, but followed suit as well (this tweet was sent at 10:15 AM Pacific time on the 12th):
Before the NBA took action, there had been talk of playing the games without fans, or playing them in areas unaffected by the coronavirus — Arizona instead of Seattle, for example. The aggressive nature of the virus made both of those plans look silly, and in hindsight both looks even worse: people get the virus from close contact, so any sport where anyone stands within a couple feet of anyone else is a bad idea, and Arizona is now firmly middle-of-the-pack in per capita infection rate. There was never any chance this season would start on time.
One week ago, the state of California issued its shelter-in-place order. It was the first state to do so. Counties had been issuing the order individually, but enough of a critical mass built up and keeping people away from other people had become so urgent that any responsible government official could see there was no choice. 20 more states have now followed California’s lead, with numbers growing by the day. This is all normal now.
It’s been three weeks.
Three weeks ago, we were going to have new baseball games to watch today. Now the idea is unthinkable. That’s not to say that that’s the thing to focus on, but it’s a sign of how much the world has changed in less than a month. It’s a cliche to say that every week is a year now, so I’m gonna start saying every day is a decade. Can’t wait for the royalties to start pouring in!
The world should have been different. It’s a thought I have often: about my job, about politics, about having to stand in a long-ish line at Safeway. But it’s especially pertinent now, when not only are we bombarded with information every day about how the President refused to address the crisis before it became one, but we’ve also seen what normal looks like. We see it every year (well, not 1995, I guess). There’s comfort in the regular rites of spring, and baseball is a big part of that for a lot of people. Instead of having that, we have this: a holding pattern, waiting and hoping that this thing goes away so we can have some normalcy again.
It’ll be a while before we get that normalcy. In the meantime, people will get sick and die, and if we’re lucky, we’ll sit at home and watch it on TV. The world should have been different, but it’s not, and this is what we get.
All in all, I prefer baseball to COVID-19.