St. Louis Cardinals Delay Series Vs. Cubs Due to Positive COVID-19 Tests

The St. Louis Cardinals are facing a brutal remainder of their 2020 MLB season after three more members for the organization tested positive for coronavirus. The positive results have postponed their weekend series with the division rival Chicago Cubs, leaving the team with a daunting compressed schedule in order to finish the season out.

With this latest postponement, the Cardinals have only played five games so far, and have not played since July 29. That means the team has 55 games to play in just 49 days to get to the scheduled 60 games. That seems close to impossible, as Cardinals president John Mozeliak said:

I don’t know what our future looks like at this point. For all of the optimism we had a couple days ago, it’s frustrating for everyone involved. […] Mathematically, it would be challenging.’

Among the players to have tested positive are All-Star catcher Yadier Molina, shortstop Paul DeJong, and starter Carlos Martinez. The total count for the team includes nine players and seven staff members with positive tests, a severe depletion of their roster and organizational team.

Though MLB has changed doubleheaders to include two games of only seven innings each, the Cardinals are still in line to have at least eight days with two games in the remainder of the season, a brutal schedule. In fact, the last time an MLB team played as many games as the Cardinals are scheduled to was in 1975, when the Minnesota Twins went 20-35 in the same amount of games.

For a team that had World Series aspirations before the coronavirus, the schedule might be a death kneel St. Louis, if they even can finish the season. Any other outbreak will likely force baseball to make a difficult decision about one of its marquee franchises, and how the league handles the Cardinals and their plight will speak volumes about its plans for the rest of the 2020 season.

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