Diamondbacks Yankees Postponement Creates Scheduling Mess

Today's Diamondbacks at Yankees game has been officially postponed due to tropical storm Ophelia hitting the New York area.

Today's #Dbacks at #Yankees game is canceled. We'll see what happens tomorrow. As of this moment tomorrow's forecast doesn't look much better. https://t.co/xlrcynweyb
— Jack Sommers (@shoewizard59) September 23, 2023

There will be much discussion and speculation about how this game will be made up, and whether or not the two teams will be able to play tomorrow for that matter. According to the latest hourly weather reports at Weather.com the chances for rain during the day tomorrow are even higher. That would seem to make the playing of double header tomorrow extremely unlikely. The rain is expected to continue into Monday morning but should be clearing later in the day.

The Yankees have a scheduled off day on Monday but the Diamondbacks are scheduled to play the Chicago White Sox on Monday. Both the D-backs and White Sox have a scheduled off day on Thursday. So one possibility is that MLB could work with the three team to have the D-backs and Yankees play one or even two makeup games on Monday, and then move the D-backs-White Sox Monday game to Thursday.

If that solution does not work than the only other day on the schedule that is open for makeup games is October 2nd, which is supposed to be an off day prior to the start of the Wild Card series on October 3rd. While it would not seem equitable to force the D-backs to fly to NY on the night of October 1st to play a makeup game on the 2nd, the league could opt for that choice on the chance that the game may not be necessary.

For example if the D-backs playoff seeding were locked in at either the second or third wild card spot, regardless of the outcome of a postponed game, then the league could just cancel that game all together. So a wait and see approach may be the road they take.

Last night Torey Lovullo said that they were ready for anything when it comes to pitching decisions. Zac Gallen is scheduled for Sunday, and then again on next Friday against Houston. That would have enabled him to pitch in the first game of a wild card series on October 3rd. If he has to pitch on Monday however, then he would not be able to pitch against Houston until Saturday, and that would knock him back to game two of a wild card series should they make it.

As you can see there are just too many unknowns and permutations at this moment. I don't expect there to be clarity to the situation until some time late in the day on Sunday, depending on whether they can even get one game in. Stay tuned for further news from Inside the Diamondbacks.