Indians Manager Francona Doesn't Know Where, When and How the 2020 MLB Season Might Work

Like most people during the covid-19 lockdown, Cleveland Indians manager Terry Francona been doing what most people across the country have the past few weeks.

“I’m kind of bored. I’ve taken up walking, which I never thought I would,” Francona said Thursday.

“I’ve watched Netflix until I can’t watch it anymore. We’ve had a lot of Zoom calls, organizationally, with Chris (Antonetti) and (Mike) Cherny (Chernoff), so we’ve tried to at least take advantage of the downtime that we would never have ordinarily and get groups together where we can talk.”

Major League Baseball remains on hold for the 2020 season while the country for basically the most part stays in lockdown.

It is a very different way of living for Francona along with the organization as a whole, who as of Thursday would have played their 20 game, an afternoon 1:10pm first pitch at Progressive Field against the Detroit Tigers.

Instead, it’s been mostly meetings as well as keeping track of players who at one point or another may have been on the shelf were injured.

Having a few extra weeks to recover maybe the only benefit the team has for those players that were slated to miss the first few weeks of the season.

“Everybody’s doing pretty well,” Francona said of the injured players.

“(Carlos) Carrasco’s been throwing bullpens and he always sends us video right after. I think it’s a good thing he wasn’t supposed to throw today. It looks like it’s pretty white out there. He’s been doing fine.

“(Mike) Clev’s (Clevinger) doing great. (Tyler) Naquin’s doing great. And (Oscar) Mercado, he’s fine.

“There are a lot of teams that were in similar situations to us, where if the season started on time, they wouldn’t have guys. But now, whenever it starts, you’ll have your guys back.”

The current plan to start the 2020 campaign is still very much in flux. No one seems to know where or when it will start, though it seems the latest and most plausible proposal has the season being played in spring training sites in Arizona and Florida.

It’s a proposal that was thrown out by Bob Nightengale of USA Today last week, and it seems to make the most sense to have a shortened 108 game season.

“I think if we’re going to be able to play baseball, everybody is going to have to be a little bit willing to make adjustments,” Francona said.

“If we think we’re just going to roll out a normal baseball season, I think we’re probably all kidding ourselves.

“I think MLB has done a really good job of explaining, ‘Hey, if and when we play, it’ll be appropriate to play.

“We’re not going to take away from other people, and certainly the safety of our players and their families comes into play.’ If you see us playing, I’m pretty confident that we’re in a pretty good place, as far as our whole country.

“We’re going to have to be willing to make some — whether concessions or be flexible, because it’s just not realistic that we’re going to start playing in Cleveland right away. It’s just not going to happen.”

The proposal that the USA Today piece laid out had the Indians playing in the “Cactus League West” in Arizona along with the Cincinnati Reds, Chicago White Sox, Los Angeles Angels and Los Angeles Dodgers.

Whatever Major League Baseball decides to do, it’s going to be something that likely is going to take getting use to not only for fans, but for the players, managers and teams in general as well.

“The hypotheticals are kind of hard to answer. I mean nobody knows the roster size, when we’re gonna start,” Francona said.

“I know this is shocking, but I think you’re putting the cart a little ahead of the horse. Again, we’ll do whatever we’re supposed to do.

“Like always, the teams that handle adversity usually put themselves in a better chance to win than the other teams.

“That’s part of why I like our guys so much because I think they’re willing to handle adversity. This would just be another area of that.”

While many think that those higher up in baseball like managers may have a little more insight as to what is going on and when the season may start, it sounds like Francona is just like everyone else, waiting and seeing what will come next.

One thing Francona doesn’t care about is the idea of playing the 2020 World Series at neutral sites maybe as late as December.

The manager said Thursday that if the Tribe is playing in what’s been referred to in the past as the “Fall Classic,” he doesn’t care where or when they take the field.

“If we were playing a World Series, I would go anywhere. If somebody would tell me now, ‘Hey, you’re gonna play in the World Series,’ I’ll go anywhere,” Francona said.

“Again, you’re asking hypotheticals that – things that get out in the media, MLB is throwing out ideas and some of them become public. That doesn’t mean it’s gonna happen.

“As I said earlier, I think as baseball people this year, we need to be flexible in doing whatever is in baseball’s best interest. And I don’t know what that is. I’m glad there are people that are smarter than me that are making those decisions.”