Tony Clark wants to watch live baseball as soon as possible — in America, even — no surprise for MLB’s union chief. However, in an interview with ESPN that was published Tuesday (but conducted last week), he said that the Players Association needs to see more before players safely return to the field during the coronavirus pandemic.
“Despite all that has been floated and all the rhetoric that is out there, we have not received anything formal (from MLB) that details an actual plan,” said Clark during his conversation with ESPN’s Marly Rivera.
“Unless or until we see and receive an actual proposal with a plan or plans — because my guess is there’s going to need to be flexibility in whatever is going to be considered — it’s all assumptions.”
It’s unclear whether or not those remarks came after the league leaked a proposal to USA Today on April 28, touting a temporary realignment that would restart the league as soon as late June and allow each team to play in their home ballpark — even in current coronavirus hot spots like New York.
At the time of the interview, however, Clark suggested that he was getting his information from the same leaks as the public.
“Unless or until we receive something and are able to work through it anything out there is just a best guess at this point,” said Clark, who played in 15 seasons, including one season a piece with the Yankees and Mets.
“We want to play,” said Clark. “As players, we want to play. As these ideas find their way into mainstream media, there are some ideas that seem to make sense, there are others that don’t track very well.”
Clark also said that the current conversation between the league and union “lends itself to the uncertainty because there’s a lot of ideations, but not any substance behind them just yet.”
MLB indefinitely suspended the season on March 12, but have been in active discussions with government officials and public health experts in hopes of playing through the ongoing pandemic.
One of MLB’s early leaked designs was an Arizona-only relaunch that would quarantine players and needed staff within the Phoenix metro area and begin the season in May. The league distanced themselves hours from the initial report.
“While we have discussed the idea of staging games at one location as one potential option, we have not settled on that option or developed a detailed plan,” said MLB in a statement. “While we continue to interact regularly with governmental and public health officials, we have not sought or received approval of any plan from federal, state and local officials, or the Players Association.”
Clark said that the union was also “working with experts” to determine a safe path forward, and intends to work with the league if and when baseball comes back. He also said that the union and league “have discussed” scenarios where a player gets infected with COVID-19.
The MLBPA head shared his frustration with the confusion all the leaks have created among players, which he says has fallen on the union to clarify and correct.
“We have to provide fact and separate that fact from fiction and do so daily at this point.”
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