Play ball! Everything you need to know about the KC Royals as MLB finally gets rolling
The Kansas City Royals will play baseball again this year. The official word came down Tuesday night that Major League Baseball will play a 60-game 2020 season.
Players will report to Kansas City for the resumption of spring training — “spring training, part 2” — by next week. The regular season will begin on July 23-24.
After months of being in a holding pattern as well as contentious back and forth between the owners and the MLB Players Association, baseball will get into full swing in a relatively short period of time.
Here are some of the important steps along the way as baseball returns.
Players report: Wednesday, July 1, is now the new report date for spring training. The Royals will hold spring training at Kauffman Stadium.
Testing: With the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic still widespread, players will be required to test negative for the virus in order to start spring training. Once spring training starts, players, coaches and support staff will be tested every other day continuing through the regular season and postseason.
Players will receive temperature/symptom checks twice per day, and antibody testing will be conducted once per month.
Transactions: MLB instituted a transaction freeze early in the shutdown due to the pandemic. That freeze will be lifted Friday at noon (ET).
Rosters set: Prior to the start of the season, teams will submit a list of 60 players eligible to play in 2020, which will include their 40-man roster plus a 20-player taxi squad.
For the first two weeks of the season, each club will have a 30-man active roster. For the following two weeks, they’ll have 28-man active rosters. Following that, clubs will have 26-man rosters for the remainder of the season.
Trade deadline: The trade deadline, typically July 31, will be pushed back to Aug. 31 for this season.
Postseason eligibility: Players must be on a team’s roster by Sept. 15 in order to be eligible for postseason play. This year, baseball’s playoffs will consist of 10 teams. The World Series is set to begin Oct. 20 and a potential Game 7 would be played on Oct. 28.
Can we watch? On TV, sure. But MLB is not allowing fans to attend the games at this point.
This story was originally published June 24, 2020 at 12:09 PM with the headline "Play ball! Everything you need to know about the KC Royals as MLB finally gets rolling."
