How are you staying fit during the Coronavirus shut down?
Walking around the neighborhood? Basement weight set? Hot yoga? Peloton?
Phillies infielder Jean Segura is pushing an Escalade down the street, via his Instagram account:
It’s not our place to tell private sector businesses how to operate during a crisis. We’re in a shit situation here, and if companies need to lay off workers or cut costs or implement furloughs, then so be it. That’s their prerogative.
The thing with Aramark, which employs food service workers down at The Wells Fargo Center and other Philadelphia arenas, is that they haven’t returned any emails or phone calls since the COVID-19 pandemic began. Compare that to Harris Blitzer Sports and Entertainment and Comcast-Spectacor, who not only have responded to media inquiries but agreed to pay the folks who work Sixers, Flyers, and Wings games in South Philly. The decision to help those hourly workers during a difficult time was met with wide praise from the local sports community.
For the time being, ticket takers, ushers, security guards, and part-time game night Sixers staffers will receive money while the arena is shut down, but the folks who deliver food to your seat or make the concourse cheesesteaks are shit out of luck. That resulted last week in Unite Here Local 274, the union representing those workers, sharing a letter from city council addressed to executives with the Sixers, Eagles, Flyers, and Phillies, asking them if they can “work cooperatively” with Aramark to help these people out.
I’ve tried emailing and calling Aramark over the course of 14 days now and haven’t heard anything back. The extent of their Coronavirus PR strategy appears to be a couple of website links, one that brings you to a resource page for associates with a blurb reading this way:
Sports Betting Updates
ESPN’s Jeff Passan, who has great taste in music:
* The caveat agreed to by the players and league is that they will consider playing games at neutral sites instead of home ballparks — and will consider the feasibility of playing in empty stadiums and just how proper a solution it may be for both sides and especially fans.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) March 27, 2020
That caveat basically nullifies bullet point one, so I’m not really sure it makes sense, nor do I imagine we’ll meet those bullet points anytime soon.
Just a hunch, but baseball begins in empty stadiums later this summer. That’s my guess.
We made it to opening day!
Unfortunately there’s no baseball because of the Coronavirus, so that sucks.
In lieu of games that mean something, MLB and its 30 teams are loading up the slate using the #OpeningDayAtHome hashtag, which links us to replays of classic games and other cool items.
Here are some of the Phillies-related things that are on deck:
- 9 a.m. – replay of Bryce Harper’s walkoff grand slam against the Cubs (Phillies website and MLB Twitter)
- 4:10 p.m. – Rhys Hoskins takes on Miguel Rojas in MLB The Show (Phillies Youtube page)
- 6 p.m. – replay of the Signing Harper Documentary (NBC Sports Philadelphia)
- 7 p.m. – replay of Roy Halladay’s 2010 perfect game (NBC Sports Philadelphia)
And here’s some of the national stuff MLB is showing:
Two Fridays ago, Comcast Spectacor and the 76ers announced that they’d be paying employees who work at the Wells Fargo Center for a period of time during the Coronavirus crisis. That includes game night staff, ticket takers, ushers, security, and other personnel who fall within the Comcast or Harris Blitzer Sports and Entertainment umbrella.
It leaves a portion of arena workers uncovered, however, the group that works in food and concessions and is employed by Aramark. We contacted Aramark for information regarding these employees and didn’t receive a response.
Fast forward about 12 days and here’s a video and statement from UNITE HERE local 274, which is the union representing the food service workers:
Let’s do a theoretical here:
Pick an arbitrary date for the start of the MLB season, like June 1st. Say we just start the year at that point, pick up the schedule there, and play a shortened campaign.
Any issues? Problems?
You’d save yourself the headache of rescheduling, but the standings would be unbalanced due to the loss of divisional games, which would have to be weighted or worked into the back-end of the calendar somehow. The Phillies are set to play six divisional series between now and June 1st, which would be lost in our theoretical scenario.
One of possible solutions to reworking the schedule is to play doubleheaders, which Jeff Passan writes about in a story posted to ESPN this morning:
Terrible news for the Mets…
New York Mets starter Noah Syndergaard has a torn ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow and is expected to undergo Tommy John surgery in the near future, sources tell ESPN. The procedure will keep him out until at earliest April 2021 and likely into the summer months.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) March 24, 2020
…and good news for Atlanta, Philly, Florida, and Washington batters, who won’t have to face the former All Star.
If you’re really missing baseball, I have a video you can watch, after the jump:
Didn’t expect this today, but it’s a very enjoyable video clip.
Here’s a rational and reassuring Coronavirus message from the Phils’ manager:
