FORT MYERS, Fla. _ Greetings from outside the clubhouse.
We could be here awhile.
Don't expect quite as much color in the quotes and coverage in the coming days. Understand expansive explanations will be harder to find. Please be patient as we work to make the most of this, even if there are some moments when we wonder if we should be working at all.
If the temporary _ emphasis on temporary _ changes Major League Baseball and other professional sports leagues launched Tuesday really help stop or slow the spread of coronavirus by keeping media members out of clubhouses, then sports journalists should do their jobs to the best of their abilities while adapting.
This is a time for cooperation, not conflict. But let's hope that cooperation goes both ways. Let's hope temporary really means temporary.
We get it. Even the best interview is not worth one more person catching and passing on a problem that is costing lives.
Congressmen are being quarantined. Events much more important than Grapefruit League games have been canceled. Social distancing is the most popular thing since social media.
Some things are more important than how today's starter felt about his stuff. OK, a lot of things. This is one of them.
But someone smarter than me will have to explain how keeping media members out of clubhouses Tuesday made folks safer than they were Monday.
I could not help but wonder about that at JetBlue Park before Tuesday's game, as media members covering the Red Sox shared a disappointing story. After the news of clubhouses closing to reporters until further notice was out, Boston media were asked to request interviews with specific players. Reporters arrived to an interview area and encountered a problem. No players showed up before the game. Talk about a curveball, outside.
Plus a heavy dose of hypocrisy, considering what was happening all around the ballpark.
Multiple rounds of 20-plus fans were guided to the Red Sox dugout minutes before the team took the field, an up close and personal tour that left fans touching seats and rails that would soon be touched by Red Sox players.
Ushers who spent the mornings wiping down stadium seats gathered near coaches and players.
Team employees bounced between interactions with media in the press box and players in the clubhouse.
Scouts from different teams congregated in the press box to chat before heading out to talk to other scouts at other stadiums.
Players signed autographs and mingled.
Oh, and one more thing.
Boston's 3-2 win against the Cardinals was played in front of an announced crowd of 10,090, the largest crowd to see a game in Lee County this spring.? Lee County, by the way, has had two confirmed cases and one death from the COVID-19 coronavirus, The News-Press of Fort Myers reported Tuesday.
My point?
Tuesday looked like business as usual for every part of baseball but the media side.
"Kind of a weird rule," said one Cardinal who seemed to see things a little differently than his teammate Adam Wainwright, whose comments made back in Jupiter sounded like he wouldn't mind closed clubhouses becoming a permanent thing.
That's one of the fears here, though it is second on the list behind The Big C at the moment.
When access gets taken away, sometimes it comes back in a warped version, or not at all. We worry about these things because access is an important part of doing good work. Examples abound.
Just this month the Post-Dispatch has captured Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina's extensive thoughts on a potential contract extension, shared the background of new Korean pitcher Kwang Hyun Kim and told the story of ace Jack Flaherty talking shop with two young prospects.
All of these stories were reported from inside the clubhouse, where players are comfortable and valuable conversations thrive, thanks to professional relationships that are developed _ get this _ inside the clubhouse.
Some people seem to think the clubhouse is the showers. It's not. Some people seem to think the clubhouse is always open to reporters. It's not. Some people seem to think the clubhouse is where reporters hug players. It's not, unless I'm the only one who's being left out.
Tuesday showed why a more limited kind of access is worse. On the field before the game, players were naturally drawn toward batting practice. Outside of the clubhouse after the game, players were naturally drawn toward their rides home. They were on the move. It showed. And this was during a day the Cardinals media relations staff deserved to be applauded for its efforts to go above and beyond in making things as normal as possible with the new mandate.
"It's important that you're able to do your jobs," said Cardinals manager Mike Shildt, who confirmed no Cardinal has shown signs of having the virus.
"We always think about health first," Shildt said. "My personal hope would be that, first, we get this behind us, just from everybody's benefit, not only in our sport, but in the big picture of society. We'll get ahead of this at some point. And after that, we return to business as usual, because the media is a big part of how we do our jobs."
Cooperation over conflict. We should all be on the same team when it comes to washing our hands of this outbreak. Still, it's hard to miss the fact that the real story is being shut out.
The crowd in the clubhouse is a tiny percentage compared to the ones that gather for games.
