I can’t come up with a good rationalization for this.

To put the well-being of players and fans at risk is a callous, irresponsible approach.

Serious measures should be taken to combat Coronavirus, and the scientific consensus indicates that large public events such as sporting events should be delayed.

All of the talk over the years about sports as a diversion is inapplicable to this particular situation, in which sports could be the direct cause of plight, not a distraction from it.

Lives are being put at risk and to not even put aside meaningless Spring Training games is a gratuitous risk.

Little as anyone seems to know about what the next few weeks and months will bring for the world, it is safe to say that most people aren’t thinking too much about sports right now.

And I promise you that while a world in which sports aren’t happening is quite strange, as happened in the week following the September 11 attacks, you will get over this absence more easily than you think.

Bigger things exist in the world today than watching fringe major leaguers compete for a Major League season that probably isn’t going to start on time, with its odds of starting on time being lowered the more we drag our feet on combating Coronavirus in the first place.

Over the years, there is some precedent for canceling sports due to major news, and that a week of delayed games after 9/11 is really the only reference point most of us have is a sign of our privilege.

Utah Jazz players Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell testing positive for Coronavirus exemplifies the problem—every single person in an NBA arena in which they participated was put at some level of risk, and while the mortality rate of Coronavirus is in the low single digits, 1% of a 20,000 seat venue is a catastrophe.

Truly, if the worst thing that comes from this outbreak is you miss sports for a few weeks, we got absurdly lucky.

Times like these call for us as people to think beyond our very basic, temporary creature comforts.

Have you ever, when all was said and done, deeply regretted taking precaution?

Exactly.

Baseball doesn’t matter at a time like this.

Everybody has a moral obligation to avoid the spread of this disease, and if that means you have to miss out on watching a team’s #19 prospect striking out another team’s #15 prospect, that’s an incredibly minor sacrifice to make when it comes down to it.

Nobody is going to think back on missed Spring Training games in 2020 with even the slightest bit of regret at what was lost.

Just consider how relatively quickly the NBA, MLS, college basketball conferences, and perhaps by the time this post goes up the NHL were willing to sacrifice far more meaningful games than MLB is presently dragging its feet regarding.

A lack of perspective this pronounced is truly staggering given the adults supposedly in charge.

My goodness.

I had a post ready to go up today but it occurred to me that absolutely nobody was going to care to read about anything else today besides the biggest public health crisis of my lifetime, myself included.

Nobody is going to miss these games for more than a few seconds if we lose them.

Stop the games.