Due to COVID-19 issues on the Minnesota Twins roster, Monday’s series opener against the Oakland Athletics has been postponed, MLB announced on Sunday. The Twins’ previous two games, scheduled for Saturday and Sunday against the Los Angeles Angels were also postponed by Major League Baseball. Minnesota and Oakland are tentatively scheduled to open their series with a doubleheader on Tuesday.
Monday’s scheduled game between the host Oakland Athletics and the Minnesota Twins at Oakland Coliseum has been postponed to allow for continued testing and contact tracing involving members of the Twins organization. Subject to change based on further test results, a traditional doubleheader has tentatively been scheduled for 3:30 p.m. (PT) on Tuesday.
The Twins had to place shortstop Andrelton Simmons on the COVID-19 injured list earlier this week and then it was later revealed that at least five members of the traveling party to Anaheim — not Simmons, as he didn’t make the trip — have been away from the team on the trip due to either positive tests or contact tracing.
In a Zoom press conference, Twins manager Rocco Baldelli also said that they had another positive test on Saturday, bringing the total with members of the traveling party to three positives.
As for getting the two Twins-Angels games made up, it’s going to be difficult. Here are the shared off days between the two teams, one of which they’ll likely try to squeeze in a doubleheader in Anaheim:
- April 29, but the Twins play the previous day in Cleveland and the next day at home while the Angels would have to fly home from Texas and then immediately leave to fly to Seattle.
- May 20 and the Angels would already be at home, both on Wednesday and Friday, but the Twins would have to fly in from Minnesota and immediately leave for Cleveland.
- August 23, but the Angels would have to fly home from Cleveland and then immediately fly back to Baltimore. The Twins would have it worse, flying in from New York and then immediately leaving to fly to Boston.
- Sept. 2. The Twins would be coming from home and then immediately leaving to fly to Tampa Bay. The Angels would already be home.
- Sept. 13. The Angels would have to come home from Houston and then immediately leave to go to Chicago. The Twins are in the middle of a homestand, so they’d have a quick round trip flight with a doubleheader in between.
- Sept. 27. Both would be on homestands.
It seems like the most convenient would be to do May 20, but they could always shoot for Sept. 27 and then cancel the games if they don’t impact playoff races. The problem there is it is the last off day for each team and rainouts or COVID-19 postponements later in the season wouldn’t have a chance to be made up.
