Marty’s musings: a potential plan to salvage the 2020 season

Welcome to ‘Marty’s Musings’, my weekly column of numbers summarizing the happenings in the baseball world. I am your guide for taking an analytic look at the news and notes throughout the game, and highlighting this week’s key pitching matchups.

This week we continue to speculate on when games will resume, but the reality is we do not know anything about the timeline for certain. Following last weeks’ service-time announcement, MLB cleared up details surrounding year-long suspensions, and the White Sox mourn a long-time broadcaster.

News & Notes

100 - Game season flirted with by MLB executives, who are trying to figure out how they can maximize the number of games played in an environment filled with uncertainty. The 100-game plan would presumably begin on July 1 and conclude in mid-October, with a World Series at a warm-weather neutral site.

400 - Weekly stipend that MiLB players will receive until at least May 31st. Perhaps more importantly, these players also receive their medical benefits. Due to the current crisis all MiLB players will receive this in addition to what they are contractually owed.

2021 - The year in which anyone suspended as part of the sign-stealing scandal, and banned from the game for one year, can return. It’s welcome news for A.J. Hinch and Jeff Lunhow, although it’s unclear whether or not any team would welcome them into the dugout or front-office. Since the suspensions are tied to the “end of the 2020 postseason”, if there is no postseason, that’s that.

28 - Seasons that former big league pitcher Ed Farmer served as the radio voice of the Chicago White Sox. Farmer had a history of kidney disease and had been in poor health recently. Farmer pitched for the Indians, Tigers, Phillies, Orioles, Brewers, and Rangers before joining the White Sox in 1979. He served a short stint as Special Assistant to the GM, and afterwards up back in the radio booth for nearly three decades.

??? - Days until Opening Day.