NBC Sports California’s Jessica Kleinschmidt breaks down the A’s position battles at the catcher and second base positions.
The A's position players were supposed to conduct their first full workout at the Oakland Coliseum on Sunday. It didn't happen.
The team is hoping the workout might happen Monday, but it could be delayed again.
The Athletic's Alex Coffey reported Sunday night that the A's coronavirus tests have yet to be shipped from San Francisco to the league's lab in Utah.
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According to Coffey, A's general manager David Forst told reporters that the July 4 holiday played a role in the tests not being shipped Saturday.
While A's pitchers and catchers were working out at the Coliseum on Sunday, position players can't participate until their coronavirus test results come back negative. In this case, the tests haven't even had a chance to be processed and analyzed.
Coffey reported, citing a source, that A's third baseman Matt Chapman "voiced his displeasure" to Forst.
Forst then sent a lengthy WhatsApp message to all A's players, and Coffey obtained a copy of the text. Here's part of what Forst wrote.
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"MLB has informed me this evening that our test samples from Friday have not arrived at the lab," Forst wrote. "They were not delivered as intended on Saturday because of the federal holiday and then were not switched to Sunday delivery in time to arrive today. As of this moment, they are sitting at SFO waiting to fly to Salt Lake to be delivered to the lab by 1:30 Mountain Time tomorrow. On top of screwing up the logistics of this whole thing, neither MLB nor CDT (the company that collects the samples) communicated any of this to us until we pressed them for information, at which point all they could do was apologize, which frankly doesn’t really do much for us."
Forst continued to point the finger at the league for what happened this weekend.
"At this point, the blame lies with CDT and MLB and I won’t cover for them like I did earlier today," Forst wrote. "Despite having our schedule a week ahead of time, they didn’t alert us to the possibility of any complications around July 4th, and once there were issues, they did nothing to communicate that to us or remedy the situation until Nick (Paparesta, the A’s head athletic trainer) and I forced the issue at various times today. If possible, I’m as frustrated and pissed as you are (well, probably not as pissed as Matt is), and I assure you the rest of the staff is as well.”
While other teams have had their full squads working out at their home stadiums, the A's now are behind the eight-ball. With limited time to get ready for the 60-game 2020 season, every day matters.
Earlier in the day, before the A's knew the full extent of the delay, manager Bob Melvin expressed his frustration that position players weren't going to be able to work out Sunday.
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According to Coffey, the A's tests are scheduled to arrive in Utah at 1:30 a.m. MT.
It's unclear if the lab can turn the tests around quickly enough for the players to report to the Coliseum and conduct a full workout Monday evening.