MLB Stadiums Will Add Plexiglass For The 2021 Season
With all the changes Major League Baseball embraced last season that are implemented for good, a new one for this season will bless the league for the better. Most teams are adding plexiglass walls around the netting and the dugouts. The ultimate purpose is to limit the exposure of COVID-19 from fans to players. Unlike last season, fans can sparsely attend both spring training and regular-season games in small clusters of family and friends ranging from four to six people.
The first stadium to put up the plexiglass walls is the New York Yankees Spring Training facility, Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, Florida. The barrier doesn’t have any gaps allowing for respiratory droplets with the virus to be stopped. The height is also six and a half feet tall. In addition, a buffer zone will sit between the edge of the roof of the dugout on the field side, consisting of 12 feet of space, extending back, cutting out the first few rows of seating. Minimizing the virus is the most important measure ultimately, and taking all precautions is necessary. In order to persist a full 162 game season of baseball, changes like this have to occur.
Observing Spring Training will be a test to see how these measures will do their job. Almost a year ago, during last Spring Training, COVID-19 shut down the world as we knew it. A lot has changed, and baseball was able to come back a few months later, with all the precautions. There is high optimism tha with the rolling out of multiple vaccines, baseball will run much more efficiently for the 2021 season. Let’s knock on wood and hope for the best. Baseball, the stage is yours.
