Seattle Mariners: It’s 100 days until Opening Day! Well, maybe not

It is now 100 days until the Seattle Mariners scheduled opening day, but it does not look like the game will be played on April 1st.

When the MLB released all 30 teams’ regular-season schedule during the middle of a pandemic before a game had been played in 2020, it raised some eyebrows. Now it looks like the eyebrow-raising was right as there have been reports that the Mariners’ date with the San Francisco Giants set for April 1st of next year might be pushed back.

According to reports Opening Day for the whole league could be pushed back 4-6 weeks for many reasons. One being obvious, it gives the COVID vaccine time to hopefully be out to the general public and for our sake as baseball fans, and more importantly to the MLB, the owners’ pockets, it means fans in the stands. The other major reason for a delay would be another labor dispute, which delayed the 2020 season for months.

The MLB owners have thrown out numbers in the billions but no books have been opened to show how much the pandemic actually hurt the league, and there is a growing distrust in the players of the owners. This year’s labor dispute will be incredibly weird and complex because, besides that, we may start the season with no fans and regulations for a pandemic, and finish it with the World Series played in front of 40,000 people.

So who knows. We might get a Seattle Mariners regular-season game in exactly 100 days, or we might not get one for another 140 days. As it stands right now there are some reasons for optimism and 100 days until Opening Day is always a fun thing to hear as it means we are closer to spring, warmth, and of course, baseball.