Brewers alternate site team in quarantine

Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

The news comes after two players and a staffer tested positive for COVID-19.

The entirety of the players at alternate training site of the Brewers in Appleton, Wisconsin are in quarantine after a flurry of positive COVID-19 tests, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic:

The group of 28 players, you know, who are at the training site to fill the holes in case of injury, sickness, etc, are now all in quarantine. So yes, not an ideal situation. While the squad is being tested daily and the major league team isn't affected for now, we’re one IL stint away from a major disaster.

At the moment, the Brewers have no positive tests among their major league roster. President of baseball operations, David Stearns, says he doesn’t see this event having an impact on them either. “We have gone through contact tracing,” Stearns said. “We do not believe it will have any impact at all on our major-league team. We’ve been fortunate to get through this season relatively unscathed in this area. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to get all the way there at our alternate site.” It has not yet been decided if the alternate site will be shut down or continue to operate through to the scheduled close date.

As Rosenthal also reported, some players may be permitted to join the team’s taxi squad if their tests consistently keep coming back negative. The Brewers are currently in a fighting position for second place in the NL Central or a Wild Card spot. While they’re 6.5 games behind the Cubs, they’re only a game behind the Reds and Cardinals. The Phillies have a mere 1.5 game lead in the Wild Card race, and that could flip at any moment. As long as the Brewers are allowed to maintain a normal taxi squad situation, they should be good to go if any injuries or other problems arise.

We’re wishing a speedy recovery to the players and staffer who tested positive.