Rest of Mets-Nats series postponed

WASHINGTON -- The Nationals and Mets will not play baseball this weekend.

Major League Baseball announced on Friday afternoon that the remainder of the season-opening series at Nationals Park has been postponed. A total of four Nats players have tested positive for COVID-19, after an inconclusive test yielded a positive result upon retesting. Nine players, including the positive cases, and one staff member are in quarantine.

“We’re moving forward in the most safe and professional way that we can,” general manager Mike Rizzo said Friday. “Our No. 1 priority is the safety of our players, their families, our staff and the fans.”

The Nats and Mets were scheduled to open the 2021 season on Thursday night in a nationally televised broadcast featuring a matchup of Max Scherzer and Jacob deGrom. (Both players still are slated to start in their season openers.) That game was postponed after a test conducted on Monday -- the final day of Spring Training, -- yielded a positive result early Wednesday morning. Additional tests came back positive following contact tracing and quarantine.

“It’s a little disappointing,” Mets infielder J.D. Davis said on Friday. “It could happen to anybody. We’re fortunate enough to have good protocols in here and have good rules, to track down this kind of a spider web of what’s going on over on the Nationals, to kind of lock it down and get control of this virus. It is unfortunate, but it could happen to anybody.”

Rescheduling of the three-game division series will be provided by MLB when available.

The Mets will play their first game of the season Monday night in Philadelphia against the Phillies. They will continue to hold team workouts at Nationals Park every day through Sunday, when they’ll take a bus trip to Philly.

The Nationals are scheduled to host the Braves on Monday afternoon, and Rizzo said the team is preparing to do so. Their roster would include a number of players from the alternate training site in Fredericksburg, Va. If the latest round of tests come back negative, Rizzo hopes the club will receive clearance from MLB to hold segmented, socially-distanced workouts on Saturday.

“I would say that it’s unfortunate that this happened right at Opening Day, but is it any worse than it happening in the middle of the season, when you’ve played half a season?” Rizzo said.

“We’re going to take this as is. We’re going to care for our players, care for their families, make sure we do the right thing, put the best 26 players on the field, whenever we play -- be it Monday or whenever we start the season – and get after whoever we’re playing.”