While Major League Baseball considers its options for starting the 2020 season and Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball season remains delayed, the Korea Baseball Organization could start its season as soon as May 1, Yonhap News Agency reported Sunday.
An official announcement could be made as soon as Tuesday, according to the report, with the entire 144-game season presumably salvageable. Games would be played in empty stadiums, at least at the outset.
The KBO, which was supposed to start March 28, would use a generous number of doubleheaders, as well as games on Mondays, in order to complete its schedule. Mondays traditionally are off days in the KBO.
The league would also play any games scheduled after Nov. 15 in the KBO’s lone domed stadium in Seoul.
South Korea has seen a decline in coronavirus cases, with eight new ones reported Sunday, the lowest number over a single day in two months.
MLB continues to weigh its options, with ideas as extreme as putting all teams in Arizona to start the season, while playing most games in spring training parks. Another idea has teams playing regular-season games at their spring training complexes in both Arizona and Florida.
The United States’ top infectious disease doctor, Anthony Fauci, has already said that if baseball were to return this summer it would be without fans in the stands, while players would be kept in quarantine at hotels.