Yankees Rumors: Opening Day Game vs. Nationals Might Not Be Played in DC

A week out from Opening Day, Yankees-Nationals may have to move.

Yankees baseball is fast approaching (seriously), as the team ditches its recent intrasquad games in favor of head-to-head competition against the Mets and Phillies beginning this weekend.

Opening Day is very much set for next Friday across MLB, with teams putting the finishing touches on their stadiums, fake crowd noise, and cardboard seat-fillers. The Yankees will get the entire process started in Washington on Thursday night, with Gerrit Cole facing off against Max Scherzer.

Or, at least, they were supposed to.

Rumor has it that the city of Washington has still not yet confirmed the game will be taking place at Nationals Park, and the team has been looking into alternate locations.

According to local health protocols, any player or staffer will be required to quarantine for two weeks following a positive test, and the city has been unwilling to bend the rules to accommodate these two warring baseball teams.

Once again, this game is to be played a week from Thursday. Getting down to the wire here, fellas!

If at all possible, we highly recommend that Washington, DC opt to play the game in their friendly confines, as opposed to moving it to one particular proposed location: West Palm Beach. A sudden, unscheduled trip to Florida is exactly what no one wants for this Yankees unit, especially at this point in the ever-creeping pandemic.

Luckily (luckily?), Fredericksburg, VA seems to be the front-runner, if the contest needs to be moved quickly.

We were getting so close, too.

All the pomp and circumstance that’s gone into the league’s opening (which feels somehow both inevitable and unstable, at this point) has led up to this. Everything’s ready for Opening Day, the sponsorships are in place, the TV deal has been signed, and, oh, one more thing: We just need a location for the very first game, and then we should be good.

Hopefully, this complete eye roll of a scenario gets fixed soon. Gerrit Cole’s Yankees debut taking place in Fredericksburg would be a jarring bit of trivia forever.