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Marlins manager Don Mattingly and his Miami franchise are coping with being in limbo as the coronavirus pandemic continues to deal uncertainty to professional sports and many other businesses.

Mattingly has grown out a bushy light gray beard in the month since Major League Baseball pulled the plug on spring training in response to COVID-19 restrictions on large gatherings and new requirements for social distancing.



Mattingly said he and his players have many of the same questions but few answers regarding when baseball might return.

“It’s hard to give answers when we don’t know what type of timeframe we’re talking about,” Mattingly said Monday in a Periscope interview with Marlins play-by-play announce Paul Severino. “I know they’re in the same boat. There’s nothing really necessary constructive that you’re able to do. You don’t know a timeframe, so we’re all kind of floating out here not really knowing what’s going to happen next.”

Mattingly said he is texting teammates every week or two and meeting with his staff over the phone.

The expectation for the Marlins is baseball will provide a stronger indication of what’s ahead by early May. The Centers for Disease Control has guidelines indicating mid-May baseball is unlikely.

Several states are keeping their social distancing guidelines in place into late May.



Mattingly said the Marlins still have a handful of roster spots to decide on before any games are played.

“Things that we were able to hit on and push on, I think those are there,” Mattingly said. “We have talked about different ways to continue that messaging through this. As we, if we, get to a point where we know when or how long, we’re going to hopefully send messages to our guys and put some videos together and stuff that they could be looking at to refresh their memories of what we tried to accomplish during that month of spring training.”

–Field Level Media (@FieldLevelMedia)