Three NBA players have tested positive for the coronavirus since last week, and professional baseball now has its first known case of the virus as well.
A minor league player in the New York Yankees’ system has tested positive for the coronavirus, ESPN’s Jeff Passan first reported on Sunday. The player was instructed to quarantine on Friday morning after coming down with a fever, and he has since tested positive for COV-19.
A minor league player in the New York Yankees system has tested positive for coronavirus, sources tell ESPN. He is the first known case in baseball. He was quarantined Friday morning after saying he was running a fever.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) March 15, 2020
The Yankees player who tested positive for coronavirus was only on the minor league side of the team's facility in Tampa. Still, as we're learning about coronavirus' ability to spread, that distance alone does not necessarily protect those who are nearby from contracting it.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) March 15, 2020
The news of a professional baseball player testing positive for the coronavirus came not long after Major League Baseball sent a memo to teams instructing them to end organized workouts, so it seems likely that the two events were related.
Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert was the first pro athlete from the major American sports to test positive for the Coronavirus, and his teammate Donovan Mitchell as well as Detroit Pistons center Christian Wood have tested positive since.
