Tuesday marked a significant milestone for Major League Baseball, even before the Braves completed their long-shot run to a championship.
A year prior on the baseball calendar, if not the actual calendar (it was October 27, 2020), Game 6 of the World Series got disrupted, its celebration stained, when the Dodgers removed Justin Turner in the eighth inning of their clinching victory because he tested positive for COVID. Then Turner decided it would be a good idea to pose for photos with his teammates, blatantly violating the collectively bargained pandemic protocols.
Those were tense times.
“Absolutely, it’s amazing to think back,” Jon Coyles, MLB’s vice president of drug, health and safety programs, said in a telephone interview when I mentioned the Turner anniversary. “…Last year was a totally different landscape.”