Though Major League Baseball went ahead and built a baseball field in the middle of an Iowa cornfield, it will have to wait before two teams actually play a game there.
According to a report from The Athletic's Ken Rosenthal, the Field of Dreams game, slated to take place a week from Thursday in Dyersville, Iowa, has been cancelled. The White Sox were scheduled to take on the St. Louis Cardinals in the nationally televised showcase, but Rosenthal said that logistical reasons in a year upended by the COVID-19 pandemic have forced the league to call the game off.
Rosenthal made sure to mention that the cancellation of the event was not due to the Cardinals' growing number of positive COVID-19 tests. According to Monday reports, 13 members of the Cardinals organization have tested positive for COVID-19, including seven players. The team didn't play its scheduled three-game series against the Milwaukee Brewers this past weekend in Wisconsin, and its four-game series with the Detroit Tigers in Michigan was postponed Monday.
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The report of a cancellation comes just three days after MLB tweeted out a video of the progress being made on the field in Iowa.
MLB at Field of Dreams is becoming a reality.
— MLB (@MLB) July 30, 2020
(MLB x @GEICO) pic.twitter.com/5RcNZRTn3l
With the All-Star Game, as well as the league's planned series between the Cubs and Cardinals in England, cancelled this year, it seemed the Field of Dreams game was the only showcase baseball would have left to show off to a national TV audience during this shortened season played amid a pandemic, and it figured to be a nice opportunity for the White Sox to show off their rebuilt roster to that same wide audience.
Originally, the game was supposed to pit the White Sox against the New York Yankees, but after the league shifted to a regional schedule, with teams only playing their division rivals and teams from the corresponding division in the opposite league, the Cardinals were used as a substitute.
The game in Iowa was supposed to be the start of a three-game set between the two teams, with the White Sox playing hosts to the Cardinals on the South Side the following Saturday and Sunday. Even with the Field of Dreams game called off, the White Sox are scheduled to play the Cardinals in that three-game series two weekends from now. The Cubs are scheduled to play the Cardinals in St. Louis this upcoming weekend.
Whether the Cardinals' rising number of positive tests - which have already forced the postponement of seven games - has any effect on the White Sox schedule remains to be seen.
The White Sox are in Milwaukee for the start of a four-game, home-and-home set Monday, where the Cardinals were supposed to play over the weekend. The Minnesota Twins and Cleveland Indians, the White Sox division rivals, played a four-game series in Minneapolis over the weekend, where the Cardinals played before traveling to Milwaukee.
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Field of Dreams game between White Sox, Cardinals reportedly cancelled originally appeared on NBC Sports Chicago
