Pirates manager Derek Shelton: 'Getting back to baseball is going to help us on a larger scale'

Derek Shelton considers himself an optimist by nature, so the Pittsburgh Pirates manager is pushing a positive narrative that baseball will be back this summer.

No matter what it takes.

As MLB examines safe ways to play the 2020 season amid the coronavirus crisis, Shelton believes finding a way to play baseball is important to the nation’s psyche.

“There’s no hoops that are big enough,” Shelton said Monday afternoon on a conference call with Pittsburgh reporters. “Any way we can find a way to play, we play. …

“Getting back to baseball is going to help us on a larger scale. I have not put myself personally or in conversations with our staff in any place where we’re not thinking anything but optimistically that there’s going to be baseball.”

Even if that means playing in empty stadiums, hardly an ideal setting for Shelton to make his MLB managerial debut. While watching Pirates games from last season, Shelton has taken into consideration not only the strategy involved but how much different it will be to conduct a game with no spectators making noise.

“I think we’re going to have to be very mindful of how loud we talk, and I think you’re going to have be very minduful of your conversations with umpires because everybody’s going to be able to hear that,” Shelton said. “The biggest part of that is we’re playing.

“We’re all going to have to adjust. It’s going to be historic because there could be adjustments in terms of not only the fans but the main thing is if that is the case then we’re back playing baseball — and I think that’s what we all want.”

While Shelton refused to speculate on how baseball will look — whether games are played at spring training sites in Arizona and Florida or at their home ballparks — he realizes this is going to be a season like none other.

The games might look altogether different, especially with a proposed 10-team, three-division format that could have the Pirates playing in the East alongside the likes of the reigning World Series champion Washington Nationals and the 103-win New York Yankees.

Shelton believes the national pasttime, a game he said “everyone has played at some point” will bring back passion and excitement to a nation that has been shut down for six weeks and is craving a competitive outlet.

“Historically, it’s definitely going to go down in the record books because of how everything has changed,” Shelton said. “The big thing is, I feel strongly that the country needs baseball. It’s something that helps us heal. By getting back to the game, our national pastime, is going to help. It’s going to help in all regards.”