By now, most baseball fans are aware that included in MLB commissioner Rob Manfred’s 60-game 2020 season and related health and safety protocols therein, spitting – of any kind – during the COVID-19-shortened season will not be permitted. This, of course, includes pitchers spitting on (or licking) their fingers to improve their grip of the ball. In place of spitting (or licking), Manfred’s proposal includes that pitchers may use ‘a wet rag’ to moisten their fingers.

Yeah, right.

“It’s kind of something we just talked about in passing, just kind of joking right now,” Dodgers right-hander Ross Stripling said during a Zoom press conference on Sunday afternoon. “I haven’t actually sat down and thought about who on our team, our staff, actually licks their fingers. I know Alex Wood does like breathing into his hand a lot. I imagine he won’t be able to do that, but I don’t remember him actually licking his fingers.

“But right now, we kind of joke about it because it sounds kind of funny – like, a wet rag in your pocket, I guess it’s going to be hanging out, it’s going to be stuffed in there, what’s that going to look like? But nothing, at least in the bullpens that I’ve seen guys throw or the live BP’s, I haven’t actually seen anyone do a wet rag yet,”

One can only imagine how uncomfortable having wet uniform pants would feel as a result of having a wet rag in their back pocket.

As for Stripling himself, with five-time All-Star and 2012 AL Cy Young award-winner David Price having announced that he is opting out of the shortened season over COVID-19 health concerns for he and his family, might the popular 30-year-old Bluebell, PA native and Dodgers fifth-round draft pick in 2012 out of Texas A&M be in line to fill Price”s spot in the Dodgers starting rotation; and where is he at in his short Spring Training-2 build-up accordingly?

“Well, theoretically, really we only have time for like three build-ups, right?, before the real thing, so it’ll be four, five, six [innings] and then basically set me up for a start in that first series, if that’s what they want me to do in the role that I have.

“But I’ve always said that no matter what in all this, I’ll be a huge asset early because there will be a lot of guys that won’t be able to go no more than three or four innings this first turn or two times through the rotation,” Stripling added. “So I’ll be soaking up innings, in my opinion, basically either way; whether I’m starting or not, but obviously I’d rather start. But I feel like I can start and I can fill right into that spot.”

Because the 60-game season schedule has yet to be announced, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts has likewise yet to announce his season-opening five-man starting rotation. That said, it is being reported that MLB will announce the 2020 schedule on Monday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. PT.

Stay tuned…

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