Coronavirus is saving Astros from MLB hate: Yankees’ Adam Ottavino

Before the coronavirus pandemic shut down Major League Baseball, the Astros were still the sport’s collective enemy for their 2017 sign-stealing scandal.

Yankees reliever Adam Ottavino is convinced the current stoppage in play has allowed Houston to slide under the radar.

“I don’t think people are going to forget it, but I think it’s helping them because that was the story of spring training up until the virus,” Ottavino said Wednesday on “The No-Sports Report” podcast. “That was all day, every day. It was already to the point where it was exhausting. And, I think that once the season started, they were going to be in for a lot of hatred from fans around the country.”

Prior to the shutdown, the Astros were just starting to see what life on the road this season was going to look like. Fans were attending Astros spring training events with garbage cans, clever signs and lots of choice words to spew. Their colleagues around baseball were united in vilifying the 2017 World Series champs for the brazen scheme.

Should baseball find a way to start again, and the hope is that happens some time in July, fans will likely not be allowed to attend.

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“So, to me, I think this is helping them, especially when they come back, there are definitely not going to be any fans in the stands,” he said. “So, I think that helps them. Some of (the Astros) have kind of come out of the cave and went back on social media, doing all their stuff, and, you know, good for them, power to them.”

With coronavirus issues still prevalent and tense labor negotiations, which appear to be at a standstill, at the forefront of MLB news, harping on the sign-stealing scandal is now on the back burner.