SB Nation FanPulse: Voters weigh in on shortened-season possibilities

Welcome to SB Nation FanPulse, a survey of fans across MLB. Each week, we send 30 polls to plugged in fans from each team. Brewers fans, sign up HERE to join FanPulse.

Major League Baseball has halted their season and there is no clear end in sight to the stoppage of sports. The league and MLB Players’ Association surely hopes that a resumption of games will be feasible at some point and that some type of abbreviated regular season can eventually be played. There have been discussions regarding the possibility of playing games in front of no fans at Spring Training sites, but that proposal comes with some heavy-handed caveats and plenty of logistics that still need to be worked out.

The patrons who follow and support the league are hungry for baseball to return; according to polling results from SB Nation’s FanPulse, close to 80% of respondents listed “games every night” as the thing they miss most about the shutdown (going to games came in next, at about 15%). Roughly 40% of fans believe that there need only be 80 or more games in order to create a meaningful season; another 40 or so percent think that 100+ games will accomplish that goal. The majority of people are on-board with some kind of “neutral site” alignment in order to make a season happen — 70% are good with neutral-site regular season games, 61% are okay with neutral sites through the playoffs, and 73% support the idea of a neutral-site World Series.

With that said, however, voters do not seem to be very on-board with the concept of so-called “Arizona Bubble League.” When asked if they support the idea of playing a full season in the Grand Canyon State, the split was 40% Yes / 60% No. Fans apparently aren’t exactly enamored with the idea of realigning the divisions based on the possibility of playing at Spring Training sites, with 55% voting “no” to the idea.

When it comes to the issues relating to players, however, the voters generally fell on the side of ownership interests. 58% of respondents voted “no” when asked if 2020 should count towards service time without any games being played. 54% of voters also thought that teams should get some type of compensation for losing a player on a one-year contract if no games are played in 2020. The only player on the Milwaukee Brewers that would be affected by that situation would be Brett Anderson, who signed a straight one-year deal to serve as a left-handed starter in the rotation.

Where do you fall, Brew Crew Ball reader? Do you support the idea of an abbreviated season played at Spring Training sites? How should player pay and contracts be handled? Do you think there will be any professional baseball games played in 2020?