Will Canada relax their Covid vaccination travel restrictions for MLB teams?

Just weeks after the Kansas City Royals had to make the trip north without a jaw-dropping ten players, due to their vaccination status, the St Louis Cardinals are headed to Canada without some of the the biggest names yet: All-Stars Nolan Arenado and Paul Goldschmidt. Additionally, catcher Austin Romine will also miss the flight for the same reason and Johan Oviedo has an expired passport.

Several teams this season have had to travel to Toronto without their full roster due to Canada’s strict entry requirements requiring anyone entering the country to have at least two doses of an approved vaccine.

Some big names have been left behind, but Arenado and Goldschmidt are the biggest yet. Both are All-Stars and Goldschmidt is a candidate for the National League’s MVP award. The silver lining for Cards fans is that it is only a two-game series that they will be missing, but even so, the Cardinals are trailing the Brewers in the NL Central by only 1.5 games, and now is no time to let these two games get out of hand. They only have a game in hand over the Phillies, so the race is too tight for leaving your best two players at home.

Lots of noise is being made on social media, slamming both players for a presumed “anti-vax” stance, although it must be emphasized that Canada’s requirements will consider a person who has received only one dose, or a second dose less than 14 days prior, of a vaccine as “unvaccinated”.

While it is unclear what either player’s actual beliefs are, there has been reference made in social media to a statement by Arenado that he wants to start a family soon and for that reason has not been vaccinated. Presumably, he is of the misguided notion that the covid vaccine causes either impotence or sterility, both of which are patently nonsense and have been repeatedly debunked by scientists.

In the end though, the United States is a free country, and all of these players have every right to determine whether or not to get a vaccine. Canada is also a free country, and are perfectly within their rights to deny these players entry for their unvaccinated status. Fully 94% of the unvaccinated players who are turned away at the Canadian border are American-born, showing that this is almost an entirely American issue.

And when it comes down to it, the Cardinals are perfectly within their rights to dock their pay for missing this series, which they have now done. Nolan Arenado will lose $384,416, while Paul Goldschmidt will find his pockets $241,758 lighter. Austin Romine’s pay bracket means that he will forfeit only $10,989 for missing the flight and Johan Oviedo’s passport problems are still trying to be resolved.

If you are hoping that Canada might relax their border restrictions or make some kind of exception for MLB, don’t hold your breath. The Canadian government has announced that the restrictions in place will remain so until at least the end of September.