Major League Baseball announced on Tuesday that it will work with its teams to create a ticket refund or ticket exchange program from games lost to the coronavirus pandemic. According to Tim Healey of Newsday, it will be up to teams to decide when and how to handle their respective ticket policies, with the Mets likely to announce an updated plan on Wednesday. Until the announcement, MLB resisted any talk on refunds as they claimed that games were merely postponed and not canceled and that refunds were unnecessary and not justified. But now that a month of baseball has been missed, MLB is coming under increased pressure to alter its ticket policy.

Fans and politicians alike are upset over baseball’s seeming indifference to this matter, as MLB continues to hold millions of dollars of tickets from March and April that are unlikely to be used. At least one lawsuit, currently seeking class-action certification, has been filed in U.S. District Court against MLB teams and ticket agencies seeking refunds for fans, and a handful of members of Congress have been vocal in appealing to sports leagues and ticketing agencies to refund ticket money to consumers.

With this pressure coming from several areas, and baseball enters into its fifth week of postponed games, MLB has blinked and action has resulted, starting with Tuesday’s announcement. There will be definitive ticket refund policies from several teams as early as this week. Some teams have already stated that their new policy will be in place on Wednesday.

Initially, the offer of refunds is expected to be limited to scheduled games in March and April, according to an industry source familiar with MLB’s plans. The Wall Street Journal was the first to announce baseball’s decision to offer refunds.

Locally, Healey reported MLB told teams that it is now up to individual teams to decide when and how to handle tickets for games that are not happening. As mentioned, MLB will offer guidance if needed. There has been no word yet on the Yankees’ plans.

Other teams that have made their intentions known are the San Francisco Giants and Oakland Athletics. Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle reported Tuesday that the Giants will have a new policy in place in 24 hours and that the A’s will announce theirs later in the week.

Baseball, a $10.7 billion industry, is facing other pressures as well, most notably the viability and structure of a 2020 season. The hope is to salvage the season, most likely starting this summer with games in empty stadiums in locations where government and public health officials have lifted stay-at-home directives. The hope would be to permit fans to attend games later in the modified season, perhaps in limited numbers to allow for social distancing.

But even if this best-case scenario was to occur, MLB would still be facing massive losses.

This is an evolving story and as more information is made available, especially with regard to Mets tickets, MMO will provide the information with updates to this article and in new articles as well.

Stay tuned.