The Field of Dreams game scheduled for Aug. 13 in Iowa has been postponed until at least 2021 due to the coronavirus pandemic, Major League Baseball officially announced Tuesday.
The contest was to feature the Chicago White Sox and St. Louis Cardinals at a newly constructed 8,000-seat ballpark in Dyersville, Iowa, at the cornfield adjacent to where the 1989 movie “Field of Dreams” was filmed. Multiple outlets reported the cancellation on Monday.
“We made every effort to go ahead with a first-class event for the people of Iowa, admirers of the film and fans generally,” commissioner Rob Manfred said Tuesday in a statement. “Unfortunately, we have come to the conclusion that it would not be prudent to ask clubs to step outside their normal routines, given the evolving public health challenges. We hope to host this event in Iowa in 2021.”
The movie, which included Kevin Costner as one of the stars, was highly popular among baseball fans as well as the general audience.
The Cardinals currently have 13 members of the organization — including six players — who have tested positive for COVID-19 in the last week. MLB did not say whether that factored into the decision to cancel.
The New York Yankees were initially scheduled to be the White Sox’s opponent. But plans changed after the coronavirus pandemic delayed the start of the season and led to a revised 60-game schedule.
The White Sox will be involved if the game happens in 2021, per MLB’s release.
Nominated for three Academy Awards, including best picture, “Field of Dreams” told the story of Ray Kinsella (played by Costner) interacting with former White Sox standout “Shoeless” Joe Jackson and other players who were banned from baseball in the 1919 Black Sox scandal.
