GOODYEAR, Ariz. — Cincinnati Reds first baseman Joey Votto is out for an indefinite period after testing positive for COVID-19 at spring training, the team said Wednesday.

The Reds put Votto on the injured list and he gave the team permission to announce he was sidelined because he had tested positive for the virus.

The 36-year-old Votto has played in four spring training games, going 4 for 9 at the plate. Last season he hit .226 in 54 games, with 11 home runs and 22 RBI.

Reds Manager David Bell said there were “no indications of any other issues with our team.” Players are tested at least every other day.

“He was feeling very good about where he was, so hopefully he’ll be back as quick as possible,” Bell said.

The Reds open the regular season April 1.

RANGERS: The Texas Rangers could have a full house for their home opener next month after opening their new 40,518-seat stadium without fans in the stands for their games last season.

If that happens, the Rangers could be the first team in Major League Baseball or any major U.S.-based sports league to have a full-capacity crowd since the coronavirus pandemic started rapidly shutting down sports a year ago this week.

On the same day that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s order took effect allowing businesses in the state to operate at 100% capacity, Rangers president of business operations and CEO Neil Leibman said the team hopes to be at that for the April 5 opener against the Toronto Blue Jays.

Local officials would be able to impose “mitigation strategies,” such as reduced capacity, if virus hospitalizations exceed 15% of all hospital capacity in their region over certain periods.

Even with his order, Abbott has encouraged the public to continue practicing social distancing measures and wearing masks, though they are no longer mandated.

The Rangers will still require fans to wear masks for games, unless they are actively eating and drinking at their seats, as was the case for postseason MLB games played at their $1.2 billion stadium last October.

Leibman, who is part of the team’s ownership group, said MLB allows teams to operate under local capacity policy, as long as adequate protection for players is in place. The Rangers are installing plexiglass barriers on top of the dugouts and along the back and sides of the bullpens.

After the Rangers played all 30 of their home games during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season without fans, MLB allowed about 28% capacity at the retractable-roof stadium for the National League Championship Series and World Series that were played there exclusively. Abbott was on hand for the World Series opener, where he got to deliver the “Play Ball!” message before a crowd of 11,388.

All concession and merchandising transactions this season will be cashless, tickets will be digital and the roof will remain open during games when weather permits. The team will enforce social distancing for fans entering and exiting the ballpark, as well as when in lines for concessions or merchandise. No tailgating will be allowed outside the stadium.

“We’re very confident we won’t be a super-spreader event,” Leibman said. “With all the protocols that we’re following, we’ll be extremely responsible and provide a very comfortable environment for somebody to enjoy the game without worrying we’re going to be a spreader event.”

Rob Matwick, the team’s executive vice president, stressed the need for fans to voluntarily comply with any requirements, but said they will be enforced when necessary.

“We will need fan cooperation, there’s no doubt. The good news is the numbers are trending down,” Matwick said. “Can we drop our vigilance? No. We need their cooperation.”

The Rangers plan to create “distanced seating” sections in certain locations of the stadium, with more space between occupied seats for all games after the home opener.

Texas had been allowing some fans at sporting events, from high schools all the way through the top professional leagues, since last summer and most teams and leagues have kept attendance at sharply reduced levels. The Rangers’ stadium hosted about 50 high school graduation ceremonies last summer, the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo in December and a college baseball tournament last month.

METS: Pitcher Carlos Carrasco is uncertain to be ready for the start of the season after elbow soreness forced him to stop throwing.

Manager Luis Rojas said the right-hander, who turns 34 on March 21, started spring training workouts behind other players after receiving additional medical evaluation.

Carrasco is in remission from leukemia and had the novel coronavirus vaccine.

“He’s been experiencing some body aches because of the second vaccine that he got yesterday, so we’ve been paying close attention to that with him. But also he’s experienced some soreness in his elbow right now, apparently coming from the live BP that he threw the other day,” Rojas said. “Right now, this is nothing too concerning from a medical standpoint. So he’s just going to take a few days off without throwing and we expect him to be back maybe by the end of next week facing live batters.”

YANKEES: Left-hander Zack Britton is scheduled for surgery Monday to remove a bone chip from his pitching elbow and seems likely to be out until at least May.

Britton will not be able to throw for several weeks while the incision heals after the operation by Yankees head team physician Dr. Christopher Ahmad at New York-Presbyterian Hospital. Britton will then need to build arm strength.

“It’s going to get taken care of and I’ll be able to pitch this year and help the team. And so that’s the most important thing,” he said. “Could I rehab through it and possibly come back and it wouldn’t impact me? There was a chance. But we like the chances better of me coming back this season and pitching at a high level if I just got it removed now. If this was during the season, I’m not sure surgery would be the decision.”

Left-hander Aroldis Chapman is the Yankees’ closer, and Manager Aaron Boone said he will mix and match during the sixth, seventh and eighth innings with right-hander Chad Green, side-arming right-hander Darren O’Day, left-hander Justin Wilson and right-hander Esteban Loaisiga.

Britton’s start of spring training was slowed as he recovered from COVID-19, which he suspects he contracted while at a hospital for his wife to give birth.

“It wiped me out pretty good for about 10 days,” he said. “Lost about 18 pounds, which could be good, I guess, right? But I wasn’t looking to lose 18 pounds and it happened quickly, so that’s not good on your body and puts pressure in a lot of places.”

Because of the recovery, he had not pitched in any exhibition games. His arm felt sore following a bullpen session Sunday, so he contacted director of sports performance Michael Schuk.

Britton said an MRI showed that ligaments and tendons in the elbow looked great.

MARINERS: The Seattle Mariners will change the structure of their front office operations following the resignation of former team president and CEO Kevin Mather.

Mariners chairman John Stanton told reporters at the team’s training facility in Arizona that the club will separate its baseball and business operations. General Manager Jerry Dipoto will report to Stanton directly on baseball-related matters, while a new team president will oversee the business side of the operations.

Stanton said the team is in no rush to hire a president.

Mather resigned on Feb. 22 after video from an online event surfaced where he expressed his views of the club’s organizational strategy and made controversial remarks about players. He took insensitive shots at a former All-Star from Japan and a top prospect from the Dominican Republic for their English skills. He also admitted the team may be manipulating service time for some of its young players.

Stanton said the team is finalizing severance for Mather, who will not hold any stake in ownership of the club moving forward.

ASTROS: Top prospect right-hander Forrest Whitley will have Tommy John surgery.

Whitley was diagnosed with a sprained ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow on Sunday after experiencing discomfort during a batting practice session last week. He received a second opinion before opting for the surgery this week.

The 23-year-old Whitley was the 17th overall pick in the 2016 amateur draft but has yet to reach the majors as he’s been hampered by injuries and a 50-game suspension in 2018 for violating the minor league drug program.

NATIONALS: Jon Lester could tell something wasn’t right.

Long known for taking the ball whenever it was his turn to pitch, no matter what – never making fewer than 31 starts in any of the past 12 full Major League Baseball seasons – Lester seemed, to use his phrase, “a little more sluggish.”

During games with the Chicago Cubs. Even between games. And so he wondered: Was he putting in enough work? Is this just what getting old feels like?

“There would be times where I would run out in the fifth, sixth, seventh inning and feel like I hit a brick wall. There were times last year where I would come out of the bullpen and be like: `God, did I pitch the game already?”‘ the 37-year-old Lester, who is now with the Washington Nationals, said during a video conference from spring training in West Palm Beach, Florida. “Just thinking that maybe I needed to do a little extra in the weight room. Maybe I needed to run a bit more. Maybe I needed to do 20 extra minutes on cardio or whatever. When in actuality, this thing was slowing me down.”

“This thing” turned out to be hyperparathyroidism, which can affect the amount of calcium levels in the bloodstream and lead to someone tiring easily. So last week, Lester left camp to have what he called very minor surgery to remove one of his parathyroid glands – a scar now runs horizontally at the base of the front of his neck – and he says he already senses a difference in his energy levels.

“The big thing is kind of your brain telling you: You can do something or you want to do something. And I think that’s been a big switch in my head,” said Lester, who signed with Washington as a free agent after spending six years in Chicago. “I feel like since I’ve been back, it’s just the desire to want to work out.”

Lester has been playing catch on flat ground and soon should be able to throw off a mound to work his way into form.

OBITS: Blake Cullen, an executive for the Chicago Cubs and the National League who went on to own minor league hockey, baseball and soccer teams, has died. He was 85.

Cullen died Monday at Sentara Virginia Beach General Hospital, Chicago Blackhawks senior vice president of hockey operations Al MacIsaac, a former player and assistant coach of Cullen’s Hampton Admirals hockey team, said.

A graduate of Cornell with a degree in hotel management, Cullen worked for a Chicago hotel after college and was the Cubs’ traveling secretary from 1965-75.

He moved to New York and became the National League’s administrator under league president Chub Feeney, serving as a key aide during rising labor turmoil that included a 50-day midseason strike in 1981.

Cullen was the first witness at the 1985 Pittsburgh drug trials that implicated several baseball players, testifying about team schedules.

Cullen left the NL when Feeney retired and was replaced by A. Barlett Giamatti in 1986. Cullen spent a year as owner of the Daytona Beach Admirals, a Chicago White Sox affiliate in the Class A Florida State League.

In 1989, he founded the Hampton Admirals of the East Coast Hockey League, a team he sold after the 1995-96 season. From 1997-98, he owned the Daytona Beach Speed Kings of the Eastern Indoor Soccer League.

Cullen had a stroke in 2011 and had been rehabilitating since as part of his recovery.

He is survived by a sister, Georgeanne Cullen, MacIsaac said.

Burial is planned at the family plot in Newport, Rhode Island. A celebration of life will be planned at a later date.

• Norm Sherry, whose suggestion to Los Angeles Dodgers teammate Sandy Koufax helped the future Hall of Fame pitcher reach his potential, has died. He was 89.

Sherry died Monday of natural causes at an assisted living facility in San Juan Capistrano, California, his son Mike told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

He played just five years in the majors, hitting .215 with 18 home runs and 69 RBI. He was with the Dodgers from 1959-62 and finished his career with the Mets in 1963.

But it was Sherry’s contributions without a bat that helped along the careers of Koufax and Don Sutton, another Hall of Fame pitcher for the Dodgers who died in January.

In 1961, Koufax was pitching and Sherry was catching against the Minnesota Twins in a spring training game in Florida. Koufax was struggling with his control, something that had plagued the left-hander up to that point.

Koufax walked his first three hitters, prompting Sherry to visit the mound. He suggested Koufax take some speed off his fastball to gain better control. The advice helped contribute to Koufax’s turnaround, and he went on to be hailed as one of the greatest pitchers in baseball.

“He had a good eye for people’s talent and what they were doing wrong,” Mike Sherry told the AP by phone. “He helped them with some subtle direction. He was really low-key and unassuming.”

Born Norman Burt Sherry on July 16, 1931 in New York City, he moved with his family to Southern California as a youngster. He attended Fairfax High in Los Angeles.

Sherry first signed with the Dodgers after a tryout while they were still in Brooklyn in 1950. He spent seven years in the team’s farm system. His career was interrupted while serving two years in the U.S. Army based in Germany.

Sherry’s brother, Larry, also made it to the majors as a relief pitcher for 11 seasons. He was the Most Valuable Player in the 1959 World Series, when he and Norm were teammates on the Dodgers. Norm didn’t play in that series.

On May 7, 1960, the brothers became the first all-Jewish battery in MLB history.

In 1965, Sherry began his managerial career in the Dodgers’ minor league system. He scouted for a year with the New York Yankees, and returned to managing in the California Angels’ system in 1969.

He managed the Angels to a combined record of 76-71 in 1976 and ’77 before being fired. He was one of the small number of Jewish managers in MLB history.

Sherry then returned to the coaching ranks, where he worked for the Montreal Expos, San Diego Padres and San Francisco Giants.

Mike Sherry recalled his father was coaching a minor league game in the South one summer when all the available catchers were injured.

“He had to activate himself and this was way past when he had been playing,” said the younger Sherry, who served as a batboy. “He hit a double and he was on second and the guy had a base hit, so he had to round third and go home. He was so gassed, but I was so impressed. That was a cool memory because I didn’t remember him playing.”

Besides his son, Sherry is survived by daughters Cyndi and Pam from his first marriage to wife Marty. He was predeceased by his second wife Linda.

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