With opening day two weeks away, the Seattle Mariners said they are working with Major League Baseball Rob Manfred’s office on “alternative plans” for their regular-season games this month. The move comes as baseball is searching for ways to play games at alternative sites, rather than in empty stadiums, as the pandemic spreads.

The Mariners’ announcement came after Washington Gov. Jay Inslee announced a restriction on gatherings of more than 250 people in the Seattle area because of the growing coronavirus in his state. The Mariners were scheduled to begin a four-game series against the Texas Rangers on March 26 at T-Mobile Park, their stadium in Seattle’s SoDo neighborhood.

“While we hope to be back to playing baseball in Seattle as soon as possible, the health and safety of our community is the most important consideration,” the team said in a statement.

For days, even as the outbreak spread across the country, MLB insisted that it wanted to start its season as scheduled, with no disruption. But with that no longer an option, MLB has begun working on contingencies.

The league hopes to avoid playing in empty stadiums--an approach that has gained currency elsewhere in the sports world. So MLB is instead working on a plan to find alternative sites for the teams most affected by the outbreak, according to several people familiar with the league’s thinking.