This is the degree of difficulty season. A game in Seattle Tuesday between the Giants and Mariners was postponed due to poor air quality stemming from the Western wildfires. That joins COVID-19, protests over racial injustice and hurricanes for postponement reasons.

Swarms of locusts are probably due any day.

This season — like much in 2020 — grows more difficult. The plans MLB and the players association announced Tuesday only layered on hassle and hardship for those seeking a championship. No team will have an easy route. To win their first World Series since 2009, the Yankees almost certainly will have to become road warriors.

As part of the MLB/PA accord, contending clubs must quarantine at a hotel the final week of the season, even if they are the home team. Because of that, in the most extreme, the Yanks could be gone from their homes six weeks starting this Thursday if they were to reach the World Series.

The Yankee itinerary to conclude the regular season is to leave after Thursday’s home game versus Toronto for three days in Boston followed by four in Buffalo before returning to the Bronx after the Sept. 27 game. But the team has to go directly to a New York-area hotel to quarantine for the entirety of a Sept. 25-27 series versus the Marlins.

The best-of-three first round is going to be played exclusively in the home of the three division winners and the second-place team with the best record. To avoid an entire playoffs on the road, the Yankees have to do more than leapfrog the Blue Jays into second place in the AL East, which they did decisively Tuesday by crushing Toronto 20-6. They have to get to fourth in the AL and are two games behind Minnesota.

After the wild-card round, every team left in the playoffs will leave home for good. The AL Division Series and Championship Series will be held in Southern California. The World Series will be in Arlington, Texas. Getting to the World Series is quite a gift for time away from home, but it is going to be literally a long road for the teams that get there.

“It’s 2020,” Aaron Boone said. “It’s not ideal. I would love to be coming home from Buffalo next week to my home with my family for a few days before heading out, but we understand we all have to make sacrifices and deal with different things that are gonna make it viable for us to play this season and on into the postseason. We know what we signed up for and we’ll cooperate as best we can.”

If a reminder were needed as to why the Yankees should do everything they can to play the first round at home, it came Tuesday. The Yanks crushed 11 extra-base hits, including six homers to improve to 19-7 in The Bronx this year compared to 8-14 on the road. They are 129-59 at home in Boone’s three seasons, the majors’ best mark. Their offense and attitude are just so much better at home.

So of course Boone wants the first round there. But he says he will toggle between winning as much as possible, carefully reintegrating players back from injury and lining up as best as possible to win in the postseason. Giancarlo Stanton and Gio Urshela came off the injured list on Tuesday — Urshela going 3-for-3 with two doubles and a walk while shining on defense. Aaron Judge is due back imminently. However, Gleyber Torres’ quad still was not right, according to Boone, and the Yankee manager backed off starting his hottest hitter. It didn’t matter Tuesday in the assault on Toronto pitching.

Boone also said that no matter how much the Yankees might need wins in the season-closing series versus the Marlins, the intention is to save Gerrit Cole and Masahiro Tanaka for the first round. Boone would be prioritizing having his best starters available in the playoffs over going all out to play at home in the first round.

However, the way the postseason is set up now with no travel days needed in a single neutral site, there are no off-days and, thus, it will be harder to use Cole as much as in a standard postseason.

The last time the Yankees won it all (2009) there were so many off-days baked in that they played 15 postseason games in 29 days. That allowed them to start CC Sabathia — in his first year with the Yankees as Cole is now — in five of 15 games and to avoid weak fourth starter Chad Gaudin entirely. This year MLB is piling four playoff rounds into 30 days. To win, the Yanks are going to need Deivi Garcia, J.A. Happ and Jordan Montgomery. So Garcia’s emergence has been vital. He held Toronto to three runs in seven innings and has a 3.28 ERA through four starts.

“It puts the entire staff more in play if you’re gonna have a successful run,” Boone said.

For whichever team wins the degree of difficulty championship, it is going to take a long roster on the long road.