The Baltimore Orioles’ game with the Chicago White Sox at Camden Yards was played today without any fans in the stadium.

It came about because of a city curfew, following civil unrest, and the teams involved not wanting to get too many games behind schedule. The White Sox have three games to make up, I believe, after losing one to bad weather in Kansas City, and then two in Baltimore.

And as I was looking at video of the game, it occurred to me that it might be interesting, once a year, to play a game in an empty stadium.

I have always wondered if players sometimes grow weary of 20,000 or 30,000 people watching their every move. Certainly, most of us would have trouble getting our jobs done with even a half-dozen people looking over our shoulders.

In the linked story, below the video, the men in uniform seemed to miss the fans. Which would suggest they become accustomed to being watched. What a concept.

But maybe it could become a thing — one game a year in an empty yard.

It would be on television, of course. And fans could appreciate the novelty of it all.

Maybe you tweak it a little by allowing in a very small number of people at some high price. And they could sit in luxury boxes, pretty much out of sight of cameras.

Or perhaps Major League Baseball pulls one game out of hat before each season, and that is the year’s designated empty stadium game, and the next year MLB draws another name, but it can’t be the guys who had the empty stadium the year before.

I know a lot of money was lost (this story suggests more than $1 million in ticket revenue and concessions, though it will be less if season-ticket holders are not reimbursed), and “x” number of fans were not able to attend maybe the only game they would see all year.

I just found the concept interesting, compelling even, and I wouldn’t mind seeing it again — but as an event planned ahead of time, not a reaction to trying circumstances.