TORONTO — If Major League Baseball needs to squeeze more games into a condensed season without exhausting pitching staffs, perhaps this idea could get tossed into play: seven-inning doubleheaders.

“Maybe that’s something we have to consider,” Toronto Blue Jays general manager Ross Atkins said on a conference call Wednesday.

Opening day has been postponed until at least mid-May because of the new coronavirus pandemic. The regular season had been scheduled to begin Thursday.

Minor league teams and college teams typically play seven innings in each game of a doubleheader. But twinbills are rarely planned in the majors — only a handful were originally scheduled over the last decade.

The final total of big league doubleheaders, most of them caused by makeup games, ranged from a low of 14 in 2014 to a high of 34 in both 2011 and 2018, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

Colorado Rockies manager Bud Black said last week that frequent doubleheaders might be necessary to help fit more games into a shorter window.

New York Yankees manager Aaron Boone said he would be open to considering seven-inning games in doubleheaders. He said averaging eight or nine games a week would require a couple more roster spots above the current 26, with at least 14 pitchers.

Extending play into November could lead to neutral-site games in warm weather cities and ballparks with roofs.

“It is an opportunity probably to be creative or to try some things that people think could stick a little bit or could be kind of a segue to something different down the line,” Boone said on a conference call Wednesday. “But it’s certainly probably an opportunity to try some things that you wouldn’t otherwise try in a normal 162-game setting where everything’s kind of going off according to plan.”

The math: By averaging nine games a week, a team could play 162 games in 18 weeks, eight fewer than usual. That means MLB could start as late as July and play a full schedule by extending the regular season through October.

Atkins pitched in Cleveland’s minor league system for five seasons before becoming that team’s assistant director of player development. He was hired as Toronto’s GM in December 2015.

Asked what he saw as potential solutions to scheduling issues, Atkins mentioned shorter games in doubleheaders. Still, he isn’t entirely sold on the idea of seven-inning games.

“You’re not playing the game that is written in the rulebooks,” he said. “It’s not the regulation game, it’s a different game. Bullpens and teams are built in a way to play nine innings. I’m sure there are people that would challenge that and I’m not so sure it’s something we should do.”