Boston Red Sox
“There’s still quite a bit of room to get to in terms of baseball activities.”
It doesn’t seem like Roman Anthony is close to returning to game action for the Red Sox.
Speaking to reporters in Toronto ahead of Boston’s eventual 4-1 win over the Blue Jays, Red Sox chief baseball officer Craig Breslow said that Anthony hasn’t started baseball activities yet as he works his way back from an oblique injury.
“Being around him a little bit, you can see he’s getting more comfortable,” Breslow said of Anthony, per MassLive’s Chris Smith. “When it first happened, you could look at him and tell that he was in quite a bit of discomfort and pain. That has subsided, but there’s still quite a bit of room to get to in terms of baseball activities.”
Anthony has been sidelined with an oblique injury since Sept. 3, with Alex Cora noting at the time of his IL designation that the usual recovery timeline for an oblique strain is between 4-6 weeks.
If Anthony is cleared four weeks from the day of his injury, it would be Oct. 1, which would be Game 2 of a Wild-Card series for Boston.
The Red Sox would welcome such a result, given that the 21-year-old rookie established himself as one of baseball’s most productive hitters in short order before his injury.
Over 71 games with Boston, Anthony is batting .292 with a .396 on-base percentage, eight home runs, 18 doubles, one triple, 32 RBIs and 48 runs scored. His presence has been missed atop a Red Sox lineup that has been prone to uneven scoring outputs as of late.
Even with Tuesday’s critical win over Toronto, the Red Sox are 40-44 this season without Anthony in the lineup — be it a 32-35 record before his call-up from Triple-A Worcester or 8-9 since he landed on the IL.
Considering Anthony hasn’t even started baseball activities, that four-week recovery timeline might be pushing for the star outfielder — given that Boston could be playing in the Wild-Card round in less than a week.
“Making progress,” Breslow said of Anthony. “Getting a little more comfortable every day. But it’s an injury that we knew would take some time to heal and get back on the field. He and medical staff are working as hard as they can to try to accelerate the timeline to make that possible.”
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