CHICAGO — New Chicago Cubs starter Michael Soroka left his first game with his new team with right shoulder discomfort and will require a stint on the injured list, the team announced on Monday after its 3-2 loss to the Cincinnati Reds.

Soroka, who turned 28 on Monday, felt something grab in his shoulder after throwing a pitch in the second inning. He didn’t come out for the third.

“Went to go put a little extra on a fastball and it grabbed me a little bit,” Soroka said afterwards. “And it didn’t go away.”

Soroka was acquired last week from the Washington Nationals for two prospects and though he’s experienced a dip in velocity over the last month, he claimed he wasn’t in any pain as he took the mound for the first time as a Cub.

“There was no reason to believe there was anything wrong,” Soroka said.

The six-year veteran has been searching for answers to his drop in velocity, eventually getting an MRI before his last start before being traded. It came back clean, according to Soroka, so he stayed focused on his mechanics.

“Everyone knew the velocity hadn’t been there the last month,” he said. “I still had life on everything. The breaking ball was still playing like it did in the first [inning].”

Soroka struck out two in the first inning on Monday, displaying a nasty slurve to whiff TJ Friedl and Austin Hays, but then his velocity dipped in the second when he gave up a home run to Tyler Stephenson before leaving a few minutes later.

“You’re always concerned when you have to come out of the game,” Soroka stated. “It’s never fun. I’m embarrassed. You come to this org and hope to hit the ground running and two innings later, we’re having to pull the plug.”

The Cubs need fresh arms as Soroka was their lone addition to the starting rotation before MLB’s trade deadline last Thursday. Righties Jameson Taillon (calf) and Javier Assad (oblique) are on the mend and due back soon, but the team is still short in the starting staff.

Ben Brown took over for Soroka on Monday but he has been shaky as the every-fifth-day starter. They may need to turn to him again.

“We didn’t have any signs of it,” Cubs manager Craig Counsell said of Soroka. “His velocity has gone backwards. He’s trying to figure out how to fix that. He was optimistic in the first couple days here that we could help him there and things could get better.

“This is unfortunate.”

Soroka was 3-8 with a 4.87 ERA for the Nationals before being traded for Single-A prospect Ronny Cruz and Triple-A outfielder Christian Franklin.

ARLINGTON, Texas — Aaron Judge will be activated by the New York Yankees on Tuesday, when their captain is eligible to come off the 10-day injured list after being sidelined because of a flexor strain in his right elbow.

Maybe the two-time AL MVP slugger can help get them back on track.

Manager Aaron Boone said after New York’s fourth consecutive loss, 8-5 to the Texas Rangers in 10 innings on Monday night, that Judge would be available for the middle game of the three-game series.

“Judge tomorrow,” Boone said, without elaborating when asked about his return.

Though Boone didn’t reveal then what the specific plans were, he had said before the game that Judge would be the designated hitter when he first returned to the lineup. He said the outfielder could also play catch while in Texas, which would help determine when he could return to playing in the field.

After hitting off Yankees minor league pitchers at the team’s complex in Tampa, Florida, for the second day in a row on Monday, Judge traveled to Texas and was there for the series opener. He didn’t speak to reporters in the clubhouse after the game.

Judge hasn’t played since July 25 because of the elbow strain. An MRI showed no acute damage to his ulnar collateral ligament and he had a platelet-rich injection July 27, when he was put on the IL in a move retroactive to the previous day.

His .342 batting average was still the best in the majors after Monday’s games. He was fourth with 37 homers and fifth with 85 RBIs.

New York will have an open spot on its active roster because Boone said newly acquired outfielder Austin Slater was headed to the IL. Slater, acquired last Wednesday from the Chicago White Sox, exited in the second inning Monday night because of left hamstring tightness after running out a fielder’s choice grounder.

Giancarlo Stanton has been the Yankees’ starting DH for all of his 32 games this season, including the opener against the Rangers when his 10th homer was a two-run shot in the fourth that put the Yankees up 5-4. He sat out the first 70 games of the season because of inflammation in the tendons of both elbows, and Boone said he wouldn’t play the outfield in Texas if Judge did DH during the series.

The first time Judge said he felt pain in the elbow was July 22 at Toronto, after he made a strong throw home when George Springer singled to right. An inning later, Judge winced after catching a fly in the right-field corner and throwing to second baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr. Judge was caught by a YES Network camera clenching his right hand in a fist.

The Yankees arrived in Texas after being swept in a three-game series at Miami and falling to third place in the AL East behind Toronto and Boston. They were in first place to start July, but are now 5½ games behind the division-leading Blue Jays, and currently in a wild-card spot 2½ games behind the Red Sox with 49 left in the regular season.

When asked if the current stretch, which includes an 18-28 record since June 13, was weighing on his team, Boone said he felt that it was.

“Doesn’t matter,” Boone said. “Nobody cares how stressful it is, or that’s all just noise, excuses, whatever. We’ve got to play better, and we’ve got to win, and we know that.”

LOS ANGELES — The Dodgers activated third baseman Max Muncy off the injured list Monday and placed utility man Tommy Edman on the IL because of a right ankle injury.

Edman suffered what the Dodgers called a sprain while rounding first base in the fifth inning of Sunday’s road game against the Tampa Bay Rays. Edman, 30, missed the first two weeks of May because of a right ankle injury and had been struggling since he came back, slashing .214/.273/.323 over a 56-game stretch.

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts didn’t provide a timeline for Edman’s return but said he would “be back at some point.” The Dodgers don’t want to bring him back until he is fully healed this time.

“Where we’re at on the calendar,” Roberts said, “we’ve got to make sure we do everything on the front end that we don’t have a setback.”

Muncy returned to his customary No. 5 spot for the opener of a three-game home series against the St. Louis Cardinals. He finished 0-for-3 and ended the game with a line out in the bottom of the ninth.

A little more than a month ago, he didn’t think he’d return to the field this year.

In the sixth inning on July 2, with Clayton Kershaw a strikeout away from 3,000, Chicago White Sox outfielder Michael A. Taylor slid headfirst into Muncy’s left knee. Muncy said his initial thought was, “I’ve got to get off this field so Kersh can keep pitching.” As he went down the tunnel, Muncy was convinced his season was finished.

With Muncy on the trainer’s table, the Dodgers’ medical personnel examined his left leg. He was told the knee felt strong, that the swelling wasn’t nearly as bad as anticipated. An MRI the following morning revealed no structural damage.

“As I was laying there on the ground that night, I thought for sure, ‘This is it,'” Muncy said. “At that time, obviously, you have a million things that start going through your mind. Obviously, they’re all the worst. It’s hard to stay positive in a moment like that. But just trying to be thankful and blessed to be able to get back on the baseball field this year. I’m going to try to enjoy every second of it knowing how close it was to not being there for me.”