Sources: Dodgers’ Betts out due to fractured toe
-
Alden Gonzalez
LOS ANGELES — Mookie Betts stubbed a toe in his left foot during an off-the-field incident and missed the opener of the Los Angeles Dodgers‘ highly anticipated series against the New York Yankees on Friday.
Betts is not expected to go on the injured list, according to Dodgers manager Dave Roberts, but he will not start against the Yankees on Saturday or Sunday. Roberts said the hope is that Betts will return to the lineup shortly thereafter.
“For me, right now, it’s just day-to-day,” Roberts said after the Dodgers’ 8-5, come-from-behind win.
The incident, which affected the tip of Betts’ second toe, was believed to have occurred late Wednesday night, after the Dodgers returned from a six-game road trip, when Betts banged his toe against a piece of furniture at his house. Betts called Roberts to inform him about his toe on Friday morning, then underwent X-rays at Dodger Stadium later that afternoon.
Those X-rays revealed a fracture, a source told ESPN, confirming what Betts told the Los Angeles Times after Friday’s game. The Dodgers’ training staff will spend the weekend attempting to get the swelling down on his toe. At this point, the Dodgers don’t believe he can make the injury any worse by playing on it.
Said Roberts: “It’s going to be one of those situations per his [pain] tolerance.”
Betts’ injury isn’t the Dodgers’ most serious at the moment. Late-inning reliever Evan Phillips, who was rehabbing a forearm injury, didn’t feel right playing catch earlier this week and will undergo Tommy John surgery next week, knocking him out for all of 2025 and most of 2026.
Phillips, 30, was released by the Baltimore Orioles in August 2021 and designated for assignment by the Tampa Bay Rays less than two weeks later. The Dodgers picked him up and turned him into a valuable late-game option. From 2022 to 2024, Phillips posted a 2.21 ERA and 0.92 WHIP, saved 44 games and struck out 206 batters in 179 regular-season innings.
But Phillips dealt with arm issues during last year’s postseason run and was left off the team’s World Series roster. He then went on the IL because of a rotator cuff strain in the middle of March, returned a month later, notched seven scoreless appearances, then went back on the IL on May 7 because of what the team called forearm discomfort. Platelet-rich-plasma injections did not take. Phillips never got better.
“As we started getting into it, it wasn’t really responding,” Dodgers general manager Brandon Gomes said. “We felt like this could be a possibility, so as he got deeper into the process and it wasn’t really getting better, the decision to do it was pretty much evident with our information.” The loss of Phillips is coupled with the Dodgers having four other high-leverage relievers on the IL — Brusdar Graterol, Blake Treinen, Kirby Yates and Michael Kopech, all of whom are right-handed.
The Dodgers tried to backfill some of that depth by trading for former All-Star closer Alexis Diaz on Thursday. But Diaz, who struggled so badly this season that the Cincinnati Reds optioned him to Triple-A, will initially work out of the Dodgers’ spring training complex in Glendale, Arizona.
The Dodgers also have three starting pitchers — Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow and Roki Sasaki — recovering from shoulder injuries, with Shohei Ohtani not expected to join the rotation until sometime after the All-Star break.
The lineup, at least, had been healthy. Until now.
Betts, 32, got off to a slow start but was still slashing .254/.338/.405 with eight home runs and five stolen bases while slotting between the hot-hitting Ohtani and Freddie Freeman in the No. 2 spot. More notably, Betts had proved to be a capable major league shortstop after working during the offseason at the position.
The hope is that the toe injury doesn’t set him back much longer than the rest of this weekend.
In the meantime, Miguel Rojas will continue to get starts at shortstop.
“It’s a good part about having depth,” Gomes said. “Keep the train moving.”
ARLINGTON, Texas — Slumping Rangers slugger Adolis García was held out of Texas’ lineup for the third consecutive day Sunday, with president of baseball operations Chris Young saying the club wants the 2023 ALCS MVP to make some mechanical changes.
“We need him to kind of commit to some of these changes that we think will get him back to the ’23 version of himself and help him be the player that we know he can be,” Young said before Texas’ series finale against St. Louis.
García is hitting .155 in the past 20 games with 25 strikeouts. He is hitting .208 overall, with seven homers and a team-high 27 RBIs for a Rangers club that has struggled offensively. He ranked 14th in the majors with 122 home runs over the past four seasons.
García, who has started 55 of Texas’ 60 games in right field this season, missed only one other game before this weekend, with manager Bruce Bochy saying Friday that García was being given a mental break.
“It’s about the mental reset and coming back with more energy,” García told reporters Saturday. “I’m working on some stuff without the pressure of having to do something up there.”
García, 32, is in the final season of a two-year contract.
The anticipated return of Evan Carter to the active roster Tuesday, joining Wyatt Langford, Alejandro Osuna and Sam Haggerty, further crowds the Rangers outfield as García tries to return to the lineup.
“It’s going to be performance-driven at this point,” Young said.
Texas also made three roster moves before Sunday’s game. Right-hander Nathan Eovaldi (triceps fatigue) was placed on the 15-day injured list retroactive to Thursday, catcher Tucker Barnhart was designated for assignment, and right-hander Codi Heuer was selected from Triple-A Round Rock.
The Blue Jays placed outfielder Daulton Varsho on the 10-day injured list Sunday with a left hamstring injury.
Varsho sustained the injury while attempting to leg out a triple during Toronto’s victory against the Athletics on Saturday.
Myles Straw will get the start in center field and bat eighth in the lineup for Sunday’s series finale.
Varsho, 28, is batting .207 with a team co-leading eight homers to go along with 20 RBIs in 24 games this season.
In other moves, the Blue Jays recalled utilityman Davis Schneider from Triple-A Buffalo, activated relief pitcher Erik Swanson from the 60-day injured list and optioned left-hander Easton Lucas to the Triple-A club.
Swanson, 31, has been hampered by median nerve entrapment since spring training, He has a 10.13 ERA with a 0-1 record in 5 1/3 innings during seven relief appearances in the minors this spring.
Schneider, 26, has gone 1-for-15 with one RBI and eight strikeouts in 10 games this season with the Blue Jays.
Lucas, 28, who was called up from Buffalo on Saturday and earned the win for the Blue Jays after 4 2/3 scoreless innings, is 3-2 record with a 5.82 ERA this season.
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business3 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway