BOSTON — For the second straight game Tuesday, Adley Rutschman was absent from the Red Sox lineup, battling a hyperextended right elbow. Rutschman’s unavailability over the last week — he’s missed three of the last four games and five of the last eight — has raised questions about his role for the season’s final four weeks.
It had been the Red Sox’ hope that, after giving Rutschman the final two games of the series in Miami off last week, the rest would enable the catcher to return as the team’s regular No. 1 catcher.
After a day off following the Miami series, Rutschman played three of the four games in New York over the weekend, but then wasn’t available for either of the first two games on the current homestand.
“I wouldn’t say it’s alarming,” said interim manager Chad Tracy, “and I wouldn’t say he hasn’t bounced back. It’s just something that we’re dealing with. And again, he played in New York (Saturday), it was sore and he got three hits. So I wouldn’t say it’s alarming; it’s just that there are spots that come up with it.. If it’s sore and you feel like you can give it a little bit of an opportunity to calm down, then he’s in a better spot.
“Alarmed? No. I know it’s there. I know it’s something we just have to continue to monitor and hopefully if we give him some rest, he can get past it. We’ll see. It’s kind of like a day-to-day situation with him and monitoring where he’s at.”
Tracy said Rutschman, a switch-hitter, feels discomfort from either side of the plate, though it’s more acute from the left side and, of course, when he throws.
“He’s had it,” said Tracy of the condition, “and he’s been able to get three hits with it. But if there’s opportunities where we say, ‘Hey, if we just give it a couple of days here to calm it down’ and then he might be able to go for a few days more. But also, in that rest period, you might be able to get him past it.”
Tracy said he’s hopeful that Rutschman will be available to play in Wednesday’s homestand finale. He added that he wasn’t available off the bench in Monday’s comeback win.
Asked if the condition was one the Red Sox would have to monitor for the remainder of the season, Tracy responded: “I think so. I mean, it’s possible. But you don’t know. If we give him these rest periods, he may get to a point where he says he feels really, really good. And then, it’s off to the races and there you go. So it’s just day-to-day for right now, make sure you take care of him and you have him available the rest of the season. And maybe we get to a point where he feels really, really good.”
Rutschman underwent some imaging recently and Tracy said “there was nothing on there that we didn’t expect to see. It was kind of exactly what we expected. So we’ve just got to be aware of making sure that we give him the rest he needs. We’re going to play him at times and he might feel it. But he did it in New York the other day, felt it, (got) three hits and was able to get through just fine.
“But if you do that, there may be a day where depending on the swings, he might come out of it feeling sore and he might be available the next day, but is it better to stay away and not bang on it again? We’re just going to have to watch that.”
Rutschman, obtained at the trade deadline in a six-player deal with the Baltimore Orioles, was on the IL when he arrived in Boston thanks to a wrist injury that is largely healed. The hyperextension of the elbow came after joining the Sox.
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