Like we said yesterday, the good news is that whenever he’s ready to get back to baseball, it probably won’t take long for Kris Bryant to get back into the swing of things.
But the bad news is that no one seems to know when that might be. Worse, the Cubs this week had to “back off” a bit because of continued discomfort. It doesn’t sound like Bryant is close to resuming baseball activities.
“[Athletic trainer PJ Mainville] was putting [Bryant] through some tests and he still was feeling [discomfort] in different spots so he kind of backed off,” Joe Maddon told the Tribune. “I haven’t heard anything new.” Oof.
I’m sure it’s a frustrating time for Bryant and the Cubs, who have had to operate without their best hitter being their best hitter since May. Shoulders are just bad.
There is no public timeline for anything with respect to Bryant’s rehab or return, but if he’s still feeling discomfort, you can bet the shutdown will last quite a bit longer. If you want to guard your heart to a maximum level, I’d say you shouldn’t expect to see Bryant back until September, if at all. Hopefully the Cubs can find offensive success in the interim, stay near the top of the NL Central standings, and then he can return totally healthy and productive for the stretch run.
If you want to be super optimistic – why do that to yourself? – you could hope that another week of rest clears things up, and then Bryant is ready to return within another week after that.
UPDATE: Good news from Theo Epstein this morning, as it sounds like the discomfort was only at the very end of Bryant’s range of motion, which isn’t necessarily as scary as it sounded in the initial description from Maddon.