In his lone at bat last night, Kris Bryant took an awkward swing, walked away from the plate while favoring his right side, and was checked on by the trainer and David Ross. I immediately feared it was a right shoulder issue, but Bryant was permitted to stay in the game and finish his at bat, a groundout to third.
Shortly thereafter, Bryant was pulled, and the Cubs announced that it was actually right oblique tightness that sat him down. If you’ve followed baseball for a bit, you know that oblique injuries are notoriously unpredictable in how long they can keep a guy out. Sometimes it’s just a quick IL stint, and sometimes it is multiple months before a guy can return. More often than not, though, you don’t come back from an oblique strain in just a week or two. This game is just so rotational.
So, then, it’s not surprising to hear that David Ross is concerned, but holding out hope.
“I’m worried …. It was kind of positive that he could still feel like he could do a little bit,” Ross said, per Cubs.com. “But another at-bat and something serious happens, and then he’s done for the season. We’ll see how it goes tomorrow, but I’m trying to hold out hope.”
I would assume the Cubs are going to see how Bryant feels waking up today, and then decide whether he needs additional testing. If he’s not feeling shockingly good, he’s going to miss tonight’s game, at a minimum. And if he has to go for additional testing, it’s gonna be more time. And if there’s a strain in there? His regular season is over. Maybe the entire season.
For now, we’ll await more details and we’ll be thankful that the Cubs have David Bote at the ready to man third base. In the short-term, given the expectations for how Bryant’s season was trending, this is probably not a performance downgrade. The upside is probably downgraded, yes, but how optimistic were you that Bryant was going to suddenly break out and be himself when the power is clearly absent and he’s very likely not right physically?
To that end, Ross sums up what might be the story of a totally lost season for Bryant. There are almost certainly a number of physical issues lingering: “I definitely feel like it’s frustrating. I try to put myself in his shoes, with all the things he’s been dealing with, and I’d be extremely frustrated. He was pretty emotional underneath. It’s a unique year, and he’s dealt with a lot …. Injury-wise, trying to get going, not at 100 percent. You give him a little bit of a break and it seems like something else crops up. Yeah, man, it’s a frustrating situation for him.”