Tigers injury updates: Kerry Carpenter, Gleyber Torres have encouraging news
· Yahoo Sports
Detroit — Things always seem clearer in hindsight, right?
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Obviously, knowing what he knows now — the pain in his left shoulder, the ball caroming past him and Bobby Witt, Jr., circling the bases and another frustrating stint on the injured list — Kerry Carpenter would have done it different.
“I was trying to hold him to a double,” Carpenter said of the play in Kansas City when he crashed into the side wall on what became an inside-the-park homer. “I probably should have played it safe. It was definitely a triple if I took the safe route. It was tough because I was running hard at the wall and I couldn’t really slow down.
“I met the ball and the wall at the same time. Not my best play. I was trying to make a play and it ended up not working out.”
Carpenter initially was hopefully that it was just a stinger, that it would loosen up. He stayed in the game, even rolled an infield single. But as the adrenalin wore off, the pain surged.
"I had to catch a fly ball after that and felt it a little bit," he said. "And it progressively got worse. After I took my at-bat, I went back out (to right field) and having trouble catching the ball from (center fielder Matt) Vierling. Came back in and they did a test and I couldn't even hold up my arm."
Carpenter has been rehabbing in Detroit and has begun running and light throwing. He hopes to start swinging the bat again soon. All of which is a sign that he’s trending toward a shorter stay on the IL, shorter certainly than when he missed six weeks spraining his right AC joint.
“I am assuming I will need a rehab assignment but it is progressing nicely,” he said. “I am happy with that because when it happened with the right one, it did not progress very well. Happy that it’s feeling much better.”
Because the Tigers are home until Friday, Carpenter will continue to do his work at Comerica Park. It’s possible at some point he will go to the facility in Lakeland to ramp up his baseball activity.
“You are going to start to see guys going back and forth between here and Lakeland,” manager AJ Hinch said.
Second baseman Gleyber Torres, nearing his return from a strained oblique, is on his way back to Detroit and is expected to work out and be tested by the doctors here on Monday. The results of that work could be the last step before he starts a rehab assignment with Triple-A Toledo.
Pitcher Tarik Skubal and shortstop/center fielder Javier Báez are still in Lakeland.
@cmccosky
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Tigers injury updates: Good news for Kerry Carpenter, Gleyber Torres