Outfielder Eloy Jimenez will not be participating in baseball activities for the remainder of the week.
White Sox GM Rick Hahn met with the media and said that the rehabbing Jimenez felt discomfort running while playing at Charlotte. Hahn described the situation as “normal leg soreness,” though the team will be taking Jimenez off of his injury rehab for the next five days or so.
“We don’t believe this is going to be a long term issue,” Hahn said during his briefing, “but we are pulling him off the rehab assignment in order to stop the 20 day clock. Again, we are fairly confident we’ll be able to put him back on the rehab assignment as soon as next week.”
As can be implied, the move by the organization was partly about not rushing Jimenez back with the present 20-day rehab clock that he was on. Given he was already approaching two weeks, the team decided it would be best to remove him from activities and restart the process next week. This means that in addition to the five days or so he’s off now, Jimenez would also have a new set of 20 days for his next rehab stint, even though he wouldn’t be required to use all of them.
Hahn went on to explain things further by saying, “It’s not a new injury. It’s not a reaggravation. It’s part of the process. It’s part of the process that is slowing us down a little bit. It should not have any long term effect on him other than slowing his return to Chicago.” He also mentioned that both Lance Lynn and Yasmani Grandal experienced similar soreness during their rehabs, and that the timing of when it occurred is the difference in this situation.
Jimenez, 25, has been on the injured list sine April 23rd with a right hamstring strain. He received surgery on this injury immediately after sustaining it, and has been rehabbing it since then. In 11 games before the injury, he slashed just .222/.256/.333 with a home run and a 70 wRC+. Coming out of this injury, the White Sox will definitely be looking for Jimenez to hit for more power, as in April he had an astronomical 67% ground ball rate – far too high for a slugger like himself.
With this break in activities, it’s hard to determine when we could possibly see Jimenez back on the South Side. The best case scenario would be before the end of the month, though it wouldn’t be shocking to see the recovery process linger into July.
On the bright side, Lynn is optimistic that he could rejoin the big league team next week. The Sox will wait to see how he’s feeling over the next few days before making a final decision, though the veteran felt good after what was likely his final rehab start last night. Hahn said Tim Anderson is also still on pace to begin his rehab next week, as previously mentioned several days ago.
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Featured Photo: Laura Wolff/Charlotte Knights
