The Red Sox have been reeling ever since Roman Anthony landed on the injured list.
With Anthony on the shelf with an oblique strain, Boston’s lineup has lost all of its punch over the last few weeks. The Red Sox are 5-8 since Anthony’s injury, plating three runs or fewer in six of those 13 games.
On Wednesday and Thursday, Cora offered up his first updates on the health of the 21-year-old rookie.
Speaking on WEEI, Cora acknowledged that there is still not any timeline set for Anthony’s expected return to the top of the lineup.
“He’s walking on a treadmill,” Cora said on WEEI. “Up to 25 minutes. (Tuesday) he told me it was a great walk. He walked into the clubhouse and said, ’25-minute walk, it was great.’ He’s doing better. Still sore, but adding stuff to his rehab.
“But, one thing that caught my attention [Tuesday] that he went to my office and he is like, ‘Hey, I’m feeling better,’” he said. “And I haven’t heard that in a while. It’s going to take a while. He’s doing everything possible to hopefully get back.”
During Boston’s 5-4 walkoff win over the A’s on Wednesday, NESN cameras also captured Cora speaking with Anthony in Boston’s dugout. The following morning, Cora said that his conversation with Anthony had little to do with the game playing out on the diamond at Fenway Park.
“It was more about the treadmill and his workouts,” Cora said Thursday, per MassLive’s Chris Smith. ““It was actually [the] Peloton yesterday. He did the assault bike yesterday. He added that to his program, which is a step in the right direction because that’s not easy to do. And we were joking about, ‘Hey, next time is [the] Peloton with [instructor] Olivia for a half hour.’”
What Anthony lacks in experience, he has more than made up for in terms of impact at the big-league level.
At the time of his injury, Anthony was batting .292 with eight home runs, 32 RBI, and a .396 on-base percentage. So far this season, the Red Sox are 46-27 when Anthony is on the active roster — and 37-43 when he was both in Triple-A Worcester and on the IL.
The expectation at the time of Anthony’s injury was that he was expected to be sidelined for 4-6 weeks with his oblique injury. If Anthony is cleared four ways from the day of his injury, it would be Oct. 1, which could be Game 2 of a potential Wild-Card series for Boston.
But for now, the Red Sox’s top priority is simply punching their ticket to the postseason.
Following Thursday’s 5-3 loss to the A’s, the Red Sox sit just 1.5 games ahead of the Cleveland Guardians for the third and final spot in the Wild-Card standings with just nine games to play.