Asked if he had a checkup on Thursday, Anthony Rizzo said, “I don’t remember.”
“That’s funny, right?” the joking Yankee followed up. Rizzo has been on the injured list since Aug. 3 due to post-concussion syndrome.
In all seriousness, Rizzo has been feeling better and waking up normally lately. He’s also been working out and planned on hitting in the cage Friday for the first time since being sidelined.
The first baseman added that recent tests have continued to show improved reaction times. He wasn’t sure if his were above normal levels, as he and doctors never had a baseline for him, “But they’re definitely just better than what they were,” Rizzo said. “They’re in more the percentile, I would say, of what we think they should be in, and that’s all good stuff. The biggest thing is just feeling better on a day-to-day basis.
“All signs are pointing towards quicker, faster, sharper.”
The Yankees put Rizzo on the IL roughly two months after he collided with the Padres’ Fernando Tatis Jr. in late May. While initial testing cleared Rizzo of a concussion, the issue cascaded as he experienced fogginess and the worst slump of his career.
“The fogginess is kind of subdued,” Rizzo said Friday. “They say once that starts happening, it’s all good things.”
Rizzo still doesn’t have a timeline for his return, but he hoped to be playing in the next few weeks.
“I wanted to be playing two weeks ago when this happened,” he said, “so it’s really kind of the doctor’s orders now with all of this. But just one day at a time for me.”
Rizzo, who is hitting .244/.328/.378 with 12 home runs and 41 RBI this season, added that he has not considered shutting things down for the year.
“As a baseball player, you want to play baseball,” Rizzo said. “Shutting it down is not an option for me. I don’t know how many more years I have left of doing this. So why shut down and not play? The window is small and it’s about getting back as fast as possible — obviously as healthy as possible — but no, shutting down, for me, is not an option, and it hasn’t been discussed.
“If we run out of time, then we run out of time. But as far as just shutting it down and turning off, that’s something that’s just not in my nature.”
Friday marked the first day that teams can call up prospects without them accruing 45 days of major league service time and therefore losing rookie eligibility in 2024.
While some teams began promoting farmhands, the Yankees did not. Some had wondered if outfielder Everson Pereira and catcher Austin Wells could get the call, as they weren’t in the lineup at Triple-A on Thursday. But neither were with the Yankees on Friday for the start of a three-game series with the Red Sox.
According to The Times-Tribune’s Conor Foley, Wells had an off day on Thursday, while Pereira was sick.
“Those guys are obviously knocking on the door,” Aaron Boone said Friday while noting that Pereira is on the 40-man roster, while Wells is not. “Those are guys that are pushing their way into the conversation. So we’ll see.”
Pereira, 22, has enjoyed a stellar minor league season split between Double-A and Triple-A. In 78 total games, the right-handed hitter is slashing .298/.362/.532 with 16 home runs, 62 RBI and eight stolen bases. He’s been hitting .308/.361/.515 with six homers and 31 RBI over 32 games since joining the Triple-A RailRiders.
Wells, 24, has played in 85 minor league games this season, mostly for Somerset and Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. The lefty swinger slashed .237/.327/.443 with 11 home runs and 50 RBI over 58 games at Double-A and .253/.344/.386 with one home run and eight RBI over 22 games at Triple-A.
Wells is hitting .238/.330/.424 overall this season.
“It’s been good to see those guys kind of progress from Double-A to Triple-A and have varying degrees of success down there this year,” Boone said.
Pereira is the Yankees’ third-best prospect and the 80th-best in baseball, per MLB.com. Wells is their eighth-best prospect.
Carlos Rodón is expected to start vs. the Nationals on Tuesday. The southpaw, returning from a hamstring injury, is fresh off a simulated game in Tampa.
Luis Severino, meanwhile, is going to start on Wednesday, Boone said. The righty has a 7.98 ERA this season and is coming off a start against the Braves in which he allowed five runs, three earned runs and two home runs.
Still, Boone hoped the outing was “a little bit of a breakthrough,” as Severino exhibited some swing and miss stuff, which has alluded him all year.
“I do feel like his last outing, even though, obviously, he gave up some runs and a couple of longballs, was in a lot of ways the best version of Sevy we’ve seen in a long time,” Boone said.
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