Boston Red Sox
“He’ll take BP, do all the work, make sure that he comes out of all that OK, and we’ll assess him after that.”
Adley Rutschman played two games with Triple-A Worcester over the weekend. Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe
The Boston Red Sox’ top trade pickup earlier this month could be very close to making his debut with his new club.
Catcher Adley Rutschman — acquired by Boston on Aug. 3 as part of a blockbuster deal with the Orioles — could play his first game with the Red Sox as soon as Tuesday night in Toronto.
The 28-year-old catcher, who has been sidelined since mid-July due to wrist inflammation, played two rehab games with Triple-A Worcester over the weekend and will travel with the Red Sox to Toronto to start off a four-game series at Rogers Centre.
Speaking after Boston’s 4-3 loss to the Athletics on Sunday, Red Sox interim manager Chad Tracy said that Rutschman won’t be available to play on Monday against the Blue Jays, but could get the green light to play later in the series.
“Adley’s traveling with us. He’s gonna have a workout day with us [Monday],” Tracy said. “We’ll see where he’s at, how he feels, and go from there. He’ll take BP, do all the work, make sure that he comes out of all that OK, and we’ll assess him after that.”
Rutschman made his presence felt in his first game with the WooSox on Saturday, driving in two with a double, walking twice, and throwing out an attempted basestealer. He earned some reps at DH on Sunday, going 0-for-3 at the plate.
“Being on the IL is tough, you want to be out there,” Rutschman told Matty Wasserman of The Boston Globe on Saturday. “It was just great to be able to get out there and play some ball again … “[the wrist] felt good. I was very happy with just kind of how it’s been responding and feeling.”
The Red Sox will have an interesting conundrum if Rutschman is activated on Tuesday or another day on this road trip. While Connor Wong stands as a solid backup, fellow backstop Jake Rogers is 3-for-6 with two doubles and two RBIs in three games since arriving as part of that same trade with Baltimore.
But the addition of Rutschman will be a welcome boost for a Red Sox team that just lost a series for the first time since June 29-July 1 after dropping two of three games to the Athletics.
“It’s been a minute,” Tracy said of Boston’ two-game skid, per MLB.com’s Ian Browne. “I think I said this comment when the [15-game] winning streak ended. I was like, ‘We knew that was going to happen eventually,’ and I think in this case, you probably knew this was going to happen eventually. You’re not going to win every single series the rest of the year.”
Conor Ryan is a staff writer covering the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots, and Red Sox for Boston.com, a role he has held since 2023.
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