CHICAGO — At a certain point, it probably started sounding like a broken record. Another day, another pregame media availability where Chicago White Sox manager Pedro Grifol faced a smattering of questions about his oft-injured roster, from his familiar perch in the third base dugout.
Today, those questions primarily revolved around Eloy Jimenez and Mike Clevinger.
“Every report I got today [said] that he was feeling pretty good,” Grifol opened with about Jimenez.
Grifol went on to talk about how the Sox’s Cuban-born slugger felt bothered by making turns running around the bases, but felt good when it came to running in straight lines.
Jimenez, who returned to the lineup after a month-long stint on in the injured list with a hamstring injury, looked to have some lingering pain after gingerly going from first to third in the seventh inning of a 11-2 loss in Detroit Sunday.
After the game, Jimenez told the Chicago Sun-Times Daryl Van Schouwen he was experiencing some discomfort — Something he wasn’t feeling in the days leading up to his return Sunday.
“We’ll see how it works out today in the game,” Grifol said.
As is often the case with injuries, a mental component always plays a role alongside the physical one.
A player might be fully healthy from a physical perspective, but if his mind lingers over the possibility of reinjury, is he truly 100% ready to get back on the field?
Not in Grifol’s eyes, and that’s where the conversation went next.
“After injuries like that, I don’t think guys are ever going to be 100%, especially mentally,” Grifol said of the injuries experienced by Jimenez. “They don’t want to get hurt again … 100% for me is no pain and no care in the world about getting hurt because they feel great.
“When you have an injury like that, you might not have pain or no discomfort or whatever, but your mind has to be free too.”
According to a White Sox post on X, Jimenez is in the lineup for Chicago’s matchup against the Los Angeles Dodgers tonight, batting cleanup as the team’s designated hitter.
Elsewhere on the list of current White Sox injury problems is the recovery of Clevinger from an elbow injury he hit the IL with at the end of May.
In his second of two rehab starts with the Triple-A Charlotte Knights, Clevinger tossed 4.2 innings where he gave up five earned runs on seven hits, one walk and two strikeouts.
“He threw 71 pitches, threw the ball okay,” Grifol said. “Starting off I think he was up to 95 so, we’ll see today. I haven’t talked to [head athletic trainer] James Kruk about that. We’ll see what we got, how he feels today.”
If I were told that was the 10,000th time Grifol was asked an injury-related question, I probably wouldn’t have batted an eye.
Perhaps having a similar feeling as I in the moment, another member of the media scrum asked if Grifol felt any frustration having to consistently answer questions on the health of his players, constantly dealing in the minutia of the differences between 90 and 100%.
“It’s not painful, no, [There’s] no frustration,” Grifol said. “Why? Because it’s reality. That’s just where we’re at. Some of these guys have some nagging injuries and some of these guys are coming back from the IL so, those are questions I’m expecting to answer.
“These are questions you guys have to ask. I’m not going to get frustrated about it.”
The Chicago White Sox take on the Los Angeles Dodgers tonight, with first pitch set for 7:10 p.m. CT. A battle of left-handed starting pitchers is set to ensue, with the White Sox’s Garrett Crochet (6-6, 3.25 ERA) taking on the Dodgers’ James Paxton (7-1, 3.65 ERA).