BOSTON - The Red Sox are inching back to full health as the dog days of summer roll on.
On Monday, Hanley Ramirez returned to the Red Sox lineup. He wasn't the only one, though. Pablo Sandoval, who left Saturday's game and missed Sunday's game after being hit in the right elbow with a pitch, also returned to the lineup.
Sandoval was hit for the sixth time this season, which already ties a career high despite there being another month-and-a-half left. But he's ready to get back in there -- and actually was okay with it Sunday, too.
"With Pablo," Lovullo began, "he actually came to me towards the end of the game [Sunday] and said, 'I can hit if you need me to.' Here's a guy that had a pretty good contusion and a lot of swelling in that elbow area and I really appreciated that and I told him, "there's no way you're playing today, everybody says you can't, I know you're personally coming to me and letting me know you can play.' So I knew today would be a good sign, I knew today he would start leaning towards playing, and it didn't surprise me at all when he came in and said he's ready to go."
There's more good news on the injury front too, as Dustin Pedroia is making progress from his hamstring injury. Pedroia took the field earlier on Monday for the first time since going back on the DL. Lovullo, although not certain, believes the MRI on his hamstring has been bumped up from Friday to Thursday of this week.
"Dustin is good. Out on the field today. He hit," Lovullo said. "According to him, he's ready to go. But we all know and love Dustin and we just have to kind of downplay that and slow things down. He's right on schedule as far as his rehab and strengthening. He's ready to take the next step, and what that is is determined by what happened today. So he'll come in tomorrow and fill in a couple of gaps and push forward with him."