Cards C Molina (oblique) not in Game 3 lineup
Yadier Molina’s injury lingers into Game 3 and beyond. (USATSI)
SAN FRANCISCO — Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina is not in the starting lineup for Game 3 of the NLCS, just as was assumed the case for the past two days following his oblique injury in Game 2. Given the comments of manager Mike Matheny Tuesday before the game, it sounds like it’s possible — albeit unlikely — that Molina will be used as a defensive replacement.
“He showed yesterday, and we’ll wait until we watch him go out and throw again today, see if anything’s changed,” Matheny said of Molina throwing. “If he can’t do it, he won’t be used. But if he can, that’s a valuable weapon we have to possibly bring in for defensive purposes late.”
As far as hitting, that’s a different matter altogether.
“He’s not ready for that,” Matheny said of Molina swinging a bat. “I’m sure he’ll be pushing for it as soon as he can, and once again, we have a very talented medical staff that’s able to keep on top of what’s going on here. We know that he’s going to push when he can push. And as long as we’re not risking him hurting himself further, we’re going to allow him to keep moving forward.”
As things stand, it’s basically up to Molina and how he deals with the pain, including how he can perform through it — because there’s no risk of hurting himself worse.
“Just like we talked yesterday and reaffirmed today with our medical team,” Matheny said Tuesday. “They are confident that he’s not going to hurt himself worse with this. There’s a significant injury there, but it’s just going to be dealing with the pain and figuring out how he can and if he can do the different movements we need him to make.”
For now, it sounds like Molina can do very little, but this could be interesting later in the series. He’ll need to balance being a competitor and wanting to play with realizing what kind of limitations the injury has on him.
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