Andrew Bailey Close To A Rehab Assignment

If you’ve been watching a lot of baseball around the league this year, you may be asking yourself why the Red Sox traded Josh Reddick. Reddick has played great all year for the rejuvenated A’s and sits at .271/.349/.529 with 21 home runs and 46 RBIs. Now, you may not remember, but a lot of Red Sox fans (myself included) thought that the Red Sox had a steal when they traded Reddick and two prospects for Andrew Bailey and Ryan Sweeney. Reddick has done great since the trade, Sweeney has been himself (.272/.317/.387, 18 doubles), but Bailey has been nowhere in sight.

That’s because on March 21 this year, in a Spring Training game against the Pittsburgh Pirates, he injured his right thumb. This was a huge blow to the Red Sox in the early part of the year, as the bullpen reeked for the first few weeks. However, since April 21– when the Red Sox blew a nine run lead to the Yankees in three innings– the bullpen has been the best in the league. This opts the question of where arguably the biggest acquisition of the offseason even fits into the 2012 team.

Well, whether we like it or not, we’ll be getting an opportunity to see that before too long as Bailey is about a week away from a minor league rehab assignment. He will throw batting practice before the Red Sox vs. Rangers game this evening (not looking forward to this week!). It appears that his thumb is ready to healthy, the question is whether his arm will be in shape after several months off. In any case, I’m looking forward to finally getting a glimpse of Bailey in a Red Sox uniform and that day will be coming very soon.