ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Texas Rangers shortstop Corey Seager could possibly be headed to the injured list after leaving Tuesday night's game against Kansas City because of left hamstring tightness while running the bases.
Seager was running between first and second base in the fifth inning after hitting an opposite-field double into the left-field corner. He appeared to make the turn around first base cleanly, but then pulled up after a few steps and gingerly went to second base.
“Gosh, he’s been swinging the bat so well You hate to see it because he’s been on fire. I mean he’s just squaring up everything,” Rangers manager Bruce Bochy said after the Rangers won 8-5 in 10 innings. “We’ll re-evaluate him. You know, he’s got some tightness there and we’ll see where we’re at (Wednesday).”
Seager missed nearly a month while on the injured list with a left hamstring strain in 2019.
Bochy said he had spoken only briefly to Seager, who wasn't in the clubhouse when it was opened to reporters after the game.
It was the fifth game in a row for Seager to have an extra-base hit. But after touching second base, he bent down and then almost immediately started going back toward the Rangers dugout, even before a team trainer got all the way out to check on him.
Josh Smith took over as the pinch-runner and remained in the game to play shortstop.
“We have a really good shortstop in Smitty and (Ezequiel) Duran, he played a lot of short this spring,” Bochy said. “So we do have some coverage until we get (Seager) back.”
Seager is the second year of a $325 million, 10-year contract with the Rangers. He was 2 for 2 with a walk against the Royals, and is hitting .359 this season.
Before playing 151 games in his debut with the Rangers last season, Seager missed about 2 1/2 months of the 2021 season with the Los Angeles Dodgers because of a fractured right hand after getting hit by a pitch. He was limited to only 26 games in 2018 because of right elbow surgery.
___
AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
