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There are a number of ways a baseball player might injure a finger. Ordering room service at a hotel isn’t traditionally one of them.

But that was the case for Los Angeles Dodgers right fielder Josh Reddick, who hurt a finger while holding his door open for a room-service cart, according to Andy McCullough of the Los Angeles Times. Reddick was scratched from the starting lineup Monday because of discomfort he experienced while throwing a ball.

Reddick pinch hit in the fifth inning of Monday’s game against the Cincinnati Reds, however, so it appears as though his injury won’t keep him out of the starting lineup for long. That’s good news for the Dodgers, who held a one-game lead over the San Francisco Giants in the National League West following Monday’s 18-9 win.

The Dodgers and Giants open a three-game series Tuesday in Los Angeles.

Reddick, 29, is hitting just .149 with one double in 18 games since the Dodgers acquired him from the Oakland Athletics ahead of the Aug. 1 non-waiver trade deadline.

“I’m at rock-bottom right now,” Reddick said, per McCullough. “But I will climb out.”

In 68 games with the A’s this season, Reddick hit .296 with eight home runs and 28 RBI. In 2015, he notched 20 home runs and 77 RBI while hitting .272 for Oakland.

With Reddick sidelined, Andrew Toles stepped into the starting lineup and went 2-for-5 with his first big league home run and four RBI. Los Angeles won 18-9.

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Just when the Los Angeles Dodgers have finally caught up with the San Francisco Giants, their starting pitching has gone and quit on them.

Clayton Kershaw and Rich Hill, that’s your cue to come back and fix everything.

Both are on the comeback trail from injuries, and Hill in particular is making real progress. He has yet to pitch for the Dodgers since they acquired him and Josh Reddick from the Oakland A’s at the Aug. 1 deadline. But Andy McCullough of the Los Angeles Times reports the veteran left-hander is slated to pitch Wednesday:

Hill has been dealing with blister problems that have sidelined him since the middle of July. But in a 78-pitch simulated game in Arizona on Thursday, everything was green on his screen.

“Everything felt great,” Hill said, per Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register. “The ball came out really good, the velocity maintained, breaking ball was really sharp.”

Kershaw, meanwhile, has been out with a bad back since late June. But on Friday, he was able to throw off a mound for the first time in over a month. And contrary to the bad vibes that came from his last mound session, the world’s best pitcher was practically beaming after this one.

“I felt good,” Kershaw said, per McCullough. “I don’t know. Until you face hitters, you don’t really know for sure. I feel 100 percent right now, so that’s a good sign.”

Unlike Hill, Kershaw’s return is not imminent. Don’t hold your breath waiting for it. In fact, I’m legally obligated to repeat that. Seriously, don’t.

But the idea that Kershaw’s return could happen at all is a big enough development on its own. It wasn’t long ago that Jon Heyman was casting doubt on Kershaw coming back at Today’s Knuckleball. According to McCullough, the Dodgers now “hope he could start again at some point in September.”

Talk about a September call-up. It seems like Kershaw last toed the mound ages ago, but it’s hard to forget just how absurdly good he was in his first 16 starts. With an MLB-best 1.79 ERA, 16.1 strikeout-to-walk ratio and other such fantastical numbers, the lefty was on his way to his fourth Cy Young and possibly his second MVP.

And don’t overlook what Hill could bring to the Dodgers. The 36-year-old journeyman put up a 2.25 ERA in 14 starts for the A’s, bringing his ERA in 18 starts since his re-emergence last season to 2.06. It all passes the smell test, too. 

Of course, Hill and Kershaw have been out so long that there’s hardly a guarantee that both will pick up right where they left off. There could be some rust. Potentially lots of it.

But no matter the amount of rust, there’s not a team in the league that wouldn’t roll the dice on two such dangerous arms at this point in the season. And if there’s one club that has no choice but to hope for the best, it’s the Dodgers.

The Dodgers are owed all the credit in the world for not letting Kershaw’s absence crash their pursuit of the Giants in the NL West. They instead did the opposite. As San Francisco collapsed out of the gate in the second half, the Dodgers surged. This past Tuesday, they finally took over first place.

But now the Giants are back on top again, having taken a half-game lead. And while they still have their problems, the Dodgers have come face-to-face with a big issue that we mentioned way back when: starting pitching.

As our own Danny Knobler pointed out, L.A.’s starters didn’t pick up the slack during Kershaw’s absence. They were mostly mediocre. Now they’ve become downright bad. After Brett Anderson paced the Dodgers to an 11-1 loss to the Cincinnati Reds on Saturday with six runs allowed in three innings, L.A.’s starters now have a 7.03 ERA in August.

This feels like a reckoning. Outside of Kershaw, the Dodgers rotation was a motley crew coming into the season. Five months later, not much has changed. Kenta Maeda has been a nice find, but Scott Kazmir has been up and down and Anderson, Brandon McCarthy, Alex Wood, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Julio Urias, Ross Stripling and Bud Norris have been a mixed bag of injured and ineffective.

As such, the only real surprise is that the Dodgers rotation hasn’t been a team-crippling liability. As Corinne Landrey noted at FanGraphs, Yasmani Grandal has done his part by framing everything for strikes. Otherwise, it speaks to how good the team’s offense and bullpen have been. The latter, in particular, is arguably the best in the National League.

With those assets being as good as they are, it would be hyperbole to say the Dodgers can’t make it to October without Kershaw or Hill at their best. They’re in a comfortable spot in the wild-card race as things stand, and the Giants aren’t going to run away and hide with the division race.

But after three straight NL West titles, simply getting into the postseason is a mere formality for the Dodgers. It means nothing if they don’t go far into October. If they can pair Kershaw and Hill with Maeda, their strong offense and (finally) a strong bullpen, they’ll have everything they need to do just that.

Again, it can’t be taken for granted that Kershaw and Hill will save the Dodgers. But if nothing else, the timing works in their favor. This far from October, there’s plenty of time for the two of them to get back on the mound and back in rhythm. Had L.A. gotten the good news a week or two from now, the clock would be ticking a lot faster.

Having Kershaw and Hill arrive at the last minute and leading the charge isn’t how the Dodgers drew it up. But they’ll take it.

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com and FanGraphs unless otherwise noted/linked.

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The San Francisco Giants (66-54) will try to end a four-game losing streak behind ace Madison Bumgarner (11-7, 2.11 ERA) when they host the New York Mets (60-60) on Thursday.

The Giants are listed as -160 betting favorites (bet $160 to win $100) at sportsbooks monitored by Odds Shark against the Mets, who will lean on ace Jacob deGrom (7-5, 2.30 ERA) to get them back on track.

Bumgarner ended a five-start winless streak last time out against the Baltimore Orioles on Saturday, pitching seven scoreless innings and allowing just three hits with three walks and eight strikeouts in a 6-2 victory.

The 27-year-old southpaw had not earned his previous win since before the MLB All-Star break, even though he gave up two runs or less three times in those five games, getting two runs of support or less four times.

For New York, the chances of a repeat run to the postseason look bleaker with each game, as the team is coming off a 13-5 road loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks on Wednesday. The Mets lost two of three at Arizona to fall back down to the .500 mark.

The good news is that they have won in the last three games deGrom has started, along with seven of the past nine. He is 4-1 during that stretch but owns a 2-3 mark away from home with a 2.83 ERA in nine starts and opponents hitting .268 against him.

The lanky righty has already beaten San Francisco once this season, surrendering no earned runs in six innings of a 6-5 home victory back on April 30.

Bumgarner has also defeated the Mets this year, throwing six scoreless frames in a 6-1 road win on May 1 with three walks and seven strikeouts. However, that is only one of two times the Giants have won in the past seven meetings following a 9-1 run in the series dating back to 2014, according to the Odds Shark MLB Database.

The over also cashed in the first three meetings between the teams this season in New York after going under in the previous three, all of which took place in San Francisco.

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Colorado Rockies starting pitcher Tyler Chatwood has run into problems with his back once again and is facing another extended absence. 

Continue for updates.

Chatwood Headed for the Disabled List Again

Tuesday, Aug. 16

According to Nick Kosmider of the Denver Post, Chatwood has been placed on the 15-day disabled list with a mid-back strain.

He initially felt the injury during the first inning of Sunday’s game against the Philadelphia Phillies, per Kosmider, but he stayed on the mound until being pulled in the fourth inning after he was tagged for six runs. 

Chatwood originally hit the DL on June 19 with the same kind of injury and was out until July 5. It could provide an explanation as to why he’s suffered such a drastic drop in performance despite his 10-8 record and 3.75 ERA this season. 

Before his first stint on the DL, he began the year at 8-4 with a 2.89 ERA as Colorado’s most reliable starter. 

In the eight starts since his return, the 26-year-old went 2-4 while allowing four or more earned runs in four of them. 

“We figured he was going to need some time, so you do the math, and it’s worth putting him on the disabled list,” Rockies manager Walt Weiss told Kosmider. 

Entering Tuesday night at 56-63, 10.5 games out of the National League West division lead, there’s no reason why the Rockies should keep Chatwood in the rotation.

For a team well outside the postseason picture, it’s better to keep a potential ace healthy while looking forward to next season.

In the meantime, the Rockies recalled right-handed pitcher Christian Bergman from Triple-A Albuquerque, per Kosmider. 

Bergman has appeared in nine games with Colorado this season, starting one. He’s compiled a 1-3 record with a 5.89 ERA. 

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com.

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A little after 1 p.m. Sunday, a Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher not named Clayton Kershaw took the mound.

Fifteen minutes later, the Dodgers were down 5-0, and the pitcher not named Clayton Kershaw was done for the day.

By day’s end, the Dodgers—without Clayton Kershaw—had lost to the Pittsburgh Pirates, 11-3. Sunday starter Brett Anderson had a sprained left wrist. Rich Hill, acquired at the non-waiver trade deadline because the rotation needed help, had his Dodgers debut pushed back for a third time because of blisters.

It would be funny if it weren’t so predictable. I wrote them off six weeks ago, and I wasn’t the only one.

On second thought, don’t click on that June 30 column. The one where I said the Dodgers’ season could fall apart because of the back injury that sent Kershaw to the disabled list. The one I wrote when the Dodgers were seven games over .500—14-2 in Kershaw’s 16 starts and 30-35 in the 65 games he hadn’t started—and six games behind the first-place San Francisco Giants in the National League West.

The Dodgers have gone 21-15 since then and are tied with the Washington Nationals for the best record in the National League over that span.

As of Monday morning, they were one game behind the Giants in the West and a 93.6 percent bet to make the playoffs one way or another, according to Baseball Prospectus.

So the season didn’t fall apart when Kershaw went down. It didn’t even fall apart when Jon Heyman wrote last week on Today’s Knuckleball that Kershaw might not come back at all this year.

It hasn’t fallen apart, even though the Dodgers have used nine different starting pitchers since Kershaw was hurt. They’ve used 13 starters this season, second-most in MLB behind San Diego, Atlanta and Cincinnati.

Overall, the rotation has been as mediocre as you’d expect since Kershaw went down, posting a 4.82 ERA while averaging fewer than five innings per start. The offense has been good, but six teams in baseball have scored more runs than the Dodgers in that span.

So how are they doing it? How are they playing at what amounts to a 96-win pace without the great Kershaw, who was touted for much of the first half as an MVP candidate?

1. Building the Bullpen

As Sports Illustrated‘s Tom Verducci first pointed out, the Dodgers are on a record pace in one significant category. Their opponents have a .202 batting average in innings 7-9.

That’s not just the best of any team this season, it’s the best of any team in any season over the last 113 years, according to Baseball-Reference.com’s play index, beating the 1968 Detroit Tigers (who won a World Series) and the 2001 Seattle Mariners (who won 116 games).

The Dodgers have used 20 different relievers this year, and they’ve regularly carried an eight-man bullpen. They’ve needed it, because their starters pitch so little and their bullpen pitches so much (only the Reds have more bullpen innings). First-year manager Dave Roberts has maneuvered it so well that only 35-year-old Joe Blanton is among the top 17 in the majors in relief innings pitched.

No Dodger is among the top 12 in relief appearances—proof that Roberts understands he can’t rely on just two or three bullpen arms.

Give Roberts credit, but also remember that a strong, deep bullpen is a trademark of Andrew Friedman, the Dodgers president of baseball operations, dating back to his best Tampa Bay teams.

2. Doing It with Depth 

Fox Sports‘ Ken Rosenthal played up this angle, another one borne out by the numbers.

Unheralded catcher Yasmani Grandal has a .710 slugging percentage since Kershaw went on the DL, the best in baseball. Third baseman Justin Turner is in the top eight in the National League with 29 RBI in that time and has been key in a lineup where so many of the big hitters swing left-handed.

The Dodgers have dumped some big names since Friedman arrived 22 months ago, including Matt Kemp (Grandal was acquired in that deal), Carl Crawford (released with about $35 million left on his contract) and Yasiel Puig (sent to the minor leagues with a $7.2 million salary).

They’ve also played most of this season with Anderson ($15.8 million) and Andre Ethier ($18 million) on the disabled list and the last six weeks with Kershaw ($34.6 million) on the DL.

The current 25-man roster makes only about $113 million this year—more than Friedman ever had to spend with the Rays but hardly a big-market number. It’s working.

3. Managing Matters

Roberts works the bullpen and the depth but also gets high marks for the tone he has set and the clubhouse he has run.

Friedman told Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times:

“He’s been challenged as much as I can imagine someone being challenged in year one, just with the sheer volume of injuries. To handle it the way he has, in his first year, is incredible. I know manager-of-the-year banter doesn’t really pick up yet, but I don’t know how he’s not front and center in that conversation.”

4. Giant Problems

The Giants had the second-best record in the National League (49-31) when Kershaw went on the DL. Had they kept up that .613 pace, they’d have 72 wins and the Dodgers would be seven games behind.

Instead, the Giants opened the door. Because of injuries and poor play coming out of the All-Star break, they’re 17-20 since the Kershaw DL announcement.

Credit the Dodgers for taking advantage.

5. Semi-Soft Schedule

This one isn’t as much of an explanation as you’d think, given how top-heavy the National League is this season. The Dodgers’ 21-15 run includes 12 games against teams that are currently in playoff position (Baltimore, Washington, St. Louis and Boston).

They went 7-5 in those games.

Still, with the injuries that have hit the Cardinals, Miami Marlins and New York Mets, it’s hard to find five worthy NL playoff teams. The Dodgers have played at a 96-win pace with Kershaw on the DL, but they shouldn’t need to keep up that pace to make it to October.

They may need to have a shot at passing the Giants, who they meet for three games next week at Dodger Stadium (just before the Cubs come in) and six more times in September and October.

Even a playoff spot would be an accomplishment, given the challenges the Dodgers have faced and the forecasts of doom when they lost Kershaw. But for a franchise that has played in October seven times in the last 12 years but hasn’t been back to the World Series since winning it with Kirk Gibson in 1988, the goal will always be higher.

No matter what they’ve done over the last six weeks, it’s awfully hard to see them winning in October with the team they have now.

There’s no way they’re a World Series team without Kershaw. This time, I’m sure of it.

Danny Knobler covers Major League Baseball as a national columnist for Bleacher Report.

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San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey was removed from the lineup on Sunday with a back injury. It is unclear when he will be able to return. 

Continue for updates.

Posey Out vs. Orioles

Sunday, Aug. 14

The Giants announced Posey would not play against the Baltimore Orioles on Sunday due to back tightness.

Posey’s Health Key to Giants’ Success

Durability has been a key part of Posey’s game, as the backstop has played in at least 147 contests in each of the last four years, so this is a concerning setback. He also dealt with an irritated nerve in his thumb earlier in the season.

Fans can look at Posey’s lengthy list of accomplishments to realize how important he is for the Giants. He was the 2010 National League Rookie of the Year and 2012 National League MVP, helping lead the Giants to three World Series titles in his career.

Posey turned heads in 2012 when he won the National League MVP award behind a .336 batting average, 24 home runs and 103 RBI, but the 29-year-old is still a prime producer.

The Giants are World Series contenders again this year largely because of Posey’s presence behind the plate. He helps manage their excellent starting rotation and is one of the team’s key offensive cogs at the plate.

Losing him for significant time would be a difficult blow for the Giants heading into the playoffs.

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Arizona Diamondbacks manager Chip Hale announced on Wednesday that outfielder David Peralta will undergo season-ending surgery on Thursday to repair a wrist injury that he suffered last Friday when running into an outfield wall, via Fox Sports Arizona:

Continue for updates.

Peralta’s Frustrating Season Comes to an Early End

Wednesday, Aug. 10

Peralta had battled a wrist issue earlier this season that caused him to miss almost four weeks of action. 

The 28-year-old was in just his third major league season, all with the Diamondbacks, as he was set to build off a stellar sophomore campaign. 

In 2015, Peralta looked as though he would become a vital part of Arizona’s outfield, batting .312 with 17 home runs and 78 RBI while leading the league with 10 triples. 

But in 2016, he appeared in just 48 games, hitting .251 with four home runs and 15 RBI. Not only did he miss time due to the wrist, but he missed 36 games from June 15 to July 28 due to a lower back sprain.

He spoke with the media about the latest injury and his frequent trips to the disabled list, via Nick Piecoro of AZCentral.com:

It’s part of the game. Being on the DL three times, it’s tough being on the bench and watching these guys play and not feel like I can do anything to help the team. … 

It hit the wall and it started to get tight. We had to do something. … 

There’s a ligament here in my wrist. I don’t know how to explain it. The doctors talk their language, you know? But he explained there’s a ligament here and when I dove, I guess the ligament moved and it was loose.

Socrates Brito was recalled from Triple-A and will continue starting in right field for the Diamondbacks now that Peralta is done for the season. 

The 23-year-old Brito is the Diamondbacks’ second-ranked prospect, per MLB Pipeline, and this is now a great opportunity for him to get some major league playing time. 

Arizona is 47-66 and hasn’t been in the playoff picture for quite some time. Because there’s no reason to rush Peralta back into a non-contending situation, Brito can gain some experience at the top level without any pressure and continue developing into a future asset the Diamondbacks can use to build a contender around. 

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com.

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It can be dangerous to buy into the hype whenever a top baseball prospect begins his major league journey. There’s a long list of examples to vouch for how potential doesn’t always pan out.

And then there are guys like Corey Seager.

The hype surrounding Seager coming into the year seemed almost impossible to live up to. The young Los Angeles Dodgers shortstop had grabbed everyone’s attention with an enticing breakthrough in 2015, hitting .337 in the season’s final month. That attention was solidified when all the big publications rated him as the No. 1 prospect for the 2016 season.

Last month, Seager was an easy choice for the National League All-Star team. And now it says a lot that we’re not even talking about the 22-year-old as the front-runner for National League Rookie of the Year. Barring injury, that award is his for the taking.

Rather, the conversation has shifted to Seager’s place in the NL MVP race. Mike Petriello of MLB.com put Seager’s candidacy on the table last week, and his case is legit. The wins above replacement leaderboards at Baseball-Reference.com and FanGraphs don’t dispute the notion Seager is one of the NL’s very best players.

This is happening largely because of Seager’s bat. He’s hitting .302 with a .357 OBP and an .889 OPS. Fellow rookie shortstop Aledmys Diaz has a higher OPS, but the cavernous dimensions of Dodger Stadium allow Seager to lead all shortstops, rookie or otherwise, in adjusted offense.

Of course, Seager being a .300 hitter is a case of his living up to expectations rather than a case of exceeding them. His .337 average in the majors last year was preceded by a .307 average in the minors, and all the gurus had nothing but praise for the skills that made these numbers possible.

For example, Keith Law of ESPN.com touted Seager’s approach as the reason why he was baseball’s top prospect. Christopher Crawford of Baseball Prospectus preferred to drool over Seager’s swing, which he saw as one “that you can watch over and over again without ever getting tired of the repetition.”

The surprising part of Seager’s superstar emergence is his power. He came into the year having never hit more than 20 home runs in any professional season. In Monday’s 9-4 win over the Philadelphia Phillies, he clubbed his 20th and 21st dingers of 2016.

Seager likely doesn’t have enough power to surpass Mike Piazza’s Dodgers rookie record of 35 home runs. But with a little under two months to go, he could definitely get to 30. Pretty good for a guy Baseball America claimed would hit around 25 home runs once he reached his prime.

Where’s the extra power coming from?

“I never really hit this many,” Seager told Doug Padilla of ESPN.com. “It’s probably one of those things that who knows what this is. It’s happening.”

What’s clear, though, is that Seager isn’t selling out for power. He entered Monday with a 1.5 ground ball-to-fly ball ratio. Most true power hitters keep their marks under 1.0. 

Seager is letting his power come more naturally. He may not put the ball in the air often, but he doesn’t hit cans of corn when he does. Even before he mashed his latest dingers, he was averaging 95.2 miles per hour on his fly balls and line drives, according to Baseball Savant. That was ahead of fellow rookie slugger Trevor Story and just a few ticks shy of guys like Chris Davis and Kris Bryant.

This is not the only area where Seager has been a pleasant surprise. As much as everyone was praising his bat coming into the year, “meh” was the general opinion on his defense.

“Seager has the hands for short but not the speed or agility, while his arm would play anywhere on the diamond,” wrote Law, “making a move to third base…[is] the most probable long-term outcome.”

This could still be true, but the defensive metrics say there’s no hurry. Defensive runs saved claims Seager’s defense at shortstop has saved four runs. According to ultimate zone rating, it’s more like 7.7. If it’s the latter that has the right idea, Seager is safe among the league’s top 10 defensive shortstops.

This makes him come off like a guy who carries a chip on his shoulder. That may be because he does.

“Since the day I signed I was told I would [have to] move to third base,” Seager told Tim Brown of Yahoo Sports over the All-Star break. “… Nobody had seen you play, and you’re already getting written off.”

What’s more, Seager has been at his best at a time when the Dodgers have needed it most.

A back injury has rendered staff ace Clayton Kershaw, he of the three Cy Youngs and one MVP, unable to pitch since June 26. It was easy to predict the Dodgers’ demise at the time, but Seager is one of the forces staving it off. All he’s done since Kershaw’s injury is hit .311 with a .900 OPS, helping to lead the Dodgers to a 22-13 record. Their deficit in the NL West is just one game.

For now, Seager isn’t the no-brainer in the NL MVP race he is in the NL Rookie of the Year race. It’s a crowded field, and he faces stiff competition from guys like Bryant and Daniel Murphy. If the Colorado Rockies get hot again, National League home run and RBI leader Nolan Arenado could crash the party.

The fact Seager is even a part of this discussion, however, is as fitting as any statement one could make about his rookie season. In the face of overwhelming expectations, he’s managed to overwhelm expectations.

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com and FanGraphs unless otherwise noted/linked. 

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The San Francisco Giants outlasted the Miami Marlins in a 14-inning marathon Monday, 8-7, and shortstop Brandon Crawford made headlines in the win.

According to SportsCenter, Crawford’s seven hits were the most in an MLB game since 1975 and tied the National League record. Rennie Stennett of the Pittsburgh Pirates was the last to reach the mark.

The Cauldron shared a table illustrating Crawford’s place in history:

Crawford finished the game 7-for-8 with two RBI, a run and a stolen base. He was a home run short of the cycle but fittingly drove in the game-winning run in the top of the 14th with a single to center field. The hit scored Brandon Belt, although Crawford was thrown out while trying to take second base on the throw.

The Giants appeared to be on their way to a loss at Marlins Park when they trailed 5-1 through six innings, but they poured in five runs in the top of the seventh. Crawford singled and scored during the rally. Before knocking in the winning run, he played the role of late-game hero with a game-tying RBI in the eighth after Miami had taken the lead.

The Giants had some fun on Twitter with Crawford’s historic day:

“It doesn’t happen very often that you get eight at-bats in a game,” Crawford said, per MLB.com’s Patrick Pinak. “I figured [seven hits] probably didn’t happen a whole lot. You don’t think about stuff like that when you’re playing.”

The 2015 All-Star, Gold Glover and Silver Slugger was slashing .265/.334/.422 with 10 home runs coming into the game.

According to ESPN.com, Crawford hit .208 in his first 24 at-bats in August. He was dialed in during the victory over the Marlins, though, which was a much-needed one for a Giants squad that was a disappointing 6-15 since the All-Star break before the win.

San Francisco is one game ahead of the archrival Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League West and could use an extended hot streak from Crawford as it attempts to snap out of its recent downslide and reach the postseason.

Monday’s contest was a dramatic step in the right direction.

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The San Francisco Giants were without manager Bruce Bochy for Monday night’s game against the Miami Marlins because of an illness, per Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle, but he is ready to return.

Jon Heyman of Today’s Knuckleball noted that Bochy has been released from the hospital, is feeling better and will manage on Tuesday night.

According to Schulman, the Giants didn’t give a reason for Bochy’s hospitalization on Monday other than that he was “feeling ill.” Schulman noted on Monday that the manager was “expected to rejoin the team Tuesday after being held overnight for observation” at the University of Miami Hospital.

Bochy was admitted to the hospital on Monday morning, although it wasn’t “immediately clear if this had anything to do with a February 2015 heart procedure in which Bochy had two stents inserted,” per Schulman.

The Giants kicked off a three-game series in Miami on Monday, and bench coach Ron Wotus assumed manager duties for Bochy in the contest. The Giants won Monday’s game 8-7 in 14 innings. 

Bochy has been with the Giants since the 2007 season and sports an 814-755 record with the club. The 1996 National League Manager of the Year helmed the San Diego Padres from 1995-2006 before joining the Giants.

Bochy has led the Giants to three World Series titles during his tenure in San Francisco (2010, 2012 and 2014) and has the team well-positioned to challenge for another crown this year when he returns. The Giants are 63-48 and sit a game ahead of the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League West.

However, the division leaders are also in the midst of a slump and are a mere 7-15 since the All-Star break.

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