{"id":559531,"date":"2026-03-23T18:31:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T18:31:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/559531\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T18:31:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T18:31:11","slug":"cubs-outfielder-seiya-suzuki-to-start-season-on-injured-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/559531\/","title":{"rendered":"Cubs outfielder Seiya Suzuki to start season on injured list"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chicago Cubs<\/a> right fielder Seiya Suzuki<\/a> will start the season on the injured list, manager Craig Counsell told reporters Monday.<\/p>\n

Suzuki, who suffered a minor ligament strain in his right knee during the World Baseball Classic, already had been ruled out for Opening Day<\/a> against the Washington Nationals<\/a> at Wrigley Field on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Editor’s Picks<\/p>\n

2 Related<\/p>\n

Suzuki got hurt in Japan’s 8-5<\/a> loss to Venezuela in a World Baseball Classic quarterfinal March 14 in Miami. He walked gingerly to the dugout<\/a> after a headfirst slide into second base when he was caught stealing in the first inning. Suzuki was replaced in center field after the end of that half-inning.<\/p>\n

The 31-year-old returned to the Cubs’ spring training facility Monday, when he was seen walking slowly with a soft brace on the injured knee. Suzuki underwent imaging to determine the extent of the injury.<\/p>\n

Suzuki is going into the final season of an $85 million, five-year contract. He has hit .269 with 87 home runs and 296 RBIs in 532 games for the Cubs, including a team-leading 103 RBIs with 32 homers in 2025.<\/p>\n

In other roster news, Counsell said Ben Brown<\/a> has made the team and will come out of the bullpen, while Javier Assad<\/a> will start the season in the rotation for Triple-A Iowa.<\/p>\n

Brown, 26, pitched as both a starter and a reliever in 2025, going 5-8 with a 5.92 ERA in 25 appearances (15 starts). He had 121 strikeouts and 32 walks in 106\u2153 innings.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chicago Cubs right fielder Seiya Suzuki will start the season on the injured list, manager Craig Counsell told…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":559532,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,85],"class_list":["post-559531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=559531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559531\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/559532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=559531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=559531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=559531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}