LOS ANGELES \u2014 When the champagne flows \u2014 whether late Thursday at Dodger Stadium or this weekend at Petco Park \u2014 Gavin Sheets will be in the middle of a celebration.<\/p>\n
Where he belongs.<\/p>\n
Thankfully.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen it happened in Tampa, I didn\u2019t know if this day was necessarily going to come this year,\u201d Sheets said after joining the Padres at Dodger Stadium on Thursday. \u201cI\u2019m just super excited to feel like I\u2019m healthy again and feel like I can contribute.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sheets\u2019 plantar fasciitis took a turn for the worse while running the bases in a late August game against the Rays. He\u2019d been managing the injury for some time only to land on the injured list ahead of the final month of the season. Sheets did not heal quickly enough to get into minor league rehab games, but he ramped up in live batting practice at the team\u2019s complex in Peoria, Ariz., took live BP at Petco Park on Monday and returned to Arizona to continue pushing toward activation.<\/p>\n
While he was not activated ahead of Thursday\u2019s game, his return to the lineup as a left-handed DH\/pinch-hitter is imminent.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think he has to show anything else to me,\u201d Padres manager Craig Stammen said. \u201cHe says he feels healthier than he has for a little while. We saw him the other day in the live BP. He looked really good. He\u2019s taking a ton of bats in Arizona. We saw video that looks really good. So it\u2019s just a matter of when we want to make that roster move.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sheets carried the team at points in the first half, when consistent production from the likes of Manny Machado, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jackson Merrill was hard to come by. He had a .751 OPS in April and .861 OPS in May and had late-game heroics carry the team to improbable wins the first couple months.<\/p>\n
The foot injury wore on Sheets as the season went on. He hit just .175\/.292\/.305 over a 72-game stretch ahead of landing on the injured list.<\/p>\n
Though Sheets was initially wearing a walking boot in the visiting clubhouse on Thursday, he believes the worst of the plantar fasciitis is behind him.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, obviously for a while was just being in a boot, seeing if we could get some kind of scarring, some kind of healing with the plantar plate,\u201d said Sheets, who will also be wearing a brace on his left foot. \u201cAnd once we went back to Arizona, just to first see if I could do it again, and once we saw how well the recovery had worked, then we just hit a full ramp. A lot of the bats, a lot of swings, a lot of Trajekt (pitching simulation) just getting back to game speed.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo super happy with where I\u2019ve gotten.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mize\u2019s final pitch<\/p>\n
Casey Mize would not take the ball if he was physically compromised, he said after his last start (3 IP, 5 ER, 5 BBs). But a right groin ailment sent him to the injured list twice this year with the Tigers, and he rolled his right ankle slipping down the dugout steps in his fourth start with the Padres.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s something to consider in assessing the nine starts (6.64 ERA) Mize has made as a Padre. He certainly was in his between-start work leading into his final regular-season start on Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, just making sure we\u2019re kind of moving well down the mound,\u201d Mize said. \u201cTry not to get stuck in some positions and just trying to sync up my lower half to the upper half. Feel like there\u2019s been a little bit of disconnect that\u2019s going on. So connecting those and trying to get those on time and moving down the mound was kind of the main focus this week.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked if that disconnect was related to the groin or the more recent mishap with his ankle, which has remained wrapped for stability, Mize said: \u201cI\u2019m not sure. I think it\u2019s just a little out of whack right now. I need to put it together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Especially because the Padres will still be playing for something Friday. They began Thursday as the No. 4 seed and can earn home games in the NL Wild Card Series if they remain at least a game ahead of the Cubs.<\/p>\n
The start will be Mize\u2019s third this year against the Diamondbacks. He allowed one run in six innings in a no-decision in Arizona while with the Tigers in his first start of the season, then allowed a career-high eight runs in 3\u2153 innings in his first start as a Padre in Arizona.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m going to learn from every start I make, no matter the circumstances,\u201d Mize said. \u201cSo I\u2019ve pitched against them twice. Tomorrow will be the third. I\u2019ll look back on both of those starts. Already have. Just see what I can see. But, like I always do \u2026 I\u2019m going to pitch to a lot of my strengths and attack some of the weaknesses that exist as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Notable<\/p>\n
DH Miguel Andujar (wrist) was expected to join the team from Arizona, where he was getting at-bats alongside Sheets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES \u2014 When the champagne flows \u2014 whether late Thursday at Dodger Stadium or this weekend at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":475260,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[181,1334,74,76,75,2611,127],"class_list":["post-475259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-latest-headlines","tag-mlb","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-san-diego-padres","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=475259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/475260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=475259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=475259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=475259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}