Kansas City Royals’ Adalberto Mondesi is healthy and happy to be with his teammates
Adalberto Mondesi’s season debut will take place Tuesday night in Florida in the 46th game of the season for the Kansas City Royals.
The 25-year-old switch-hitting shortstop with dynamic athletic ability went on the injured list on the eve of the start of the regular season with a right oblique strain. On Tuesday, the Royals activated Mondesi and slotted him inro the No. 7 spot in the lineup for their series opener against the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field.
Nicky Lopez, KC’s primary shortstop in Mondesi’s absence, was not in the starting lineup.
“I feel good, and it feels good to be back,” Mondesi said during a pre-game video conference. “It was a long process. The only thing I could do was just stay positive and keep doing all my things to get here quickly.”
Mondesi, who led the majors with 24 stolen bases and 15 infield hits in 2020, showed no signs of physical issues during spring training, though he got a slightly late start after having been hit in the foot while training in the Dominican Republic ahead of spring camp.
He played in 14 Cactus League games this spring, but he sustained the oblique injury in his final at-bat on the team’s last day in Arizona. Mondesi initially thought he’d be fine, but the next morning his right side was tight and he alerted team officials to the issue.
Mondesi rehabbed with the training staff in Kansas City until the club shifted his rehab to their spring training facility in Arizona in early May.
He began a minor-league rehab assignment on May 13 and appeared in a total of eight games between Double-A Northwest Arkansas and Triple-A Omaha.
“I just need to go out and play,” Mondesi said of getting back up to speed. “Whatever happens, it happens. I feel good. My body feels good. I feel good mentally. It’s baseball. I just need to go out there and play my game.”
Last year, coming off a season-ending shoulder injury in 2019 and spring training interrupted by the pandemic, Mondesi struggled through the first month of the shortened 60-game season.
Mondesi posted a slash line of .213/.234/.278 through his first 30 games before a late-season resurgence. He was .297/.350/.550 with six home runs, 20 RBIs, 23 runs and 17 stolen bases in the Royals’ final 29 games of 2020.
Lopez, who filled in adequately at shortstop, had been a Gold Glove finalist at second base last season but had struggled to produce consistently on offense. Those struggles continued into spring training, and he was slated to begin the season in the minors until Mondesi’s injury.
But Lopez gave the Royals solid offensive contributions as the No. 9 hitter in the lineup.
“Obviously we can’t wait to have him back because he’s just going to make our lineup that much deeper,” Lopez said earlier this month when asked by The Star about Mondesi’s pending return. “But, personally, what it means for me — I can’t really think about that. I’m just going to think about each and every day I get the opportunity to play. When he comes back, we’ll see what happens, what they want me to do.”
Overall this season, Lopez is batting .230 with a .317 on-base percentage. He went through a rough stretch — 1 for 29 from April 27 to May 8 — but he’s batting .293 (12-for-41) with two doubles, a triple and six runs scored in his last 13 games.
Lopez entered Tuesday’s game at Tampa tied for the MLB lead with three bunt hits, and his five sacrifice bunts lead all position players in the majors. He also entered the day tied for the American League lead in triples (three).
“He’s done a nice job, filled in fantastically at arguably one of the toughest positions on the field,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said of Lopez. “He continues to make a lot of the improvements we were hoping to see offensively.”
Matheny said the club would take advantage of Whit Merrifield’s versatility and ability to play the outfield as well as the designated hitter spot to keep multiple players sharp with Mondesi back in the lineup.
A 2019 All-Star and the club’s leadoff hitter, as well as one of it’s main offensive catalysts, Merrifield had started primarily at second base with Lopez at shortstop.
