Omar Infante gets back in lineup

Omar Infante applied an icepack to the right side of his jaw as he ambled through the Royals clubhouse. The stitches on the left side of his chin still ached. Swallowing was a chore; talking wasn’t much more pleasant.

Yet he returned to action on Friday night at Target Field, just three days after an 89-mph fastball struck him in the face. A battery of tests revealed only a sprained jaw, the sort of result that made Infante thankful.

“I saw the ball,” Infante said about the wayward pitch from Tampa Bay reliever Heath Bell. “I thought it was going to break my face.”

His initial reaction was the same as that of his teammates. “I saw my blood in my hand,” he said. “‘Wow.’ I’m thinking I broke something.”

Instead, he avoided both a fracture and a concussion. He flew with the club for this three-game series with the Twins. Royals manager Ned Yost penciled Infante into his customary place in the lineup, batting second and playing second base. Inside Infante’s locker waited a revamped helmet, with extended padding to protect his left jawline.

Yost commandeered the hat for a few moments and showed it off to a few members of the team. Infante smiled as he saw Yost testing out the new equipment.

“He’s feeling much better,” Yost said. “Just getting back in the swing of things.”

The process takes time. Infante admitted he was nervous about stepping back into the box again. He knocked a single in his first at-bat.

“That’s normal,” Infante said. “I can’t do anything about that. Just try to see the ball, try not to think too much about that. That’s normal. That happened with my hand, too.”

In 2008, Infante missed 32 games when a pitch fractured his left hand. He missed 73 games the next season when the same fate befell him. Both times, upon his return, he required an adjustment period to the speed and danger of big-league pitching.

For now, team officials do not believe Infante will require a lengthy stay on the disabled list. Still, they appeared to be taking precautions. Left-handed starter Danny Duffy was held out of his start on Thursday night with Class AAA Omaha.

As he often does, Yost was cryptic about the team’s intentions. He indicated Duffy’s status was related to Infante’s health, but offered no more. “We’ve got to wait and see how Omar is,” Yost said.

He added, “I’m not going to tell you my plans before they happen. Or what our plans as an organization are. There’s too many other factors.”

Mike Moustakas notched a couple of milestones on Friday night. He raked a double, his first extra-base hit of the season. He added a single later, for his first multihit game of the season. He entered the day with only one hit on his docket.

This story was originally published April 11, 2014 at 11:52 PM with the headline "Omar Infante gets back in lineup."