Cubs' Bryant knows time's not on his side with wrist recovery
Kris Bryant admits he's a little nervous looking at the calendar, but he knows it's important to give his injured left wrist time to heal.
Bryant talked about the injury before Sunday's series finale against the White Sox. It originally happened on Aug. 12 in Cleveland when he dove for a line drive in left field and his glove hand rolled awkwardly.
Bryant knew something was wrong, but he actually hit a home run later in that game, which left a false impression that everything would be OK.
"In the on deck circle I was talking to Riz (Anthony Rizzo), I was like, 'I don't feel right, it doesn't feel great,'" Bryant said. "I didn't want to come out and of course, you hit a homer and you're on that home-run high and you feel great and you're like, 'This is awesome, I'm fine. Nothing's hurting. I'm good.'
"Then it just progressively speeds up on you. Squeezing the glove in the outfield, I was like, 'This hurts, but I feel great. I just hit a home run.' It's hard to balance those feelings. So it's like, 'Keep playing.'"
Bryant took a couple days off, then tried to keep playing. But after four games, the Cubs decided it was best to put him on the 10-day injured list, retroactive to Aug. 19. He got a medical injection in the wrist on Tuesday.
"I feel like they never really work," Bryant said of the shot. "I'm always optimistic. I don't know when it will happen. I'll do everything I can to continue to get treated and whatever the training staff recommends.
"You do feel like you're running out of time. I felt like we were running out of time right when we started the season. Days were just going by and the season was halfway done. At the same time just try to be smart about it and not end up hurting the team by continuing to run out there and not feel right."
Bryant said one of the biggest hurdles is mentally getting back to a normal swing after feeling the pain so many times.
"If you've got that hesitation mentally and physically, you're just not going to have a whole lot of success," manager David Ross said. "It's really important for us to give him the time he needs to get that fully healthy and come back and be the player he expects to be."