Yankees' Juan Soto sits out with forearm inflammation

Juan Soto wasn’t in the Yankees’ starting lineup and never got into their 2-1, 11-inning loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers on Friday night at Yankee Stadium, but there was a sense of optimism about his injured left forearm.

An MRI revealed inflammation in the forearm, Aaron Boone said before the game. It’s a sigh of relief for now, although Boone expressed caution.

“I think in the grand scheme of things, we got good news,” he said. “Just some inflammation in there, so we’ll start some medicine and right now, we’re treating him as day-to-day.”

Soto said after the game: "It all depends how I feel. Like I said, when you say day-to-day, just coming to the ballpark, see how I feel and taking decisions from that.''

Soto didn’t receive any injections and could be available for this weekend’s high-profile series. The imaging, which was done around his elbow, didn’t reveal any ligament damage.

"Yeah, it was what I was looking for,'' Soto said. "I just tried to see what was really going on in my elbow and we were having a little bit of thinking, what it's going to be like and how it's going to come out? And thank God, it came out all right.''

Alex Verdugo started in leftfield Friday night and batted second in Soto’s spot. Aaron Judge moved to rightfield, and Boone said that likely will be the arrangement through the weekend if Soto doesn’t play.

Soto missed a game for the first time since Oct. 4, 2022, as a member of the Padres. He had played in 227 consecutive games. "It was tough,'' he said. "It's always tough to watch the game from the bench. I want to be out there, want to be out there trying to win a game with my teammates, try to enjoy the moment. But it is what it is.''

Soto left Thursday night’s win over the Twins in the top of the sixth after a 56-minute rain delay because of what the Yankees called left forearm discomfort. He later said the pain is something he’s dealt with for the past 1 1⁄2 to two weeks. “I actually just woke up one day, felt the tightness and the discomfort in my forearm,” he said Thursday. “And we’ve been working on it and we’ve been trying to get away with it. And it hasn’t [gone away].”

He said after the game: "I don't think I have to be grinding through it the whole year if we do the right thing and if we do it the right way . . . Now that we know what it is and we can treat it and we can do the right thing to get it going, I think I'll be fine.''

Soto was asked  if it's more the elbow or the forearm, given that he had mentioned the elbow twice. He said: ''It's the forearm. It's attached to my elbow, but it's definitely my forearm.''

Boone said he was told by team physicians that the inflammation isn’t expected to be a long-term lingering issue. Soto could serve as the designated hitter when he returns, but Boone didn’t want to get that far ahead.

“You want that [inflammation] to calm down a little bit, and this medicine should knock that out,” he said. “And I expect that to be over the next couple of days. Hopefully he’s completely symptom-free. I don’t know if it’ll be all the way exactly.”

Boone was made aware 20 minutes before the game resumed on Thursday night that Soto was being looked at by team physician Christopher Ahmad. That’s when the decision was made to pull him out.

“It’s like, the rain delay happens and it’s like, ‘I gotta get through that process again,’  ” Boone said of Soto’s thinking. “Dr. Ahmad was here, it’s like, ‘Hey, why don’t we get this imaging on this.’ And I think a little bit of peace of mind there for him. Like why is this still lingering?”

There still wasn’t any clarity on the cause of the injury, but Boone acknowledged that while Soto felt fine in games after getting treatment, he’d been waking up feeling stiff since he first felt the effect of the injury.

Entering Friday night, Soto led the majors in on-base percentage (.424) and was second in OPS (1.027, behind only Judge’s 1.089) and third in slugging (.603, behind Judge’s .658 and Marcell Ozuna’s .608). He was third in batting average at .318, behind Luis Arraez’s .335 and Jurickson Profar’s .323.

Notes & quotes: Gerrit Cole will make his next rehab start on Sunday for Double-A Somerset, Boone said. He pitched 3 1⁄3 scoreless innings on Wednesday for Somerset, his first rehab game since suffering elbow inflammation during spring training. Cole threw 45 pitches and struck out five, allowing two singles and no walks.

By Evan Barnes

evan.barnes@newsday.comevan_b

Evan Barnes covers the Nets for Newsday. He previously covered Memphis football and the Memphis Grizzlies and also covered prep sports in Los Angeles.