ARIZONA DIAMONDBACKS
Diamondbacks’ Lovullo expects SS Nick Ahmed to miss rest of season
Arizona Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said on Arizona Sports’ Burns & Gambo Tuesday he thinks shortstop Nick Ahmed will miss the rest of the season.
“He’s progressing well. … He’s still in the treatment phase of his recovery,” Lovullo said. “We’re not going to let him back on the field until he checks all of his boxes to get him in there and get that range of motion taken care of and get him back onto the field and begin that return to baseball program but we haven’t gotten there yet.”
Ahmed was placed on the 60-day injured list in early June for a right shoulder issue that has been a problem since the start of the season. The 32-year-old had surgery on it a few days later to clean out some soft tissue and bone spurs that have been bothering him.
Ahmed was originally shut down on March 30 and worked his way back to return from the injured list on April 22, only to go back to it on May 16.
There was no listing for Ahmed’s placement on the injured list but Bally Sports Arizona’s Jody Jackson said Ahmed was working his way back from a bout with COVID-19. It appeared that Ahmed’s recovery process from that led to the same shoulder problems popping back up.
Ahmed won back-to-back Gold Gloves in 2018-19 and also had a career year at the plate in the latter season, posting bests in homers (19), RBIs (82) and OPS (.753). That helped earn Ahmed a new four-year contract with the D-backs worth over $32 million.
Since that extension, however, Ahmed has struggled. His OPS across 129 games last season dropped to .619 after a .729 mark in the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign.
In 54 plate appearances this season, Ahmed has three home runs for seven RBIs with a .702 OPS. In 2023, he will be entering the last year of that extension and be making $10.3 million, the third-highest salary currently on the team.
Without their everyday shortstop, the D-backs have turned to 22-year-old Geraldo Perdomo on just about an everyday basis.
Perdomo has started 91 of the D-backs’ 100 games without Ahmed as of Tuesday, with Sergio Alcantara (six starts) and Jake Hager (three) making up for the other nine outings. Perdomo, Arizona’s No. 9 prospect in 2021, is also known for his defense and has underperformed at the plate to the tune of a .199 batting average with four home runs and 26 RBIs.
