NEW YORK (AP) -Yankees first baseman Doug Mientkiewicz will have surgery Tuesday to insert a pin in his broken right wrist, an operation he hopes will get him back on the field faster.
Injured when Boston’s Mike Lowell ran into him at first base last weekend, Mientkiewicz originally was told he’d have to wear a cast for 12 weeks. He found that unacceptable.
He said his original plan was to have the cast cut off Aug. 1, no matter what.
“If it’s healed, fine. If it’s not, fine, too. I think I’ll be a homeless single father if I had to wait 12 weeks in a cast,” an antsy Mientkiewicz said in the Yankees clubhouse before Friday night’s game against Pittsburgh. “You can snap a bone in half and be back in 8-to-12 weeks. It’s a little tiny piece.”
Mientkiewicz thinks the operation by Dr. Melvin Rosenwasser will allow him to be back on the field with the Yankees by late July or early August.
Mientkiewicz also sustained a mild concussion and cervical sprain when Lowell ran into him in the fifth inning Saturday. Mientkiewicz thinks he hurt the wrist slightly while sliding into second base early in the game.
As he sat in front of his locker, his wrist was covered by a cast that he looked at with disdain.
“The neck is coming along OK. Without the wrist, I think I could play right now,” Mientkiewicz said. “I’ve played through worse than how I feel physically. That being said, I still have moments where I’m dizzy. I still have moments I don’t feel real great.”
Lowell, a friend since they played against each other in high school, was the first person to call Mientkiewicz at Massachusetts General Hospital. Mientkiewicz said there was nothing that could have avoided the collision.
“The only thing I could have hoped for was that if he was a step faster than he was, he would have been by me. I will tell him that,” Mientkiewicz said humorously. “Maybe we’ll work this offseason on getting a half-step faster. That way he doesn’t kill somebody else.”
Mientkiewicz appreciated the big ovation he received from the Fenway Park fans when he was taken off the field on a cart. He helped the Red Sox win the 2004 World Series – their first title since 1918 – but became a controversial figure when he initially kept the ball used for the final out. It is now at the Hall of Fame.
“I never thought I’d ever get cheered again in that park,” he said. “I’ll never forget that. It’s a hard way to get an ovation. That just shows the people. They care, and they’ve got classy people.”
Since the injury, he’s been communicating with Yankees teammate Jason Giambi, sidelined by a foot injury.
“Jason I have been texting the heck out of each other: Two old men in a convalescent home trying to kill time,” Mientkiewicz said.
Yankees manager Joe Torre quickly realized how stir crazy Mientkiewicz is while he’s sidelined.
“I’m sure his wife is going to want to send him off on some foreign soil somewhere,” Torre said.
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