The Mets have a diagnosis for Jed Lowrie, who showed up to summer camp wearing an enormous brace, participated in a limited fashion, landed on the IL, and later went for a second opinion on his knee.
"It's PCL laxity. That's the injury that's been in the knee, but he's got laxity in that PCL that's causing him the pain," Mets GM Brodie Van Wagenen explained Thursday during a Zoom call with reporters. "When he wears that large brace, the pain is mitigated, and when he takes that brace off or plays in a smaller brace, that pain increases. So it's PCL laxity. The two doctors are gonna put their heads together with the player and determine the best course of action here as we go forward."
Adding that it's too early to tell whether Lowrie will need surgery for the injury, Van Wagenen said that the team believes he remains close to major league ready and did not rule out a return for him this season.
"What we saw in summer camp, even with the layoff, was that he was major league ready offensively," Van Wagenen said. "From both the left side of the plate and the right side of the plate, he had professional and as many quality at-bats as any of the players we had in camp. We were very pleased to see that. The challenge will be, can we get him to a point where he can run the bases and play defense at the speed and the efficiency level that needs to happen for him to be a major league player."
Other notes from Van Wagenen...
ON THE TEAM'S CORONAVIRUS PROTOCOLS IN LIGHT OF MARLINS OUTBREAK
"The conversation never ends. Reminders are constant. That goes from my chair to the coaching staff to the performance staff to even the players to one another. They are mindful of what's going on around them. ... We have regular communication and a commitment to each other to do the best that we can to try to keep each other healthy and keep each other safe so we can be competitive on the field and also careful for our families when we go home."
ON THE ADDITION OF BRIAN DOZER TO THE 30-MAN ROSTER
"Obviously, he's got pedigree. Having been an All-Star, Gold Glove winner, a World Champion last year. This guy has always been able to hit, particularly against left-handed pitching. So when we looked at the balance of our infielders with a lot of left-handed hitters, we felt Brian gave us a real threat from the right side of the plate."