Placido Polanco is recovered enough from offseason hernia surgery to make his spring training debut yesterday, but Chase Utley remained out of the Phillies’ lineup with no immediate plans for his return to game action.
Manager Charlie Manuel told Todd Zolecki of MLB.com that “it’s going to be a while yet” before Utley debuts and general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. indicated that the Phillies might hold him out for the first two weeks in an effort to keep his chronic knee problems in check.
Asked if Utley is healthy, Amaro replied:
He seems fine. We’re just taking things slowly with him. There’s no reason to start putting the pounding on his knees that typically he would have during this time. There’s no reason to start that process now when we can start it a little bit later on.
That makes sense, but the extreme caution and focus on limiting Utley’s mileage sure makes it seem like the Phillies believe his knees are in pretty bad shape overall.