Reds infielder Noelvi Marte injured, exits winter league game
While Saturday was full of plenty of college football drama and had the focus of much of the country here in the US, there was baseball going on in the Dominican Republic. Noelvi Marte, who just recently joined the Gigantes del Cibao this week. He played in his first game on Tuesday, going 3-4 with a double, run, and an RBI that night. On Saturday night he extended his hitting streak to four games. He was hitless entering the 8th inning, but he singled up the middle to raise his average to .412. The next play, though, saw him steal second base and after sliding head first he called for the trainer.
On the play nothing looked out of ordinary until he remained on the dirt at second base after the slide. The trainer came out and appeared to be checking out his hamstring. About a minute later he helped him up to his feet and Marte limped off of the field with a little bit of assistance from a training staff member on each side of him. Marte then walked down the steps of the dugout on his own.
With the game taking place in the Dominican Republic, there was not an immediate update following the game. There is just under one month remaining in the regular season for the Dominican Winter League
before the playoffs begin. It’s unclear if Marte would return, even if he’s going to be healthy before then. Big league clubs usually don’t step in and prevent position players from participating in winter leagues unless there’s an injury-related reason to keep them off of the field. With Marte exiting the game early on Saturday night that could be a situation that could cause them to step in. We’ll have to wait and see what happens here over the next few days.
