Chances are you are feeling it right now. Players seem to get on the IL faster than they get off, and you only have so much room to work with. If you’re lucky, your commissar threw you an IL spot or two (or, um … five?) So you don’t lose a bench spot every time a player is sidelined, but you may find it reached the point where even those begin to overflow.
Juan Soto is the last to go down and land on the IL with a shoulder load. The news came from left field about an hour before Tuesday’s game, and so far no one has been able to provide details on the Nationals beat. I suspect, given the quiet development, it is quite small, but he will have to consume an IL spot for now.
The good news is that some season stash is now triggering. Kyle Lewis, who had been training with a bone injury to his knee since late spring, returned to the lineup on Tuesday and the Padres have finally built Dinelson Lamet to the point of releasing him on Wednesday. Ke’Bryan Hayes and Austin Nola are also on their way to return.
But there is also a downside when a player comes from the IL. If you had it hidden in an IL spot, you have to cut someone, and sometimes – probably not in the case of the players I mentioned, but sometimes – the right player to cut is the one you trigger.
You may wonder why you put it away at all. Well, this list aims to advise you which injured players are the most worth putting away and which are not so much, in case you have to make tough decisions. The criterion is a combination of how good the player is, how long he expects to miss and whether the injury could have a lasting effect on his performance.
Too valuable to drop, period
Maybe in the shallowest leagues
If it has to, it has to
Storage is pure luxury