Get ready, baseball fans. Alex Rodriguez‘s triumphant return is almost upon us.
Rodriguez told WFAN’s Mike Francesa on Wednesday that he plans to be in the Yankees lineup Monday against his former team, the Rangers, in Texas. The 37-year-old has not seen major league action since undergoing hip surgery this past offseason.
Since returning to the diamond, A-Rod has gone 5-for-28 with one home run and six strikeouts while climbing through the ranks of the Bombers’ minor league system. He is expected to begin his final rehab stint with the Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders on Thursday.
Though he would not confirm the his return, Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said that Monday is the desired target date to have Rodriguez back in the lineup.
“That’s the hope,” Cashman told ESPN.com’s Andrew Marchand. “We’ll see through the weekend. We started the 20-day rehab and once we felt he could complete the 20 days and be available to us in Texas. So let’s get through the weekend and see where he is at and see if he is major league able.”
But even if he is back to 100 percent physically, Rodriguez’s return to the big leagues may be a brief one. MLB commissioner Bud Selig is expected to hand down suspensions to Rodriguez and roughly two dozen other players stemming from the Biogenesis investigation, perhaps keeping the third baseman out of action for an entire season’s worth of games.
Hear what Rodriguez had to say about his impending return in the video below.
