Washington Nationals sending veteran outfielder for calf MRI

Corey Dickerson left Saturday’s game due to tightness in his left calf and Nationals manager Davey Martinez told reporters (including Mark Zuckerman of MASNsports.com) that the veteran outfielder will receive an MRI on Sunday.  This is not the first time that Dickerson has dealt with such an injury, as a left calf strain cost him about a month of action last summer, when he was with the Cardinals.

Washington signed Dickerson to a one-year, $2.25M deal over the offseason, adding an experienced left-handed bat to their mix of right-handed hitting -- and mostly untested -- young outfielders.  Dickerson was slated to receive the bulk of work in left field whenever a right-handed starter was on the mound. Considering the team's ongoing rebuild, Dickerson will likely be shopped at the trade deadline if he is performing well. Staying healthy is the first step to performing well, of course, and Dickerson and the Nationals can only hope that his upcoming MRI does not reveal anything serious.

More on other injury situations from around the majors…

• Garrett Whitlock made a Triple-A rehab start on Friday and Red Sox manager Alex Cora told reporters (including The Athletic’s Jen McCaffrey) that Whitlock is scheduled for one more outing with Double-A Portland on Thursday.  Assuming all goes well with that trip to the mound, the Sox would expect to activate Whitlock from the 15-day injured list for his 2023 MLB debut.  The right-hander needed a little more time to prepare this spring following his hip surgery last September, thus necessitating the IL visit at the start of the season.  The Red Sox plan on using Whitlock as a full-time member of the starting rotation this season, after hip problems interrupted his first run in the rotation in 2022.
• Dodgers manager Dave Roberts told The Athletic’s Fabian Ardaya and other reporters that Tony Gonsolin is set to throw a bullpen session on Sunday, followed by a live batting practice session at the team’s extended spring camp on Wednesday.  Gonsolin suffered an ankle sprain in early March and is expected for (hoped for) a late April return to the L.A. rotation. The right-hander appears to be making good progress in recovery.
• The Giants provided media (including MLB.com’s Maria I. Guardado) with several injury updates, including the news that Mitch Haniger and Austin Slater will both be re-evaluated this week in San Francisco, when the Giants begin their first homestand of the year.  Both players began the season on the 10-day IL, with Haniger rehabbing from a Grade 1 oblique strain and Slater a hamstring strain.  A more concrete timetable for either or both might be known after next week’s check-ins, though the team did have some hope that Haniger (who suffered his strain on March 10) would be ready for Opening Day. For his part, Slater was given an initial estimate of a 3-4 week recovery period.  He has progressed to baseball activities in his rehab and it would appear he has a chance of returning within that initial tentative window.