Tonight’s pre-game conversation with Joe Torre was dominated by the news that backup catcher Brad Ausmus (who is celebrating his 41st birthday today) will need back surgery tomorrow morning in Los Angeles to heal a herniated disc in his back.
“It’s tough. He had a little piece of the disc break off,” said Joe Torre. Stan Conte added that Ausmus will need three months to “be competitive.”
The condition has left Ausmus uncomfortable sleeping and sitting. “I don’t know if I was sad, having decided to have surgery,” said Ausmus. “Because if you were me, trying to sleep for the last week, every night and having to get up every three to five hours to walk around for 10 minutes to relieve the pain before you can lie back down…it’s not a lot of fun. The strange part is walking around and moving is when it feels best. It’s the sitting and the lying down that causes the shooting pain down the leg.”
Torre noted that A.J. Ellis will also get his reps. “Ellis will catch and we’ll make...
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