Donovan lands back on IL with groin strain, 10 days after being activated

SEATTLE -- The exciting news of Colt Emerson being called up to make his Major League debut on Sunday came in the wake of a brutal development for Brendan Donovan, whose left groin muscle strain has again sidelined him on the 10-day injured list.

Donovan underwent imaging on Sunday morning that revealed the severity of the issue, a little over a week after he returned from a previous IL stint on May 8 after missing 17 games.

“He's inflamed -- it's irritated and it's back to where it was when he went on the IL the first time,” Mariners general manager Justin Hollander said. “So we need to get it right.”

In a positive development on the injury front, backup catcher Mitch Garver returned to the lineup on Sunday after being scratched the day prior with back tightness.

Also, leverage reliever Matt Brash was slated to continue his rehab assignment at Triple-A Tacoma on Sunday. The club had considered activating him or having him make another outing with the Rainiers when returning from its recent road trip.

As for Donovan, he’ll receive a platelet-rich plasma injection in the groin strain, as well as a separate injection in his adductor “to get them both right,” per Hollander.

His timeline to recovery will be determined on how he responds in the coming days, but the club is hopeful that Donovan can return to baseball activity in two to three weeks.

Donovan reaggravated the area during Thursday’s 8-3 win in Houston, when he finished a homer shy of the cycle, Hollander said.

Bigger picture, this ties back to the major sports hernia procedure that Donovan underwent in October when he was still a member of the Cardinals -- which Donovan has hinted at as far back as Spring Training. He also missed time with hip soreness and right groin discomfort in April, well before going on the IL initially on April 20.

“Between the offseason surgery and the groin strain, it's definitely related,” Hollander said. “I talked to the [high performance] staff, they feel strongly that when you have the core surgery, you're more susceptible to groin strains and core muscle strains after that for a little bit.”

Even before the initial IL stint, Donovan had suggested that the issue is one he’ll have to monitor for an extended period. The Mariners knew that, too, when acquiring him in a three-team trade on Feb. 2, believing that he was the capstone piece to a roster with World Series aspirations.

“The most important thing we can do is make sure that we're putting him in position to go out there and feel good every day,” Hollander said. “Clearly, we need to take a step back based on how he felt yesterday after the Houston series and how he feels.”

Hollander recalled a similar surgery that former Mariners utilityman Dylan Moore underwent during the 2022-23 offseason that dealt with similar effects. But obviously, every injury and surgery is different.

“We expected that there were going to be some hiccups as you go into the season,” Hollander said. “D-Mo didn't feel like himself until July. I think that was our own internal view, was that there would be some days where [Donovan] didn't feel good for at least the first half of the season.”

When Donovan returned from the IL, the Mariners intended to bake in load management to help alleviate the lingering issue. He had two by-design days off over his first six days back, but he came off the bench in that second game in question to take Cal Raleigh’s spot in the batting order, when the catcher aggravated his oblique and was forced to exit in the ninth inning.

“I’m still learning a lot about recovery and things I can do to keep my hips healthy after my surgery,” Donovan said last weekend.

“I think workload is one of those things, and pelvic positioning is another thing. That’s something that we have to attack in the weight room and in the training room every day.”

Donovan was 6-for-28 (.214) since returning, with half of those hits coming Thursday when he finished a homer shy of the cycle. For the season, he’s slashing .274/.386/.452 (.838 OPS) with a 14.9% strikeout rate and a 10.9% walk rate in 101 plate appearances, good for 146 wRC+ (league average is 100).

When he’s on the field, he’s been their best contact hitter. But he’d started just 23 of Seattle’s 47 games before Sunday. Now in his fifth full season, he’s played in more than 130 games just once.