O'Hoppe in concussion protocol after taking foul ball off face mask

ANAHEIM -- Angels catcher Logan O'Hoppe left Friday’s game against the Red Sox in the third inning after being hit in the face mask by a foul ball from Andruw Monasterio. He’s being evaluated for a possible concussion, manager Kurt Suzuki said after the club’s 5-2 loss in the series opener at Angel Stadium.

With lefty Reid Detmers pitching with two on and one out, Monasterio fouled back a four-seam fastball that hit off the side of O’Hoppe’s mask and caused him to immediately fall backward. Home plate umpire Adam Beck helped keep O’Hoppe steady before head athletic trainer Mike Frostad visited home plate.

O’Hoppe quickly left the game with Frostad but was able to walk away on his own accord and wasn’t down for an extended period of time. But it was still a scary moment, and he was replaced by Tyler Heineman behind the plate.

“He's going through some concussion protocol,” said Suzuki, a big league catcher himself for 16 years. “I know he's been having a couple of those hard shots. I know he took some in Seattle. So we might need to find some stuff to maybe help with that, maybe an equipment change or something, I don't know.”

O’Hoppe has had concussion issues in the past, including landing on the 7-day concussion list last September on a freak play that saw A’s shortstop Jacob Wilson’s bat hit under O’Hoppe’s chin before he started a practice swing. But Suzuki said it’s still too early to know if he’ll land on the IL just yet.

“We don't really know yet,” Suzuki said. “We’ve got to kind of see what the tests show after the doctor looks at him. We’ve got to see where we're at but he's just going through some protocol testing right now.”

O’Hoppe, 26, previously missed time after sustaining a fractured wrist on April 25. He missed 19 games from April 26-May 15 with the injury but had been swinging a hot bat recently. Over his last 19 games, O'Hoppe was batting .305/.317/.475 with two homers, four doubles and 10 RBIs but didn’t come to the plate before suffering his injury on Friday. He’s hitting .228/.290/.333 with four homers, eight doubles and 23 RBIs on the season.

“It's tough,” Suzuki said. “I think it was more than just offensively, it was defensively with his receiving, his throwing. All the numbers have been trending up and he's in a really good place now. And for something freak like this to happen. I mean, this might have been his third one in the last three days or four days, so definitely not ideal. But we’ll see what the doctor says and we’ll move forward.”

If he misses time with a concussion, it would test the club’s depth at catcher, especially with Travis d’Arnaud (plantar fasciitis) and Sebastián Rivero (hamate fracture) both on the injured list. Rivero is considered closer to returning, as his injury occurred on April 9 and he was expected to miss roughly four weeks, while d’Arnaud has been out since May 6 and is still considered several weeks from returning.

The Angels, however, do still have veteran Logan Porter on the 40-man roster, and he’d be the logical option if O’Hoppe needs to be placed on the IL. Porter played in two games with the club after signing as a Minor League free agent on June 8, going 1-for-4 with a double.