FORT MYERS, Fla. -- The Red Sox open their Grapefruit League schedule Wednesday against the Twins, but catcher Christian Vazquez will be a few days later than that.
With Vazquez coming off Tommy John surgery, the Red Sox continue to take every precaution that the cannon-armed catcher doesn't do too much too soon.
"We want to get him into a [simulated] game first before we get him into a live game. He threw out to 120 feet today," said Red Sox manager John Farrell. "He'll throw controlled tomorrow to the bases. Once he comes out of that, we'll hopefully have a target middle of the week, latter part of next week, to get him in a sim game."
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Has there been any change to the club's plan with Vazquez?
"We've slowed it down a little bit over the last five to seven days. He got really aggressive with some throwing, which was part of his schedule, and it was also built in to -- I'm not going to say plateau, but we want to be careful we're not going too quick here," Farrell said. "How his body talks back to us, how he comes out of these intensive throwing sessions, we adjust accordingly. It's not a setback. We've slowed things down a little bit."
Though Vazquez has stated numerous times he wants to be on the Opening Day roster, he has no problem with the club being conservative.
"Everything is good," said Vazquez. "No pain, no nothing. I'm great. They are the boss. I follow the lead of them. They know what they're doing. You respect that."