SAN FRANCISCO -- Giants center fielder Harrison Bader will face a lengthier rehab process than expected after he was involved in a scooter accident that further damaged his injured left foot, the club announced Tuesday.
Bader has been out since May 29 with left plantar fasciitis and met with Dr. David Porter, a foot and ankle specialist, in Indianapolis on Monday. But his evaluation was complicated by the additional injury he suffered to the same foot in his scooter crash, which happened on “Saturday night/early Sunday morning,” per the club.
Bader returned to San Francisco on Monday to be further examined by team orthopedist Dr. Ken Akizuki and was due to undergo an MRI exam on Tuesday.
Manager Tony Vitello said he found out about Bader’s accident on Sunday but didn’t have much information to share about the nature of the crash.
“I reached out to him, asked him if he was OK,” Vitello said ahead of Tuesday’s 8-2 loss to the Brewers at Oracle Park. “Obviously, he's not better than he was prior to that. I’ve left the rest up to everybody else, kind of sorting out the details.
“There's a chance it could delay whatever the recovery process is for him. But again, even prior to it, we're looking at a pretty frustrating and long runway before he could get on the field again.”
It’s not the first time Bader has been involved in a scooter incident. He was also suspended for 19 games during his sophomore season at the University of Florida following another late-night scooter crash in Gainesville, Fla., in 2014.
Bader, 32, joined the Giants on a two-year, $20.5 million deal in January, but he’s been hampered by injuries in his first season in San Francisco. He tweaked his left hamstring during the final week of Spring Training and tried to play through the issue early in the season, though he was eventually forced to go on the IL on April 15. He returned after missing one month, but he appeared in only 15 games before hitting the shelf once again with left plantar fasciitis on May 30.
Overall, Bader is hitting only .170 with a .557 OPS and five home runs over 30 games for the Giants this year.
It was a wretched injury day for the Giants, who also announced that standout infielder Casey Schmitt has a torn meniscus in his left knee and that rookie starter Trevor McDonald will undergo season-ending Tommy John surgery to repair a torn ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow next week.
McDonald logged a 5.12 ERA over 14 starts this year, but he was forced to depart his last outing against the Royals on July 20 after experiencing discomfort in his right elbow. An MRI exam subsequently showed a moderate UCL strain, prompting the 25-year-old hurler to opt for surgery. Dr. Keith Meister is expected to perform the procedure, which will likely sideline McDonald for the entire 2027 campaign.
“It’s unfortunate, obviously, missing a whole year and whatnot,” McDonald said. “But I’m looking forward to the process of refining some things and getting polished. Just having a good rehab and coming back stronger and better. That’s kind of my mindset toward it. But the decision overall wasn’t a hard one. I had the second opinion from Meister, and he was pretty clear that I did need to have the surgery and get it fixed. It’s part of it.”
Vitello said McDonald was taking the news “as well as you can.”
“He's got a good mindset,” Vitello said. “He understands it happened. He's had soreness built in before. He's just ready to move on to the next thing.”