Brewers Injury Updates: Garrett Mitchell, Devin Williams making progress

The Brewers have gotten some long awaited good news on the injury front. As this nine game road trip gets going, the Brewers have nine players on the injured list. Manager Pat Murphy has updates on the recoveries of a couple of those players.

Despite injuries ravaging the team this year, the Brewers are still in first place in the NL Central with a 26-18 record. They're missing an ace (Brandon Woodruff), their closer (Devin Williams), one of their starting outfielders (Garrett Mitchell), and just recently lost their first baseman (Rhys Hoskins).

Progress is being made in their recoveries as several players are reaching key milestones in their road back to the field.

Garrett Mitchell

According to Murphy, Mitchell had the splint on his hand taken off finally, which will allow him to resume more baseball activities. He suffered a broken bone in his hand toward the end of spring training and has missed the entire regular season so far.

Mitchell will begin taking swings on this road trip and could resume facing live pitching during the Boston series next weekend.

Hand injuries are notoriously difficult for hitters. Gaining that hand strength back and getting to a point where it isn't negatively impacting his swing could take some time. After getting some pregame hitting in, Mitchell would then be looking at a rehab assignment to get some ABs under his belt. The fact the splint is off and he'll be swinging the bat soon means his path back to being activated is finally in motion.

Devin Williams

Devin Williams has also missed the entire season so far with stress fractures in his back. The Brewers bullpen has filled in the gap at closer so far, but getting their most dominant arm back would be a welcome sight.

Williams is going to play catch here on Saturday for the first time since being shut down with the injury. His recovery timeline still puts him at around mid-season, but it's finally time for him to start taking those steps forward in his recovery.

From catch, Williams then progresses to longer distances on the flat ground, then he'll eventually progress to throwing off the mound, getting some simulated innings, and after that, a rehab assignment. It's a long road still to go for Williams, who won't be activated until July, at least.

J.B. Bukauskas

Bukauskas, who pitched in six games this year with a solid 1.50 ERA, has been on the IL with a shoulder injury and was recently transferred to the 60 day IL. He's been injured since April 13th and isn't eligible to be activated until the middle of June.

Bukauskas played catch for the first time since the injury on Friday, marking a big milestone in his road back to the field. Similar to Williams, it'll be a long road ahead still since he's just starting to play catch, but he's on the path.

Other injury notes

• Taylor Clarke, a reliever acquired from Kansas City this offseason, has been activated from his rehab assignment and optioned to Triple-A Nashville. He was already there on his rehab assignment, and performed well on his two rehab outings. Now he'll have to earn his way back to the big leagues.

• Joey Wiemer is on a rehab assignment with Triple-A Nashville. He went 1-for-3 with a single on Thursday and then 0-for-3 with a walk on Friday.

• DL Hall, acquired in the Corbin Burnes trade, is starting on Sunday afternoon for the High-A Wisconsin Timber Rattlers as he starts a rehab assignment.