Injured Brewers pitcher suffers hopefully minor setback in quest to return from IL

The Milwaukee Brewers have had one of the most injured starting rotations in baseball to start the 2024 season. The hope was that they might soon have a candidate to rejoin that rotation over the next week or two.

DL Hall, who was acquired last offseason in the Corbin Burnes trade, made four starts to begin the season but struggled and racked up a 7.71 ERA in the process. Things didn't look quite right in that last start and he was ultimately put on the injured list with a left knee sprain.

It would be about a month before Hall would move on to a rehab appearance as the team worked to bring him back from the IL. That appearance took place with the High-A Wisconsin Timber Rattlers and everything appeared to go well.

In his one inning of work, a workload that was planned by the Brewers, Hall faced the minimum three batters and induced a ground out, a line out, and a strikeout. His fastball velocity sat in the mid-90s and topped out at 95.

With everything looking good there, Hall headed off to the Triple-A Nashville Sounds for his next rehab appearance. Once again, everything looked good for the most part as he faced four batters and caused two to fly out, walked one, and struck out another. Only there was one small issue this time.

Brewers pitcher DL Hall suffered what is hopefully a minor setback in his last rehab appearance.

As Hall was coming off the mound for that inning of work, those watching the game noticed that the lefty was yelling into his glove, seemingly frustrated with something that fans worried could possibly be related to injury.

Initial reports were that there was nothing to worry about with that incident but reports changed a little bit as the night went on. According to Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Todd Rosiak, Hall's cleat got caught in the mound and the belief was that he was fine, but that the team would have him checked out just in case.

That leads to the latest news that was given on Sunday when Rosiak spoke to Brewers assistant GM Matt Kleine, who stated, "We have no indication that it's worse than (a tweak) right now. But we just want to be conservative. There's no sense in rushing through it or pushing through it at this point."

The Brewers do have the benefit of taking the time to make sure Hall is 100% healthy based on their current situation. Despite all the blows to their pitching staff, Milwaukee is still sitting in first place in the NL Central with a 3.5-game lead over the Cubs heading into Sunday.

It will still be a relief to get Hall back no matter what capacity he pitches in when he returns. Even if he doesn't come back to a rotation that has somewhat stabilized with the help of Robert Gasser, Bryse Wilson, and Tobias Myers, the bullpen could use some help as well as it's unknown how much Mitch White, who is already on his third team in 2024, and Enoli Paredes, who hasn't pitched in the majors since 2022, will help.

Either way, Hall's return will be welcomed once he's actually able to come back from the IL. He just needs to be fully healthy when he does so, and the Brewers are making sure that will be the case.