New update provided on injured Brewers outfielder, including potential return date

Just 48 games into the 2024 season, the Milwaukee Brewers have seen all of the outfielders on their 40-man roster play in at least one game this year. Well, all but one, that is.

While six outfielders have seen game action for the crew, 2020 first round draft pick Garrett Mitchell is the one member of that position group that hasn't played in a game yet this year. That's due to the 25-year-old encountering the injury bug once again.

Mitchell, the 20th overall pick four years ago, broke a bone in his hand on a swing during Cactus League play and has been on the injured list ever since the season began. Knowing the injury would be a longer term one and needing roster space, he would eventually be transferred from the 10-day IL to the 60-day.

The hope was that Mitchell would be back some time in the early summer and that thought was confirmed, in a way, when it was learned last week that he was getting his splint removed. An even newer update zeroes in even closer on when that exact return might be.

Brewers outfielder Garrett Mitchell could potentially return to the field for the Crew in mid-June series.

Before returning to the field, Mitchell will need to start ramping back up and getting into some rehab games. Luckily, prior to the Brewers' Wednesday road contest against the Marlins, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Todd Rosiak shed some light on to that upcoming timeline.

Per Rosiak, Mitchell will start by taking some swings off the tee this Friday as the team heads to Boston. The Brewers conclude their current road trip with a three-game series there that starts that day after their off day tomorrow.

Then it will be two more steps before Mitchell can return to the Brewers. He would first head to the Arizona complex to put some actual at bats together. Then, he would head off to one off the team's minor league affiliates for some rehab starts.

After that, fans should finally get to see Mitchell playing in a Brewers uniform again and there's even an idea of when that series might be. Per Rosiak, the hope is that Mitchell will be able to rejoin the team in their road series against the Angels that begins on Monday, June 17th.

Mitchell would be joining a Brewers team that is humming offensively in 2024, scoring 5.08 runs per game coming into Wednesday, good for third most in MLB. As a position group, per FanGraphs, Milwaukee outfielders were 11th in MLB with a combined 103 wRC+ and 8th with a combined 2.8 fWAR going into Wednesday.

It will be great to see Mitchell on a field again when he finally makes his 2024 Brewers debut. After that, hopefully he can find a way to more permanently keep that injury bug at bay.