Brandon Phillips out with bruised heel

Brandon Phillips was forced to exit early during Sunday’s game between the Cincinnati Reds and Toronto Blue Jays due to a bruised heel. Dat Dude is still dealing with the injury on Monday night and had to remain out of the lineup.

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As the Reds have started to finally play better baseball, Phillips has seen his production surge as well. His numbers are up to .274/.306/.393. I know what you’re thinking, and yes it is depressing to think that his numbers are “up” to that slash line, but it speaks more to his slow start than anything else.

As for this heel injury, Reds’ manager Bryan Price had the following to say about the situation on Sunday (quotes from MLB.com):

"“He did not want to come out of the game and I made that decision because I did get a chance to see him play a little bit on defense with it and tried to get a pad on there,” Price said. “And he didn’t want to look at me; he didn’t want it to happen, but I just felt like it was smart. We could get started on the treatment, get an X-ray, take a look at things, and hopefully there will be a lot of progress made between now and tomorrow’s game.”"

The Reds cannot necessarily expect All-Star production from Phillips at this point, but if he can produce pop every now and then and continue to play plus defense at the keystone, that might be just plenty for the Reds. That’s as long as he can avoid the DL with this bone bruise, that is.