One Orioles player who has yet to appear in any spring training pictures is J.J. Hardy. In standard fashion, the reporters in Sarasota at first offered benign explanations for this: Hardy was sick. No big deal. Except it turns out today that Hardy has a sore lower back, had an MRI yesterday, and is getting a CT scan today, according to The Baltimore Sun’s Peter Schmuck.
The results of those tests will give a better idea of how serious a problem Hardy is suffering, but in the meantime, it seems like all of the “Manny Machado is practicing at shortstop for the World Baseball Classic” stories were also secretly Machado practicing there in case Hardy is going to miss time either during spring training or worse, the regular season.