Braves center-field prospect Jordan Schafer, still hampered by a sore left wrist, will get a second opinion after the injury was again diagnosed as a bone bruise by the team's hand specialist.
Schafer has been hampered by the wrist for much of the season, both with the major-league team in the first two months and with Class AAA Gwinnett since his demotion at the beginning of June.
He had a second MRI and a CT scan this week, and Braves hand specialist Gary Lourie examined Schafer. The test led to the diagnosis that he has a bone bruise, not torn tissue or a fracture.
"Everything looks the same as earlier," Braves general manager Frank Wren said, referring to the diagnosis after the first MRI on Schafer's wrist. "Bone bruise in the left wrist. He's going to get a second opinion on Monday, just to relieve his mind."
Schafer won the Braves' starting center-field job with a strong showing in spring training. He hit two homers in the season-opening series at Philadelphia, then hurt his wrist in the home opener in Atlanta.
He taped the wrist and continued to play every day, insisting that the soreness wasn't the cause of his mounting strikeouts and plummeting batting average.
Schafer hit .204 with two homers and 63 strikeouts in 167 at-bats before he was sent down to Gwinnett, where he has had two stints on the DL after twice aggravating the injury taking swings.
"They might want to do additional therapies beyond what they did last time, which was to rest it a couple of weeks," Wren said.
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