IL Tracker, August 6

7 rostered players on the IL, with measured timelines by injury type.

7 rostered players are on the injured list. This is not a return-date report, nothing on this site knows when anyone comes back, but it does pair how long each player has already been out against what that injury has actually cost the 272 players who have returned from one this season.

Out the longest

Days already missed, against the measured median for the same injury. The range in brackets is the middle half of those cases, for an elbow it spans three weeks to three months, which is why no single date belongs here.

What each injury has cost this season

Every returned case, by body part. Sample sizes are shown because they are the whole story: a median off nine cases is a hint, and one off forty-three is close to a planning number.

What this means

James Wood is the only name here that isn't a real decision. A value of 374 is the highest number on the board by more than a hundred points, and he has been gone two days against a typical oblique absence of 30 across 34 cases. That gap is the whole point: he is barely into it. Obliques are the injury where the honest answer is that nobody, including the player, knows when the swing feels normal again, and the 34-case sample is the largest here, so the 30-day figure is about as trustworthy as anything in the table. You hold him through all of it. The cost of being wrong is a roster spot for a month. The cost of being wrong the other way is giving away the most valuable player you own.

Soto is the more interesting hold, because he is the one where the clock is actually most of the way somewhere. Twelve days missed against a median of 29 for a calf strain means he is roughly 40 percent through what a typical case looks like, and calf strains carry a re-aggravation risk that the median doesn't price in. The case against holding is real: 15 cases is a thin sample, the spread on soft-tissue lower-leg injuries is wide, and at 265 he is not so far clear of the replacement pool that two more weeks of a dead spot is free. I still hold. What would change my mind is a second IL stint, because a calf that fails once tends to fail again, and at that point you are not waiting on 17 more days, you are waiting on a whole new median.

The drops start with Bellinger. Eleven days into a hamstring strain that typically runs 26, on the largest injury sample in the table outside Wood's, and he is worth 154. That combination is the problem. He is not valuable enough to justify holding a spot for another two weeks, and the 33-case median is solid enough that you cannot talk yourself into an early return. Cut him. If he comes back on the short end and someone else grabs him, you lost a fringe outfielder, not a season.

Schmitt is the one a smart reader will fight me on, and the argument is the position list. OF, 3B, DH, 1B, 2B is a genuinely useful thing to own in a deep league, and at nine days into an 18-day median he is closer to the end than anyone except possibly Kurtz. The case for holding is that he plugs five holes and the wait is short. The case against is the words "meniscus tear," which is the only structural injury on this list. Everything else here is soft tissue that heals. A torn meniscus either gets managed or gets cleaned up, and the 18-day median across 18 cases is telling you what the managed version looks like, not what happens if it doesn't hold. At 160, I drop him, and I do it knowing the flexibility is what I'm giving away.

Buxton and Kurtz are the two where I would not pretend to know. Buxton at 185 is eight days into an 18-day median on 11 cases, the thinnest sample here, and hip impingement in a player with his history is not something a median captures. Hold, but with your finger on the button. Kurtz has no sample at all for a strained right thumb, which means the two-day figure tells you nothing. A thumb on a hitter is a grip injury and can linger long past when it stops hurting. At 204 I hold him for now. The falsifier is simple: the first rehab at-bat where he is on the field and not swinging.

How to read this

Days out is counted from the transaction that placed the player on the list. Current status comes from the live injury feed, which is authoritative for who is out but carries no dates at all, the two are joined per player.

The typical column is a median with its sample size and interquartile range, and it describes other players, not this one. It is context for how long an injury of that kind has been costing people, not a forecast for anybody.

Only players above roster-relevant value appear. An injury to someone nobody rosters is not a fantasy event, and listing every one would bury the handful that change a lineup.

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