Delino activated among Tribe's roster moves

CLEVELAND — The time has finally come for outfielder Delino DeShields to make his Indians debut. After missing the first 10 days of Summer Camp due to his battle with COVID-19, DeShields eased his way back into baseball activities. Now that his ramp-up period is over, he was activated from

CLEVELAND — The time has finally come for outfielder Delino DeShields to make his Indians debut.

After missing the first 10 days of Summer Camp due to his battle with COVID-19, DeShields eased his way back into baseball activities. Now that his ramp-up period is over, he was activated from the injured list on Thursday and got the start in center field against the Reds.

“It brings a speed dynamic to the ballclub that can help tremendously,” Sandy Alomar Jr., who’s managing in place of Terry Francona, said of DeShields. “The issue is the amount of at-bats we have for everybody. In a limited amount of games, we have to … talk to Tito and talk to [president of baseball operations] Chris [Antonetti] about how we’re going to rotate the outfield.”

(Francona, who has been away from the team since Sunday with a minor gastrointestinal condition, will not make the trip to Chicago this weekend. The team expects to have another update on the skipper on Monday.)

Activating DeShields was one of a handful of roster moves the Tribe had to make on Thursday. With the noon ET deadline to have all rosters trimmed from 30 players to 28, the team also optioned outfielders Greg Allen and Daniel Johnson, and designated infielder Christian Arroyo for assignment.

• Team rosters can stay at 28 through season

“Definitely a challenge with a 30-man roster,” Antonetti said, “Even some of the guys that we have sent to the alternate [training] site or in Christian’s case, designate, we just weren’t able to get them many opportunities up here. That will continue to be a bit of a challenge with a 28-man roster, and that’s something that we’ll have to take day to day and try to navigate.”

The expanded rosters, although they provide the comfort of depth given the unprecedented circumstances, have made it problematic for the Tribe to get everyone consistent at-bats. Because of that, a player such as Allen had to be optioned because Cleveland had a few too many outfielders to get into the mix.

“As we explained to Greg last night, there was nothing he did wrong at all,” Antonetti said. “It was just a function of [our] roster — the number of outfielders and DH options we had. The primary opportunity in the first few weeks of the season was [for him] to come in as a defensive replacement and only get sporadic at-bats. We recognize we probably didn’t put him in the best position to succeed, but with having as many outfielders on the roster as we did, it was just hard to get him playing time.”

Arroyo was came to the Indians in a trade with the Rays in July 2019 but had to finish the rest of last season on the injured list with a strained right forearm. He entered 2020 in a better spot physically, but with Mike Freeman and Yu Chang also filling a similar role behind infielders who rarely get days off, he just didn’t fit into the puzzle.

Johnson ended up making the Opening Day roster after Tyler Naquin fractured his toe by fouling a pitch off his right foot in an exhibition game. Johnson went 1-for-12 in five games for the Tribe, and even though his time with Cleveland was short (and sporadic), the team saw plenty to be excited about.

“He has a lot of potential,” Alomar Jr. said. “It’s unfortunate that we couldn’t put at-bats together for him. When you have a gap of not playing and being thrown into the fire, every player is going to feel pressure to try to perform that day, because they feel like that’s the only opportunity they’re going to get, and then they’re going to be on the bench and not play for the next five or six days. … But Daniel Johnson, I think he has a bright future. I really like him.”