OAKLAND — A’s reliever John Axford will need a little bit more than his 10 days on the disabled list before he’s ready to return to the Oakland bullpen.
Axford, who had an MRI exam on Wednesday that showed a grade 1 shoulder strain, won’t pick up a baseball for a week and thus won’t be activated when eligible on April 12.
“It’ll probably take him a little longer than that,” said A’s manager Bob Melvin, whose initial hopes were that Axford could be back in a week after being placed on the 10-day DL retroactive to April 2.