Rusney Castillo May Be Done for Winter

During a conference call held to announce the re-signing of closer Koji Uehara, Cherington also updated reporters on the status of outfielder Rusney Castillo, whose trip to the Arizona Fall League was cut short by a thumb injury.

“He was jammed a couple times in Arizona, kind of in the same spot, if flared up. Since he was out in Arizona anyway he saw Dr. (Donald) Sheridan in Phoenix and he’s been diagnosed with a strained adductor — it’s a muscle between the thumb and the fingers — and it’s an injury that will respond well to rest and conservative treatment. It’s not a concern moving forward, but we do want to let it calm down so that there’s no complications or he’s not compensating in his swing or anything like that.

“Given the time of year where we are in the offseason, just wanted to be cautious with it. We’re just going to let it calm down. We haven’t made the determination yet on whether he would play again this winter; we’re not ruling it out, we’re not ruling it in, we just need to let the injury calm down a little bit so we can evaluate him again and that’ll happen in the next several days.”

Castillo, a Cuban defector who made his major-league debut in September, was originally scheduled to play in the Puerto Rican winter league with hopes of becoming the Red Sox starting center fielder in 2015.