Kris Bryant deals with pain, nausea on some days as he tries to come back

Kris Bryant is back on the injured list, this time dealing with lumbar degenerative disk disease, the latest set of back-related woes to befall him during three-plus years with the Rockies.

But he insisted Sunday morning that he hadn’t surrendered in his quest to return to the field and live up to the seven-year, $182-million contract the Rockies gave him in 2022 — a deal that hasn’t even reached the halfway point.

“I want to be on the field. I want to play the game,” Bryant told media, including The Denver Post, on Sunday before the Rockies faced the Washington Nationals in an Easter Sunday doubleheader. “I want to talk to doctors, see if there’s anything else we can do. But I’m not gonna give up.”

Still, there are days that Kris Bryant wakes up and can barely move. One of them was Sunday.

The treatment Bryant undergoes as he works toward a return from the injured list included two shots on Tuesday for pain and inflammation, he said Sunday. The hope is that such remedies can delay or prevent the need for surgery.

“A back surgery is a pretty big surgery,” Bryant said. “Obviously, I’m not an expert on it. Maybe I should be by now, with all the problems I’ve had.

“I want to see all my options, too … so that I’m not, like, in constant pain and nauseous, where I can’t eat, which was the situation today. I just woke up not feeling great, so it’s just extremely frustrating.”

Prior to landing on the injured list, Kris Bryant posted a .154/.195/.205 line, going 6-for-41 with two doubles in 11 games working as a designated hitter and a pinch hitter. He struck out 13 times and walked twice.

Kris Bryant has posted a negative WAR in three of his four Rockies seasons; he hasn’t been on the positive side of that metric since 2022. He has yet to play more than half of the games in a season since joining Colorado and has played in just 170 of a possible 507 games as a Rockie.

As bad as the physical issues has have been, there are the emotional ones, too, which he told the Post he hasn’t handled well.

“Not good. It sucks,” he said. “I think this is the best way to put it. It really sucks.”

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