Matt Barnes COVID Injury Update is Concerning News For Red Sox

There hasn't been much to complain about for Boston Red Sox fans in 2021. At 63-44, the Red Sox still own the sixth-best record in baseball and just recently fell behind the Tampa Bay Rays in the AL East standings.

However, the Red Sox got a bit of concerning news for All-Star reliever Matt Barnes on Tuesday. According to reports, Barnes is heading to the COVID-19 IL with "virus-like symptoms." There hasn't been any confirmation that Barnes has contracted the virus, but this seems like an over abundance of caution in ordinance with the league rules.

Matt Barnes Injury Update

Time will tell if the hard-throwing Red Sox reliever will miss any extended amount of time, but any amount of time will be sorely missed. Boston owns the seventh-best bullpen in baseball by ERA (3.62) and Barnes has been a huge part of that success. The eight-year veteran earned his first All-Star appearance in 2021 while tossing to a 2.30 ERA and 13.8 strikeouts per nine innings through 43.0 innings pitched.

There's hope that Barnes will be back sooner than later and the Red Sox will need his dominant arm down the stretch. Currently, Boston sits with +140 odds to win the AL East on FanDuel Sportsbook. The division-leading Rays own favorable -110 odds.

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Adam Taylor McKillop is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Adam Taylor also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username atmckillop. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in their articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.