Padres manager Bob Melvin expected back in dugout Friday

May 20, 2022 GMT
FILE - San Diego Padres manager Bob Melvin stands in the dugout during the first inning of a baseball game against the Pittsburgh Pirates in Pittsburgh, May 1, 2022. Melvin says he'll have prostate surgery on Wednesday, May 11, 2022, and hopes he misses only part of a forthcoming road trip. He doesn't think he has cancer "but they won't know until they get in there." (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File)
FILE - San Diego Padres manager Bob Melvin stands in the dugout during the first inning of a baseball game against the Pittsburgh Pirates in Pittsburgh, May 1, 2022. Melvin says he'll have prostate surgery on Wednesday, May 11, 2022, and hopes he misses only part of a forthcoming road trip. He doesn't think he has cancer "but they won't know until they get in there." (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File)

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Manager Bob Melvin plans to return to the dugout Friday night when the San Diego Padres open a three-game series at San Francisco, the team said Thursday.

Melvin has been away since having prostate surgery on May 11. The Padres said no cancer was found. Melvin will travel to San Francisco on Friday morning and rejoin the Padres for the final three games of a nine-game, three-city trip. That matches the timetable Melvin hoped for when he announced on May 10 that he was having surgery.

Bench coach Ryan Christenson managed the team in Melvin’s absence. The Padres went 4-2 on a swing through Atlanta and Philadelphia. Christenson also managed three games on their last homestand, going 2-1.

Melvin was hired away from Oakland on Nov. 1. Christenson was his bench coach there the last four seasons.

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