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Josh Elander updates Stone Lawless injury status for Tennessee baseball  

On3 imageby: Eric Cain05/06/26_Cainer

Tennessee baseball coach Josh Elander provided an injury update on Vols catcher Stone Lawless Tuesday night following Tennessee’s 8-1 midweek victory over Presbyterian.

Lawless was removed from Sunday’s game for precautionary reasons and was back in the lineup Tuesday against Presbyterian.

“That ball stung him, and I was just kind of looking at him there for a second,” Elander said Tuesday night. “He was kind of shaken up right there, and (trainer Jeff Wood) did a phenomenal job. There was nothing with the stuff that has happened in the past. It just stunned him.” 

The redshirt-sophomore took a foul ball off the mask in the bottom of the third inning while catching in Sunday’s 10-9 win at Kentucky. He remained in the game to finish the inning before being removed in the fourth when Jay Abernathy came into pinch hit for Lawless, who was due up fourth in the frame.

Tennessee Associate Director of Sports Medicine Jeff Wood and Elander spent a few minutes checking on Lawless after the ricochet foul ball.

Lawless was back in the lineup on Tuesday and was 0-for-1 with a sacrifice fly, catching all nine innings.

“So with the concussion protocol, you’re able to actually get him out of the game, and you can even bring him back in at some point,” Elander continued. “He was fighting me to go back in there, but I was just kind of looking at him, you know, looking at the situation.”

Lawless missed two weeks earlier in the conference season after suffering a facial fracture and a fracture in his nose. He was struck by an 89-mph pitch in the face in a game at Vanderbilt on March 29.

The catcher was cleared to resume baseball activities and was available to play for Tennessee in the home series against Ole Miss that began April 17. In nine games since his return, Lawless is hitting .210 (4-for-19) with one home run and four RBI.

The catcher is hitting .241 for Tennessee this season with five home runs and 14 RBI. Lawless is a career .260 hitter for Tennessee with 10 home runs and 34 RBI over 59 career games with 48 starts and 146 at-bats.

“That was one of the main things tonight,” Elander concluded, “was get him in there, let him get a bunch of at-bats, get his feet back underneath him. He’s in a good spot going into the weekend.”