Roberts on Roberts

Second baseman Brian Roberts will spend a few days with the team before heading back to the minor league complex in Sarasota. Roberts received some encouraging news yesterday from Dr. Michael Collins, the concussion-specialist in Pittsburgh. Though he still isn't cleared to begin baseball activities for two more weeks, his symptoms are less severe. "I think anytime that they say you're getting better, that's always good," Roberts said. "Two weeks had gone by. If I went up there and he said, 'Hmmm, you look about the same,' I wouldn't have been that thrilled. It's never as fast as you want, but that's part of every injury. It never goes as fast as you want." Asked if the symptoms are gone, Roberts replied, "If they were all gone, I'd probably be doing baseball stuff today, so they're not all gone. We're just trying to progress through some things to make sure that as I do the progressions that they're not there anymore. "I've had some symptoms depending on the amount of stuff that I've done, which is to be expected in the recovery process of these things. Hopefully, they just continue to decrease as we go." Roberts has been limited to 39 games and hasn't played since May 16. He doesn't know whether he'll return before the All-Star break that begins July 11. "We really haven't put a timetable on it," he said. "It's always one of the worst things you can do with an injury, put a timetable on it, because you start shooting for something and you get disappointed or whatever. It's going to be whenever it is at this point. "I know it's a cliché, but it's really true in this one. We're just taking it one step at a time and we haven't talked at all about what's past the next 10 days or two weeks. Once I go back to see him, then we'll see where I am at that point and we'll see what's next."