ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Speaking prior to the Red Sox’ series-opening game with the Rays, Dustin Pedroia talked about the plan he will take in regard to rehabbing the broken navicular bone in his left foot. The second baseman said that he will be getting another CT scan when the team returns to Boston Friday, at which time a decision will be made regarding surgery.

The problem, Pedroia explained, is that there hasn’t been significant healing throughout the eight weeks since he originally broke the bone on a foul ball in San Francisco because it is difficult for blood to get to the area of the injury.

“If it shows like it’s healing then I won’t have the surgery,” he said, “but it hasn’t shown like it’s healing the whole time.” The former American League MVP said that recovery from surgery typically takes 2-3 months. Michael Jordan, who had a similar injury, didn’t have surgery and it took him four months to return.

Pedroia reiterated he has no regrets in regards to attempting a return to the lineup despite the fact his injury came just after a pair of rehab games with Triple A Pawtucket and two games with the Red Sox.

“I didn’t re-injure myself. I was cleared to play because I wasn’t hurting,” Pedroia said. “Then being out there for nine innings the next time my foot hurt … I broke a bone so any time you go out there and torque on it and do all kinds of things there’s a chance it’s not ready. And it wasn’t. It’s not healed. That’s when I shut it down … It was realistic to come back when I played. Just a bad bone. That was it. I gave it a shot. They told me there were chances that could happen and I could have the pin put in. That’s just the way it is.

Later Pedroia added, “I don’t think that would have mattered. You can sit back and second-guess everything. Everybody has their own opinion. I was taking ground balls the day after I got hurt and all this [stuff]. To be honest, it doesn’t really matter. I played two rehab games, they told me, ‘Hey, you need to go see how this feels and go play and if you can’t play then you need to have the pin put in.’ That was the whole thing all along. So it doesn’t matter if I played at seven weeks, or eight weeks, or nine weeks it would have felt the same. I might have to have the pin put in.”

Asked if he perceived any problems with getting clearance to return to action, Pedroia said, “I hope not. I hope they cleared me and I should have been cleared. If they didn’t we’re going to have problems.”

Pedroia said he is taking the next week “day to day” and that he will be wearing a boot until getting re-examined. As for how the foot felt compared to when he was forced to shut it down last week, the second baseman was mildly optimistic.

“It feels better than that. It’s been a week since that. It’s feeling better,” Pedroia noted. “The problem is with this bone it doesn’t get a lot of blood supply and a lot of oxygen in that area. That’s just the bone. The good part is it’s not in the middle of my foot with that bone. That would be really bad. There are some good things but I try and take the positive out of everything.”

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