"Progress in Chase Utley's chronically injured right knee is measured these days in the lateral steps he can make at an empty Citizens Bank Park.

Hours before each game, Utley trots out to second and fields a barrage of ground balls hit to him by first-base coach Sam Perlozzo. On Sunday, Utley made more movements in the field than he has yet, going to his right to flip a ball to second and even going down on one knee to make a pivot throw.

Utley has yet to run, and that will be the ultimate test of the patellar tendinitis, chondromalacia, and bone inflammation in his right knee. He has not even jogged and is not close to doing so.

Translation: a return is still far off.

"Oh, he's made some progress," Phillies general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. said. "But again, it's slow, and it'll continue to be slow. Even if he gets to the point where he starts to be able to run or jog, that doesn't mean he's going to jump forward all of a sudden and be in a rehab [game]."

Amaro said an online report that surfaced Tuesday saying Utley could start jogging "in the next couple of days" was erroneous.

"He is not close to jogging," Amaro said. "If he was close to jogging, he'd be jogging, I guess. The deal is that that would be the next step. He's taken some ground balls. He's done OK with that so far. But it's still baby steps, one step at a time."

Amaro said Utley has done some running in an underwater apparatus. The second baseman still feels some discomfort, but it is not debilitating, Amaro said. To be cleared to run, Utley will have to be pain free."