Brad Wilkerson plays for the Red Sox during spring training.

AP photo / Charles Krupa

PAWTUCKET — After an eight-year major-league career, outfielder Brad Wilkerson has retired, said Pawtucket manager Ron Johnson.

After Pawtucket’s second game of the season, Wilkerson went into Johnson’s office and told him that his time in baseball was done.

“Second game of the season, he came in afterwards and that was it,” Johnson said. “He didn’t have the fire anymore.”

Wilkerson, who once hit 32 home runs for the Montreal Expos, is still technically on the Pawtucket roster, listed as temporarily inactive.

Wilkerson, 31, was signed in February to compete for a spot on the roster after Mark Kotsay had back surgery. He came into camp as the front-runner among the group of Paul McAnulty, Jeff Bailey and Chris Carter vying for the spot. But his spring training was miserable. His average sat below .200, and he struck out in nearly half his at-bats. Carter eventually won the job, and Wilkerson accepted an assignment to Triple A.

He had one hit in nine Pawtucket at-bats, then told Johnson he was done.

He leaves behind a .247 average, .350 on-base percentage and 122 home runs in his big-league career.

Buchholz feeling fine

Clay Buchholz’s balky hamstring is recovering well, and he said yesterday afternoon that he was on track to make his start Wednesday. Johnson seconded the diagnosis, saying the pitcher is fine.

“Buck’s doing fantastic; he’s all set for the start,” Johnson said.

Buchholz injured the hamstring while doing lunges in the gym. He heard a “pop” –– audible even to nearby teammate Hunter Jones –– but the examinations showed that the injury wasn’t that bad.

Natale to outfield

Infielder Jeff Natale may soon be outfielder Jeff Natale in an effort to keep his solid bat in the lineup, and find the 26-year-old a permanent position.

Natale, the 2006 Sox minor-league offensive player of the year, has never excelled in the field, either at second base or first, but his bat has given the organization reason to find him a spot.

“You’ve got to try to do something with the guy, because he gives you quality at-bat after quality at-bat,” said Johnson. “He’s a second baseman by trade, but in my opinion, he’s got a ways to go on that.”

Natale, who has been an infielder since his days at Trinity College, will take fly balls in the outfield before the team’s next game. Chances are, he will work on learning left field. It will be his first work in the outfield since he graduated college, in 2004.

“[Johnson] asked me if I had ever played in the outfield before –– I did in college, and haven’t really taken any balls out there since,” he said.

Natale came into Sunday’s game hitting .350 with four RBI, and he went 1 for 4 against the IronPigs.

“Like he said, anything to get me in the lineup –– I’ll play whatever position he wants me to,” Natale said.

Van Every ankle better

Center fielder Jonathan Van Every is working his way back from a badly rolled ankle suffered during a spring-training game, and should be back in the PawSox lineup Tuesday.

Van Every was initially expected to miss only a few days after he rolled the ankle, but it was soon clear that the sprain was worse than expected. Van Every hobbled around Fort Myers in a boot for several weeks, then finally got back onto the field at around the time the Red Sox broke camp.

“They’ve gone very conservatively, but at the same time, he had a bad roll of the ankle,” Johnson said.

Van Every had planned to return for the PawSox’ home opener Friday, but his timetable was pushed back even further recently out of an abundance of caution.

“This guy’s a very valuable guy for our major-league team, and his game is to move, so they want to make sure that that ankle is 100 percent, so he doesn’t come up here, run down one ball in the gap, and get shut down.”

dbarbari@projo.com