Bruce Springsteen has postponed his Philly shows. When might he be coming back?

On Wednesday afternoon, Bruce Springsteen called off the two shows he was supposed to play with the E Street Band this week at Citizens Bank Park due to illness.

But the shows were postponed, not canceled, with tickets held for these performances good for future dates.

So when might the shows be rescheduled? When can the Boss come back to South Philly?

That’s tricky to answer.

First, there’s the question of the 73-year-old rocker’s health. Is the illness serious? It wasn’t specified if the reason for the postponement was a COVID-19 diagnosis at a time when there is an uptick in cases in the U.S. So we don’t know the nature of Springsteen’s illness, how sick he is, or if he’ll be back in time to make his show in Foxborough, Mass., next week, or resume the tour sometime later.

The tour’s September schedule is busy, with few days off between shows. The exception is the gap between Columbus, Ohio, on Sept. 21 and Washington, D.C., on Sept. 29. That looks pretty sweet, right?

But here’s the problem: The Phillies are home at Citizens Bank Park through that stretch, with only Sept. 25 as a day off, which wouldn’t be enough time to set up and break down the stadium as a concert venue.

In October, Springsteen has plenty of open dates. He’s off the entire month. And the Phillies don’t have any scheduled dates either. So, that would work out fine, if the Phillies were guaranteed to not play any postseason playoff games in October.

But the opposite is true: The team is positioned to win a wild-card Card playoff berth, and you remember what happened last Red October: Bryce Harper and crew went on a run to the World Series and played home games into November. That could happen again, Phillies fans hope, so planning any Springsteen dates at CBP for October seems highly unlikely.

After that, the weather turns too cold for outdoor shows, and Springsteen will be busy touring Canada and the West Coast. Those dates run from November through mid-December.

So that leaves two possibilities: The shows could be moved from Citizens Bank Park across the street to Lincoln Financial Field, maybe in the open window in September. That seems unlikely and an awkward fit, but Springsteen has played the Linc before (in 2003) and is playing some football stadiums in other markets.

But the more likely-best guess scenario? Look for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band to be coming back to play Citizens Bank Park in sometime in 2024.

At the final show of the European tour in Monza, Italy, last month, Springsteen said “We’ll be back!” In June, E Street guitarist Steven Van Zandt responded to a question about a potential 2024 tour on the platform that was then still known as Twitter by saying: “Right now it is a hope. We are waiting for many complicating factors that are out of our control for a final decision.”

So if Springsteen and the E Street Band are back on the road in 2024, it seems quite possible that Citizen Bank shows could be woven into a tour schedule, which would presumably include dates in strongholds for the band like Philadelphia, as well as other American cities.

This, of course is all speculation. Neither Springsteen’s organization nor the Phillies have commented on when the concerts might be rescheduled, only that tickets for the postponed shows will be honored when they are.

In the meantime: Get well, Boss.