Links for Friday…
- Dylan Hernandez of The Los Angeles Times says (via Twitter) that Dodgers GM Ned Colletti hasn't asked anyone to waive their no-trade clause, which would include Manny Ramirez.
- Lyle Overbay was pulled from tonight's game in the 6th inning, and Jon Paul Morosi of FoxSports.com says there has been trade interest in the Jays' first baseman recently. However, Overbay left for precautionary reasons as he's been feeling under the weather according to MLB.com's Jordan Bastian (Twitter links).
- Rob Bradford of WEEI.com reports that Brad Hawpe chose the Rays over the Red Sox was because there was "a perceived better fit in terms of guaranteed playing time."
- The Dodgers placed Ted Lilly on waivers today, according to Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports (on Twitter). ESPN.com's Jayson Stark reported yesterday that the Dodgers aren't inclined to trade Lilly.
- Yahoo's Jeff Passan reports that Marlins president David Samsom directed millions of dollars to owner Jeffrey Loria. Samson has said publicly that he did no such thing, but Passan contests that "what Samson said was so provably false that it was akin to a 3-year-old trying to hide his peas under a pile of mashed potatoes."
- Stephen Strasburg will probably need Tommy John surgery, according to the Nationals.
- Mark Feinsand of the New York Daily News says the idea of Joe Girardi leaving the Yankees for the Cubs this offseason is "pure insanity," since the Yankees will always provide Girardi with the chance to win.
- However, Cubs sources confirmed to Gordon Wittenmyer of the Chicago Sun-Times that the Cubs will pursue Girardi to manage, possibly as the leading candidate, if he is available.
- Padres GM Jed Hoyer told MLB.com's Corey Brock that he and Red Sox GM Theo Epstein joked about the inevitable Adrian Gonzalez rumors last winter. As Brock shows, those rumors are a thing of the past for the first place Padres.
ugh…really hope strasburg can come back from the surgery as effective as he was. He was great to watch.
you know whats awesome most guy come back from tommy john a little bit slower than before right…So assuming the surgery is a 100% success. And he loses some speed, lets say 5mph on every pitch, or right around that area…his fast ball would still be 90-95 with movement and his change-up would still be a 80-85 mph pitch and his slider and curve would still move as much…he would still be one of the best pitchers in the game…the NATS just bettter get a damn good trainer and a great pitching coach so they can make sure this does not happen again other wise we might have to have a nation wide moment of silence for the nats franchise
Gahhhh! I know! He was a lot of fun to watch, and was always one of those pitchers you cleared you schedule to watch. Crushing news, but I hope he can come back strong. If there is bright side to any of this though, it is that when he finally does recover and return watching him pitch will be just as electrifying and exciting as it was the first time when he stepped on a big league mound since he will not have pitched for a year or so.
Mark Prior V2.0… Without the 18 win season.
And the no hitter…and alot of stuff
Prior didn’t throw a no hitter.
Really surprised the Baker bashers are not out in droves on this one to find some way to connect Dusty Baker to Strasburg’s injury somehow or someway.. Lol… You mean to tell me other managers in baseball might abuse a pitchers arm!!!!!! Wow what a concept. Pay attention all you Baker bashers out there what I am getting at is any manager could be blamed for leaving pitchers out too long and aiding to the cause of a pitchers arm injury.
Also even though the Nats were careful with this guy somewhat he still got injured.
Riggleman did not abuse Strasburg’s arm. Scouts have been stating that his mechanics lend himself to injury, much like Lincecum and Hanson. It was just a matter of the scouts being right this time.
“Really surprised the Baker bashers are not out in droves on this one to find some way to connect Dusty Baker to Strasburg’s injury somehow or someway.. Lol…
You mean to tell me other managers in baseball might abuse a pitchers arm!!!!!! Wow what a concept.
Pay attention all you Baker bashers out there what I am getting at is any manager could be blamed for leaving pitchers out too long and aiding to the cause of a pitchers arm injury.
Also even though the Nats were careful with this guy somewhat he still got injured.”
No, if you want to connect dots, it was Riggleman who has Strasburg when he got hurt and Riggleman who had Wood when he got hurt. Both high prize flame throwers and both were predicted to go down with injury. In the case of Strasburg, Riggleman and the Nationals did everything they could to protect him. It still did not help. Scouts and baseball people saw it coming. Too bad, but hopefully he bounces back.
I’m not sure why you are bringing Baker into the Strasburg injury. Seems like you are looking for an argument or playing the poor Dusty Baker card.
More like David Clyde. I have been saying it the whole time, David Freaking Clyde
and to whom have you been saying that to “the whole time”? The cashier at your local gas station?
Oh VTA, you’re so smart and dreamy, you just burned me so wickedly.
Read some back posts of mine, then do some research about David Clyde and the Texas Rangers situation and how it unfolded. Then you can discuss it with your local gas station attendant since that’s your point of reference to somehow “burn” me while you fill up your 64oz cantene with a “suicide” mixture and nibble on 3ft long beef jerky while dreaming about the porn mags behind the counter.
Kind of felt inevitable that this would happen to Strasburg no matter how careful the Nats were. Raises the question I guess, if guys on strict pitch counts, innings limits can get hurt so relatively easy then what’s the point of all those limits? Seems like if it’s going to happen it will happen no matter what, innings limits only delay the inevitable. Maybe not, I’m just not shocked, unfortunately, that this happened to him.
Btw, if Strasburg really does need TJ surgery they need to go ahead and get it done, now. Don’t wait a month to get it done, doing it now means he may be back early enough next year to get some innings in at the big league level, working through the natural control issues and getting himself acclimated so that by the start of the 2012 season he is that much closer to being himself again.
Tommy John surgery.. not a big deal. AJ Burnett, as a more recent example, came back fine from it — and Strasburg has a lot more natural talent than AJ.
The thing they really have to watch is his shoulder. I know some have pointed out that Strasburg does the ‘inverted W’ or ‘M’ motion when he delivers.
Most guys are actually stronger and more durable after TJ. It does set him back in development and there is a small chance he doesn’t recover but just look at Tim Hudson. He is stronger and better than he just about ever was one season after coming back from TJ. Just like I’m not too worried about Medlen I wouldt be too worried about Strasburg.
Add Josh Johnson to that list of being better after TJ surgery.
Josh Johnson/Chris Carpenter would be best case scenarios.
I love that this kid signed a contract that commanded not only money but 100 innings in the MLB. The millions of dollars that the team invests in coaches, M.D.’s, facilities, etc and this “kid” and his agent think they know more than all of that
Very sad news for Stratty and the Nats but….these days pitchers come back even stronger from TJ. Look at Tim Hudson, he’s dealn this year!!!
Shaun Marcum too
Is everyone forgetting about Tim Hudson and BJ Ryan?
Tim Hudson no, Bj Ryan yes.
Is anyone else having issues with the site that last day or so? I keep hearing one of the adds on the side bar saying “go ahead and click on this?” just me or is anyone else experiencing these issues? I can’t read the page for longer than 30 seconds without hearing this 10 times. Tim what’s up?
Apparently I have a pest problem too..At least that’s what my macbook is telling me when viewing this site.
I hate to say I told you so… wait, I love saying it. I really thought they needed to ease him into pitching professionally. If you’re banking on him being the face of the franchise then, well the term protect your investment comes to mind.
Oh well, Strasburg’s young and can heal and hopefully this will teach the Nats to be conservative with him now. He’ll probably only do a few rehab starts in the minors next year and in 2012 he and Harper will be ready to lead the team.
Whether he’s throwing innings in the majors or minors do you really think it made a difference to his arm? The Nats were pretty conservative with him, this can’t be blamed on mis or over use of his arm..
I think what it comes down to is, some pitchers just wreck their arms early on and it progressively worsens over time. Kyle Drabek has already had it done, Shawn Hill’s had it done twice, where as Roy Halladay has never had any serious arm issues (knock on wood) yet consistently tosses up CG’s and 240+ innings a year.
I think something that could be learned from all this, is that while protecting your $15 million dollar investment is important that a) things can happen regardless and b) light work loads can actually be counterproductive, weakening the arm and leading to more injuries.
Adrien Gonzalez? Who is he…???????
Red Sox have Kevin Youkilis at 1st…
prob the best first basemen in the league. not an over acheiving fu man chu
You betcha…. gotta get Youk healthy though and keep him that way..
HEY! leave the fu man chu out of this man.
Votto, Cabrera, Pujols, etc.
There is nobody in Baseball named Adrien Gonzalez.
What ever…
I cant believe that anyone would seriously think that Girardi would want to go to an organization as poor as the Cubs anyway…unless hes given the GM job as well.
Im sure it will be Ryno who will try to piece together a contending team with the few decent young players they have and the slow-footed, overpaid veterans who clog the roster.
Well believe it, because lot of other people already are, and “poor” in what sense? Do you think the Marlins were an especially “rich” organization when Joe took the helm there?
They do need to get this done now so he is back on the bump as soon as possible, isn’t there a certain time frame they need for the swelling to subside prior to surgery?
TJ will effectively put him on the shelf for a year. Then he might need another year of pitching to get the full command of his breaking ball. Overall TJ has become the baseball pitching equivalent to getting your tonsils out. There’s a high recovery rate, and, as unimaginable as it might seem, but he could come back with more velocity with the reinforced tendon in place.
Girardi leaving for Chicago is a tough call. Yankees afford the best opportunity to win, but the roster is getting old in certain areas.. areas that are under contract, or will be, for longer than they should be.
Family wise, CHC makes a lot of sense. At the same time, he’s been winning here.. 2008 was rough, and he made the adjustments to his style, and the players rallied around him and his bullpen usage has been night and day from Saint Joey Four Rings.
I think he stays in the Bronx at the end of the day.
As a Cub fan, I can definitely empathize with Nats fans right now. Hoping he comes back strong….
that optimism is certainly Cub-centric. I think Strasburg better give Prior a call and look for a good towel-league he can throw in.
TJ surgery is sort of like the Six Million Dollar man surgery now a days but I seriously, seriously feel bad for Stras and the Nats. Stras for obvious reasons because he barely began his career and I’m sure has to wonder if he’ll be the same pitcher and for the Nats because they did all the things they were suppose to do and spent an obnoxious amount of money to draft a pitcher which every knows was risky to begin with. Risksy not beacuse of his health history but simply because he’s a pitcher. And God forbid if they had chosen anyone other than Stras. The baseball world would’ve never forgiven them. I wonder if they will change if inverted “w” style and if that will effect him at all? Stras,……..I wish you well buddy. Stay with the team when you can and build that chemistry with them.
SWP said:
“I hate to say I told you so… wait, I love saying it. I really thought they needed to ease him into pitching professionally. If you’re banking on him being the face of the franchise then, well the term protect your investment comes to mind”.
I thought about that but he pitched about 93 IP in 08 and 106 IP in 09. He was at 123 IP this year. That doesn’t seem like a lot. They say the increase should be about 20% increase right? 109 + 20% is about 129 IP. Maybe you 2nd guess if they should have shut him down once he had the initial scare but it’s probably unfair to second guess the Nats. I’m no doctor so I’m not sure if this was an injury that would’ve been inevitable regardless of whether or not he pitched after the initial injury concern. I assume they did a thorough exam and didn’t see any worries but maybe it’s one of those things that’s there but you just don’t see it until it happens?
I wonder if owners will use this as a high profile example as to why the draft needs bonus slotting and whether or not picks should be tradeable? Of course the Nats are insured but it sets the franchize back a bit.
strasburg is done. he’ll come back and be a great pitcher, i’m sure. but i have my doubts that he’ll come back and be the phenom he was projected to be. there’s something unnatural about a 98 mph two-seamer that sinks a foot. semantically speaking strasburg will come back, but honestly, as the legend he was prenounced to be – he’s finished. and it sucks.
What are you basing that on? History has proven that some pitchers come back even better from Tommy John surgury- one being the man himself, Tommy John. To definitively say he’s done is ludicrous.
he’ll come back and be great. but he won’t be what he was supposed to be. he’ll need to change his mechanics. this is a special case.
It’s not only the mechanics, it’s his motion. He goes through the classic ‘Inverted W’ motion. It puts extra stress on the elbow and shoulder. There is a chance he’ll come back and be good, but his mechanics might prevent that.
I’ve also heard that called the classic ‘non-inverted M’ motion.
It’s not that you come back better. I’ve taken a college course dealing with sports injuries and in it you look into this. The area has been weakened prior to the injury so the ball is not coming out as hard. This is mostly due to the fact they’re favoring it a little. When they come back the area is fully healed so they can let loose and throw. They don’t just gain an advantage because they’ve had Tommy John.
And the intensive, grueling road to recovery also includes a shoulder strengthening program, a core strengthening program, and a re-learning of how to pitch, often with retooled mechanics in the hope of preventing new injuries. It also includes a new dedication to overall fitness-most ML pitchers already do these things, but after surgery even they kick it up a notch. You know, they go from ten to eleven. Can’t help it. The will to compete kicks in.
Even as a Yankee fan, I don’t know why the Cubs going after Joe Girardi bothers me. I mean he can leave if he wants and everyone will have to respect it, but I dont know. Whatever. As for Strasburg I’m really sorry to see him go and I do feel sorry for the Nats and their fans, because Stras is their future, they finally got that franchise pitcher to go with the franchise hitter Ryan Zimmerman, and to hear that kind of news is just sad. But the bright side is, you know how some pitchers go to TJ surgery, and come back stronger than ever like Tim Hudson and Shaun Marcum, it will be scary if Stras comes back with new found strength.
I bet 100$ this kid comesback and wins the Cy Young OR throws pitches that exceed 102 MPH.
To address Strasburg- he should change his mechanics a bit, and throw just a little lighter. You can still be a dominating pitcher if you throw 95-97 instead of sitting around 99 or 100 constantly. All of his pitches are great-it’s not just his fastball.
In regards to Girardi-it would more than likely take an offer that is substantially larger than the Yankees’s offer for him to manage the Cubs. Don’t give me any of that allure junk, or that “He can break the curse” garbage. The Cubs suck, the Yankees don’t. Contending year in and year out? Yeah, a sane man takes that.
Strasburg being a sucess would be good for the good. It’s obvious. With two injuries already and most likely having to get tommy john, what’s next? I’m not saying he’s a bust but it’s really unfortunate. His stuff is there and the stats prove it. For baseball, I hope this kid can come back.
good for the game* my bad.
Hope he can come back. It’s fun watching players like that even when they arent on your team. Stinks for the Nats who are tougher than their record shows.
That Strasburg news is absolutely depressing. I feel so bad for that kid. The weight of that organization was on his shoulders, and he was doing a good job of bearing it. Then this happens and it may be 2 years before we see him even close to the same pitcher. I think he will eventually come back as strong as ever, but this is pretty depressing.
Lilly on waivers? Officially odd.
I’m still trying to figure out why LA put Lilly on waivers? He’s 5-0 with a 1.83 era since joining. Torre doesn’t seem like one to waive a white flag and Lilly is pitching himself into another contract…
This really blows, What a sad day for baseball. This guy was getting all sorts of people back into the game, brought back the fun that we have missed since the Steroid homerun chases… I hope he can recover an get back at it. Sooo many people predicted this, alot of us just thought it would never happen again… Prior’s pitching for the Fullerton Flyers down the street from me.. I would never wish that for Stras.
Dodgers Pitcher Kuo has had 2 TJ’s and look at his dominant numbers this year.
According to some of the reports, the Nats (and Boras surely) knew about Strasburg’s diagnosis yesterday but went through the Bryce Harper dog and phony show as scheduled without divulging the info so as not to steal Harper’s thunder. So how exactly did the Nats’ braintrust manage to keep that under wraps?
And what’s wrong with the Nats waiting a day to announce the Strasburg issue? What does one have to do with the other?
I simply prefer that news be reported as it happens instead of a couple of days after it happened. Call me old-fashioned, but tabling a front-page story (Strasburg) for a few days in favor of a back-page story (Harper) seems a bit peculiar.
Seriously…shouldn’t someone hire teams of doctors and experts to examine why some of the living career IP flame throwers like Nolan Ryan, Steve Carlton and Roger Clemens were able to throw so many innings w/ any signifigant time missed due to injury? It has to be something in the conditioning, mechanics and developement. I mean look at Ryan…the only thing more amazing than the 5,714 ko’s is the 2,795 walks which is #1 by a wide margin (+962). Think about how many pitches one must throw to record 5,700 ko’s……Now think of how many pitches have to be thrown to also give up 2,795 walks. That’s a hell of a lot of pitches thrown.
Why is it that pitchers from the pre-1980 era were so much more durable than pitchers now a days?
Conditioning, mechanics, development, and steroids (at least in Clemens case)
Their arms were stronger because they through more. . look at dice k, he used to through 200 pitches as warm up when he came over, never had injury issues, red sox wanted to protect their large investment so they fought with him to conform to the way we treat pitchers here..
What sticks out to me is how little time Strasburg spent in the minor leagues. I thought the way the Nationals handled him was completely ridiculous and I’m not surprised that something like this happened. The whole point of the minors is to help these guys learn to play. All the scouts and fans and coaches were so impressed by Strasburg’s raw tools that they decided he could be immediately effective in the Majors and basically rushed him through only a few months in Harrisburg. The thing is, there was no rush. The Nats weren’t going to contend this year, and likely won’t next year either. They should’ve kept him in a place where he could learn to pace himself, where if he started feeling sore or awkward he could play around with new ways of approaching hitters besides just firing 100 MPH fastballs and twisting his arm around throwing those huge hooks. The kid comes up to probably the first sellout crowd in Nationals’ history, ESPN decides to run a full 1 hour countdown to his first pitch, and the entire country acts like he’s the future of baseball. Granted, they kept him on a low pitch count, but what do you expect the kid to do? Take it easy? Do you expect him to learn to save his arm by pitching to contact if he has a big lead when half the people in the ballpark just came to see him hit triple digits on the radar gun?Take a look at the careers of most of baseball’s great starting pitchers, and you’ll see that many of them had a couple years of adversity they had to face down before they became anything special. Heck, the aforementioned Roy Halladay had an atrocious season with a 10+ ERA before the Blue Jays sent him back down to the minors to learn how to pitch. When you rush talented players into the big leagues, bad things tend to happen, because they still have things to learn, and they’re playing at a level that cannot afford to be instructional.
Strasburg was a finished project. He wasn’t that raw. He was ready from the start of the season but the Nationals held him back. Their handling of him wasn’t hilarious.
TJ surgery really isn’t as big of a deal anymore. It has a high success rate and most pitchers end up throwing harder after they come back. Outside of the long rehab period Strasburg should be fine and make a full recovery.
It’s still a big deal even with a high recovery rate. We don’t know if Strasburg will ever recover properly.
But he is still very young and I think he should be able to recover properly and return stronger.
Yep, it is still a big deal. It is a long recovery period, 12 months on the short side up to 18 months on the long side up to never for some.
Elbows are a whole lot easier to fix than shoulders are, and he has a better chance to return close to what he was than in years past. Still, a big deal, and a grueling rehab period for him.
In Overbay’s at bat in the fifth inning, the Detroit broadcast clearly showed Overbay had his left eye blackened? Come on, media, what happened? Fight, accident? What gives?
Was sick before the game and got dizzy in the clubhouse, went to the emergency room
strasburg is exactly why you should not give pitchers that much money or draft them that high, there is just no way to keep pitchers fully healthy…and there is no way to look at a pitcher and say he wont get hurt…prior has the text-book delivery and look at him now, only 28 and fighting to prove him self in indi league
Right, because in your infinite wisdom, you would have looked in your crystal ball and passed on the consensus #1 prospect in the draft. Ridiculous.
Mike Rizzo is a ******! Why did they just not shut him down the FIRST TIME he went on the DL? Was it worth to sellout a couple of extra homegames this year, RIZZO? Now you will miss an ENTIRE season of selling out homegames for Strasburg starts.
I have said repeatedly they should have shut the kid down after his FIRST INJURY. I understand that the two are unrelated, but the injured shoulder could have changed his mechanics slightly and put more stress on his elbow.
Not only do you protect your $15 million investment, you especially protect your potential ticket out of the basement of the NL East. The Nat’s weren’t going to win anything this year anyway.
He also DOESN”T haver an Inverted W delivery. He has what many consider an upside down L…I am tired of reading people who think that they know anything about pitching mechanics, and claim that he has an Inverted W like Mark Prior.
The way Rizzo also bothced the Adam negotions during the trade deadline was also rediculous. He had to HAVE Beckham from the White Sox to make the deal happen. Why would Kenny Williams give you an elite playerprospect that is under team control for the next 6 seasons, for 13 of a season for Adam Dunn, who will be a FA.
He should have just taken the 1 average, and 1 above average prospect that the Sox were offering. Now he may get two first round picks, who might never even develop into prospects. He may end up with only 1 draft pick if the team that signs Dunn signs a higher rated Type A FA.
Those two moves combined with the fact that Rizzo has overseen an organization that has had the most pitchers on the 60 day DL with arm injuries for the psat two seasons should lead to him being FIRED!
It was going to go at some point if it was that weak, better for it to go now then at the start of a season.
Torn tendons are an injury easy to repair but defficult to protect against. I don’t think the Nats did anything particularly wrong with Stras. If it were easy to prevent then I’m sure it would be in every pitching text book in print. I do think the conditioning of a pitcher is an issue and the misunderstanding of weight lifting to build muscles vs excercises to improve muscle elasticity is an issue as well. Most kids want to lift, lift and lift and there are parts of the body that benefit from the weight training (back, leg and core) and some that don’t (shoulder, arm, etc).
Brad Hawpe. hmm
oi
As a Marlins fan, I’ve always felt like Loria was a little cheap and unwilling to pay for good players. They always said revenue was low and I always had a hard time believing it. This story coming out is just proof of what I and many other Marlins fans knew all along. I just didn’t expect that Samson would be just as guilty. He always seemed so excited about the Marlins, excited about the new stadium, and he seemed like a good guy. Looks like he was just excited because of all the money the stadium deal funneled from the Miami-Dade taxpayers. What a scam. I hope something is done about this, but if an investigation is started, no doubt it will be revealed that other teams have been twisting revenue stats, and I doubt that’s a can of worms Selig wants to deal with.
sorry to all you Strasburg crazies out there but there are speculations that he will be the next Sandy Koufax, astonishing for a few years then fizzle out quick