6:57pm: McCarthy says he likely will undergo Tommy John surgery, Shaikin tweets.
6:19pm: Dodgers starter Brandon McCarthy has suffered a torn ulnar collateral ligament, Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times reports (Twitter links). Manager Don Mattingly declined to say whether the righty would undergo Tommy John surgery, but it would obviously end his season if he does.
The 31-year-old signed a four-year, $48MM deal to join the Dodgers after posting his first 200 inning tally last year. While the results were not quite there, he worked to a career-best strikeout rate of 7.9 per nine and seemed primed for a strong 2015 campaign. Though McCarthy came with a history of arm ailments, Los Angeles decided that the risk was worth taking.
McCarthy was off to a slow start this year, due mostly to struggles with the long ball. Over just 23 frames, he had already permitted a league-high nine dingers, though he has also retired an impressive 29 batters by way of strikeout.
Now, assuming he undergoes a TJ procedure, McCarthy will have to wait until some time in 2016 to prove that the long balls were just a short sample quirk. Recovery time is generally over a year, meaning that McCarthy will probably require at least an early-season fill-in next season — assuming that he makes steady progress.
Ouch, that’s awful. NY matrix dodged that one. Great guy though, really a shame.
The thing everyone expected finally happened. Come back strong Brandon.
Can’t have expected a torn UCL.
A blown shoulder, knee, wrist, ribs, groin, ring finger or a severe case of Gastro..
But not a torn UCL.
Just referring to injury in general
Hah, fair enough. In fact, considering his history, I’m surprised he doesn’t have smallpox.
McCarthy lives on the DL. Being back on it is what everyone expected. Half a season in NY glossed over the rest of his career.
It’s more of a reference to picking a torn UCL. Injuries in general though? Yeah, absolutely – he’s got the durability of a paper bag in a thunderstorm.
One of classiest comments (on Twitter) I’ve ever seen from a pitcher going through this. Seems like a terrific guy.
He’s had a lot of practice.
And now let’s resume the Hamels rumors
To the Dodgers???? 😛
Well thats no good. Feel for the guy.
With McCarthy out and Ryu struggling to keep up with an MLB workload (plus the ticking time bomb that is Brett Anderson), I wonder what our next move is. I doubt they overreact and go for a guy like Hamels, but something has to be done.
Can we give you CC Sabathia?
The Dodgers wouldn’t even consider paying the freight charge. Which would be hefty for CC.
Considering how they took on the biggest salary dump in mlb history with that boston trade I find this post laughable lol
If they want an ace, I am pretty sure they will look at Cueto and Hamels.
Isn’t cueto a fa after this season ? If so I would just let him hit the market. And the more injuries that hall pen and the more that teams are looking for a top starter will make hammels cost sky rocket. Is he even worth trading for now ?
For the dodgers I look at it like this as well, Not sure if Greinke will opt out, which I think he will, then if he leaves, Hamels would be a fall back option and another ace to go with Kershaw. But if they don’t get Hamels , maybe they just stand pat. And the dodgers and red sox have the right prospects to get the deal done if they wanted hamels.
Teams better prepare for amaro to gut the teams farm system if he’s trading hammels and we all have seen how he handles his vets with trades. Imagine an ace type starter in his prime with some years of control left on his current deal lol. For the best deal possible imo the team trading with philly needs to take on most of hammels contract AND take on Ryan albatross Howard ‘ s contract with him
If any team does that, Philly will be getting peanuts in return. If you pair Howard with Hamels, it completely deteriorates any value Hamels has. Best to DFA Howard, get Franco AB’s, and deal Hamels for some legitimate talent.
They had something to gain with that trade – ie Gonzo. Crawford’s still sticking around too.
CC doesn’t provide much besides a name.
Dear god no.
Well he’s better than some of the other random pick and choose SP that the Dodgers have tossed around lately such as David Huff and Scott Proctor (as I mentioned below)
No he isn’t.
The Dodgers will pick up and drop starters left and right. David Huff and Scott Baker have started games for this for crying out loud (Baker’s wasn’t terrible, but you get my point)
Great guy, hoping nothing but the best for him, and a speedy recovery. Seems like the Dodgers can’t catch a break lately.
If I were a betting man, I would have bet on Brett Anderson going down before McCarthy. Luckily, I am not.
Anderson’s nearing some sort of record. Nearly a whole month healthy.
This is really disappointing, I grew to appreciate his work during his stint in NY last year. Guy is hilarious and universally liked, just a good presence for the game, it’s a shame that he’s a magnet for unfortunate injuries. I assume LA is going to have to explore some trades at this point, they can’t expect Huff and Baker to be long term solutions.
There’s a few farm options like Zach Lee.
I don’t know that the internal options are exactly optimal for the long run, though.
Beachy is coming back too. He could be a good option for them if he can get it together.
I forgot about him, that’s a good point. Though all things considered, I don’t feel as good about their rotation now as I did before Ryu and McCarthy got hurt, Anderson is still going to be a question mark health wise,they’ve got to at least be thinking about a second tier option I’d have to imagine.
I’d be wary of Beachy as any kind of solution; second TJ guys have an awful record of success.
Anyone want John Danks? Dodgers? Cardinals?
Only if the White Sox take David Huff….. wait… no, keep him in LA
I thought Huff got DFA after his start?
I guess he did. Dang.
This guy cannot catch a break.
Well, except for that 48 million dollar one this winter
Ruben Amaro Jr. looks smart now knowing both Cardinals(Wainwright) and now Dodgers(McCarthy) have SP need which increases his leverage.
I don’t think RAJ was thinking “Better hold onto Hamels, because I bet multiple teams with some budget flexibility will have season-ending injuries in the rotation.” These injuries probably only increase the odds STL or LA goes after Hamels, but I don’t think that has anything to do with Philly betting on something like this to happen
Actually, I kind of disagree. In fact, I believe Gillick said they weren’t going rush trading Cole because “Injuries can happen.” I think it just pains people to think Ruben has done something smart.
Actually, I definitely disagree. First, I’m not a Phillies fan. At all.
That said, the Phillies had no compelling reason to sell short on Hamels in spring training. The Sox could have gotten him for the right mix of their over-rated prospects but chose not to. And probably now regret that decision given the state of their pitching.
RAJ stuck to his guns, took the criticism (unjust criticism IMO) that came with that and now is sitting in the proverbial catbird seat. The Dodgers have a deep farm with REAL prospects and the Cards system, while not the deepest, has some excellent choices.
One indisputable, immutable truth in baseball? Starting pitchers are going to get injured. Maybe RAJ isn’t as bad as many of you seem to think.
RAJ is definitely as bad as most people purport, but in this instance things are going his way.
The asking price for Hamels is still high the last I checked, If the dodgers were willing to go after an ace, Hamels is the way to go or go after Cueto for a year rental. But then they also have to think about if Greinke opts out of his contract.
Good job Cash!!!
Otherwise we would have been stuck with this guy.
I get it… you always want to try and avoid injury. But he’s never had a history with the elbow. It could have been any team. It’s not like they knew this injury was going to happen.
Oh, I agree, it could happen to anyone. For all I know Tanaka might be next. But a guy like McCarthy who’s been through injury after injury it was simply unwise to invest that much money into him.
His result have never been that great either
Leave Tanaka out of this. Every time someone gets hurt his name is mentioned.
Because he has a partially torn UCL. He isn’t being implicated unfairly.
Didn’t Wainwright pitch for a few years with one?
I don’t think so. I think Wainwright got TJ.
For good reason…
Can you draw up a list of players who won’t hit the DL this year?
No, but I could draw up a list of players who already have partially torn UCL’s
Yeah, but when you overpay for a guy and he gets hurt, you end up with an overpaid guy who is hurt.
It’s his throwing shoulder that has the injury history. Almost every season, he seems to have a DL stint with a shoulder injury about a 1/3 of the way through the season.
I knew somewhere in the comments on this story, there would be a Yankee fan being what most Yankee fans are. But, we know you can’t help it.
What, so I’m not allowed to show relief for what could have been a bad move for the Yankees. Please take your snarky comments somewhere else.
Ouch!..bummer
all these teams just need one Dillon Gee to right the ship…
Absolutely not.
Just because he’ll be the #6 or #7 at the end of the season for the Mets doesn’t mean he wouldn’t be a solid #5 on most staffs and possibly a #4 on some of the weaker staffs. His #’s are league avg last time I checked; that is what you realistically hope for w. the backend of your rotation.
That’s really a shame. Enjoyed watching him work while he was with the Yankees. Seemed to know what he was doing out there and by all accounts a good teammate. I always though TJ surgery was uncommon, but now it’s the biggest growth industry in the sport.
Dodgers are paying everyone but me to not play for them this season. I’ve always been late to the party anyway.
Killer. Despite a few dingers in a small sample size, he was looking really good. Had cranked his velocity up to touch 96, was getting a lot of swings and misses. Very rare that a guy seems to click past the midpoint of his career and add some real velocity like that.
Unfortunately, he went click, then his arm went pop.
Actually, a sudden velocity spike tends to foretell Tommy John, as Will Carroll pointed out several years ago, when Strasburg’s velocity ticked up to 100 in college. Sure enough, his UCL went soon after.
Really? That’s interesting. Did Carroll have any explanation for why?
The article’s on Baseball Prospectus, archived, but you have to be a subscriber. I think the theory had to do with the muscles around the elbow unable to keep up with the other arm muscles that had been worked to increase the velocity (biceps, triceps, etc). The bottom line was that a sudden velocity increase can often mean: be wary of a pitcher’s possibility of TJ.
Anyone think Julio Urias making the move to the show?
Mccarthy is Friedman and Zaidi’s first and biggest bust move.
Get ready for more. For as many good moves as Friedman made for the Rays, he made an equal amount of bad moves.
Next year, maybe. Urias is still on a pitch limit down in AA. No use bringing him up for 4-5 innings at a time in the bigs.
No way Urias is in the majors this year.
TIme to call up Urias and call Cincinnati and give up whatever is needed for CUETO, do it NOW!!!!
You want Cueto you’re gonna have to give up Urias.
Or worse… Seager.
3/4 season of Cueto for 6 years of a consensus top-15 prospect in baseball? Ya I’ll pass every time.
The price will be super-high. When you are dealing from a position of weakness, the price always goes up.
I really need to learn how to perform Tommy John surgery. You would make a killing these days.
will zach lee get called up now?
It’s probably make or break year for him, so no time like the present. Getting out of that launching pad in Albuquerque was a good start, that place is a pitchers cemetery.
Strikeouts by pitchers are a bogus stat.
Considering that a strikeouts prevent batters from putting the ball in play (which is how runs are created) strikeouts by pitchers are anything but overrated.
Well said. It’s hard to score runs when you’re walking back to the dugout.
Since people seem to want the DH implemented in the NL because of the Wainwright injury, should we just start using pitching machines because of this injury? #sarcasm
I saw this coming from the beginning of the season, McCarthy having an injury prone history, and Anderson will probably be next with his injury prone history as well. Also with Ryu on the dl still, will this open up the rumors of the dodgers going out and getting Cueto or Hamels?
Feels like the floodgates have been open on those rumors for quite a while. I’m sure Freidman and co will kick the tires again, but Urias/Seager will probably be the same hurdle as before. If anything, the price has gone up, and I don’t think the Dodgers are desperate enough.
Urias and Seager will prolly be the main piece in the deal if the dodgers want hamels or Pederson plus other prospects.
If you have not been watching the moves they have been making, all 45 of them, then you’re not paying attention to the front office.
Stan said in the beginning of the season, he wants to promote young guys.
The doors between the Dodgers minor league teams and the Major League team is revolving.
It is interesting to me that people are, seemingly, genuinely surprised that he is injured. Granted, as mentioned by some, his history of injuries hasn’t consistently been elbow issues; but, he’s (unfortunately) proven to be less than a workhorse due to several injuries throughout his career.
I guess I’m thinking that I can’t be the only one who was expecting “something” to sideline him and that the Dodgers were taking a HUGE risk by signing him to a four year deal. I’m wondering if Friedman and company expected him to turn some corner of durability at this stage of his career (as a 31 year old) due to a strong performance for the Yankees down the stretch?
I actually expected to see multiple sarcastic comments like, “Who would have ever expected him to get injured?!?!”
Just seems odd that some find it surprising. Anyway, here’s hoping to a speedy recovery!
So when is the MLB going to start getting to the bottom of why there are so many UCL injuries? Really frustrating to watch how all these pitchers go through the same injury and not have a solution on how to avoid it.
where zach lee shot. dude has to prove him self in the majors at some point why not now
I was all on board with this deal. Ill have the egg on my face odorizzi.