2:06pm: Johnson will indeed attempt another comeback, agent Matt Sosnick tells ESPN.com’s Jerry Crasnick (via Twitlonger). The veteran righty has known of the tear for about ten weeks, but attempted to pitch through it before deciding to have the procedure. Sosnick says that his client will also look into “cutting-edge” medical developments that could prove beneficial in addition to the TJ procedure.
10:19am: Padres righty Josh Johnson will go under the knife for his third Tommy John procedure, Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com reports. He will almost certainly miss the entirety of the 2016 season after having the surgery some time next week.
Johnson most recently had a UCL replacement in April of 2014. He had signed a one-year, $8MM deal with San Diego prior to that season, but never threw a major league pitch before succumbing to the surgery. The Friars brought him back on an incentive-laden, one-year, $1MM pact, but the 31-year-old was never quite able to make it back to MLB action.
The Padres’ investment has obviously not panned out as hoped, but it was a relatively meager sum to risk on the pitcher they hoped would re-emerge. Johnson had a rough 2013 season with the Blue Jays, allowing 56 earned runs in just 81 1/3 frames, but carried a career-best 9.2 K/9 rate and drew solid reviews from some ERA estimators.
While he’d had injuries before that point, Johnson also had racked up nearly a thousand innings of 3.15 ERA pitching heading into his short and disappointing tenure in Toronto. At times, he’s been among the very best pitchers in the game.
Given that he’s undergoing the procedure, it certainly seems that Johnson will give it at least one more shot. In all likelihood, he won’t even have a chance at throwing competitively until he has turned 33.
Wow, tough break. It looked like he finally pulled it together in ’10, but it’s hard to be great when you are on the DL.
It’s really disheartening to see such a good pitcher suffer so many terrible injuries. Wish him the best.
So he never came back from the second one. Was it done wrong, is there something more serious wrong with his arm, or did he reinjure it? Regardless I wish him well but a failed attempt to come back for the second surgery doesn’t really bode well for the third one.
JJ had 2 healthy season in the last 10 years, I don’t think t was the surgeon’s fault.
Ouch. Not many have 3. Wish him luck recovering from this one
This makes me sad. Glad I was able to see him live every 5th day when he was a true #1 SP. Will always root for a person like JJ. I know how dejected he must feel right now. I hope he gets through this. Will be a great story if he does. Maybe even come back as a reliever or something, if necessary
Would he be the first player to come back from 3 TJs?
Such a tough break for him and would love to see him somehow come back.
Jason Isringhausen is the only one I can find. He came back from a third TJ in 2009, pitching 50 and 53 innings in 2011 and 2012, but he wasn’t nearly as effective as he was before the injuries.
Non pitcher’s don’t very often come back from 3 and have any/much luck with a successful return. Some of us went over this a few months back by coming up with names, think Xavier Nady was the one player who had the most AB’s who had it 3x and made it back to MLB land and he was a shell of the old slugger when he came back after the 3rd surgery of himself.
Jonny Venters has a 12 month head start on him and is under contract with the Rays for next year. Presumably, they’ll look to get him on a mound for some competitive innings next spring and make some decisions from there.
Wow, you commenters are really generous.
When was the last time you found 1MM in the gutter.
This guy has made 9MM dollars while not throwing a major league pitch.
Everyone wonder why the Padres are in such poor shape….wake up Rock Star GM!
There’s always some GM dumb enough to pay for nothing when it isn’t there money!
The original deal was reached by Byrnes, not Preller. It’s fine to disagree with the move, but $1MM isn’t a lot to risk on a guy with that kind of upside, and other teams have promised that much or more to players like Chad Billingsley, Kris Medlen, Brandon Beachy.
Something is up if he has to get a third TJ done on his arm. Players aren’t brought up with the best mechanics but you’d think once he started getting paid his pitching coach would’ve helped him.
Players aren’t brought up with good mechanics. Most pitchers don’t get quality consistent coaching – they may get a summer camp or two each year. Many hs teams don’t even have a dedicated pitching coach with the requisite knowledge to properly fix mechanics. The first time kids get an actual “pitching coach” is at the college level or AAU (which I have been critical of at times). By this time a lot of the bad habits have already been developed. how many times have rookie pitchers been labeled as “throwers” or “raw” by the time they make their debut? I believe this is indicative of the lack of coaching these kids receive coming up.
Pitching is incredibly stressful on the arm. Proper mechanics can diminish some of the risks, but it needs to be taught at a young age, long before these problems develop. I would like to see little league baseball get involved, start requiring that each little league retain a league while pitching coach/coaches to work with the kids.
I get your point but as a society we don’t spend that kind of money/time/effort for something that in the end will only benefit .0001% of little leaguers.
I wish more players would attempt to recover without opting for surgery.
7 more until he gets a free one from Dr. James Andrews!
In all honesty I had forgotten Josh Johnson existed. Regardless, tough break, hope he recovers fully.
Some bodies just aren’t built to handle the rigors of overhand throwing. A thinner/weaker UCL, an Acroiom bone that curves downward to much, minor things that would never affect most of our day to day living can spell doom for the arm/shoulder doing a lot of overhand throwing. Best of luck overcoming genetics JJ
You’re going to run out of stealable ligaments soon buddy.
JJ wanting to play shows his love for the game or he just want the money. either way after 3 TJ surgery isnt it a sign to maybe it time to hang it up
Baseball is likely all he’s ever known in life. Cant blame him for wanting to hang on a little longer.
Well he provides Boras with plenty of reference material for Harvey
this year’s mark prior
Dude, you’re 31 years old and have already made 50 million dollars. Hang it up. Go fishing or something.
Maybe he actually likes baseball and competing at the highest level, and wants to keep doing that?
Third TJ, that’s it! He couldn’t come back from the other 2!
Third time the charm? Lol smh