Left-hander C.J. Wilson’s shoulder soreness has led the Angels to shut down his throwing program for at least 8-10 days, manager Mike Scioscia told reporters (including Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register). There was already speculation that Wilson would miss some significant time to begin the season, and this latest setback means that he won’t be able to return until May at the earliest.
An MRI last month revealed that Wilson was suffering from tendinitis rather than a more serious injury, though that’s probably little comfort to Wilson now as he’s missed all of Spring Training. The southpaw was already recovering from another injury, an August surgery to remove bone chips from his elbow that cut short his 2015 season.
Wilson is owed $20MM in 2016, the last season of the five-year, $77.5MM free agent deal he signed with the Halos following the 2011 campaign. That salary, the elbow surgery, an eight-team no-trade clause and Wilson’s age (35) all limited his trade value this past winter, as the Angels were known to be shopping the veteran in an attempt to get some payroll relief. A few teams showed interest but only as a buy-low candidate. Now that Wilson will miss at least a month, it creates less time for him to re-establish his health and effectiveness before either the July trade deadline or for free agency in the offseason.
Over his four years in Anaheim, Wilson has averaged 181 innings per season with a 3.87 ERA, 7.7 K/9 and 2.03 K/BB rate. His absence further thins out an Angels rotation that also has Jered Weaver battling neck stiffness. The rotation projects as Garrett Richards, Andrew Heaney, Weaver, Hector Santiago and Matt Shoemaker, with Nick Tropeano and (when he returns from Tommy John rehab) Tyler Skaggs also on hand.
Two things:
It’s safe to say this contract didn’t work out
And
Apparently going from the Rangers to the Angels doesn’t work for players.
Going to the Angels from any team is the problem. Looks like CJ is starting retirement early.
why? Because there has been a couple free agents that havent worked out?
name the last successful free agent signed by arte
@jmac 3 free agents, les not forget about Gary Mathews jr…
@Melvin McMurf – Vladimir Guerrero
Probably because CJ went to a team where it’s new GM replaced a catcher that handled a pitching staff as good as any, and who pitchers love working with, with a no glove, no arm, no pitching framing walk specialist.
Angels pitching fell off a cliff after Jerry Dipoto traded Jeff Mathis.
Hamilton would’ve tanked wherever he went.
Seriously? You blame the angels woes on not having Jeff Mathis?
No one said anything like that. Read before commenting.
I’m pretty sure if Mathis was the reason the Angels pitching staff went downhill he would be a starter on another team. The Angels went downhill because Artie knows nothing about baseball, team chemistry and can’t help but stick his nose in something he knows nothing about. Every single big free agent the Angels have signed since the World Series has been an absolute bust Wells, PooHole, Wilson, Hamilton. I take that back Hunter was the lone great signing. The Poohole signing set the team back 10 yrs. Having to trade Trumbo although that return was pretty good and letting Morales go while crippling the payroll for the future with Poohole’s contract. Morales would have been a cheaper and more productive player the Poohole while also allowing the Angels to have payroll flexibility to fix the glaring holes at 3rd, 2nd, catcher and left field. Signing Hamilton and Wilson was done out of spite to stick it to the Rangers and that back fired so bad that now the Rangers are laughing with Hamilton back on their team getting paid by the Angels. Mike Sausage is also a big reason the Angels have been on the down cline, his inability to embrace metrics and work with a GM while also bringing in the worse pitching coach ever in Butcher have hurt the development of the pitching staff. As a life long Angels fan it has been disheartening to see the decline of an organization that had so much promise just a few years ago while having the best player in baseball on the team and no ability to surround him with the talent the need to truly compete for a championship.
No one ever said anything about Mathis being the reason Angels pitching went downhill. But trading him and bringing in Iannetta was a big factor. And the big contracts are a poor excuse. The Angels still would have a pretty big payroll without them. You’re also forgetting that other teams have stepped up in the AL West and it’s not just the Angels and everybody else anymore.
Stop blaming Dipoto for every problem the Angels have, if it wasn’t for him they would of signed many other free agents to big deals
No one said anything about Jerry Dipoto being the cause of all of the Angels problems. Try again.
The Angels are now stuck with him for the rest of the year. Unless the angels are out of the playoffs come trading deadline and Wilson is having a cy young year the contract is their $20 million write off
Hate to see that, CJ Wilson is a good dude. His loss is really going to put a big time strain on the rest of the Angels pitching staff. I remember wanting my Sox to sign him when he was a FA, we dodged a big time bullet there, he just hasn’t been able to stay healthy enough to have been worth his contract.
Good luck to you CJ with your recovery!
Bigpapi that was the classiest post you’ve made
No it wasn’t. The fact that he has to say “my sox” in EVERY post, be it about Boston or not, says plenty about how classless he is.
Stop commenting on here. Period.
They dodged a bullet there, they just decided to give panda, Hanley and porcello ridiculous contracts instead
Red Sox can do no wrong in his eyes LOL
Man! I feel so bad for the Angels, they just can’t catch a break! Now what could have been moving CJ and the 6MM left on his contract in late July becomes the reason they can’t make a move at all. They virtually have nobody else they can trade that would clear enough salary to allow a difference making move without hurting the product that they currently have on the field. I don’t know what they can do now, but I hope they overcome all these obstacles and have a great season!
Baseball should adopt the amnesty rule that they have in the NBA. You can waive one player and have his money come off the books. Pay him to go away! Howard probably would be the first one to go, followed closely by CJ. I love CJ, but it seems like the Angels have been trying to get rid of him for over 2 seasons now.
The amnesty thing was only a 1 time thing that slready expired for teams to use in the NBA.
My point exactly! Institute it for the next cba in baseball. The current bargaining agreement that was implemented when they formed the new cba in basketball is still the current one. So, it’s not like this was something they could not incorporate today. The reason they don’t use the amnesty clause today is because it only worked for contracts that were signed prior to the agreement and basketball contracts are limited to 5 years. So there is no existing contract in the NBA that could be amnestied.
My thoughts were: Implement an amnesty clause in baseball that can be used for each team, one time, over a 5 year period. If a player is traded, he cannot be amnestied(Negating the possibility of a team amnestying a player, and then trading another player they want to amnesty to a team that hasn’t used their provision yet). Allow the teams to use it once every 5 years. Just my thoughts.
I love the amnesty idea. Granted it only matters in luxury tax. But if you’re going to allow the amnesty rule allow it for every exception. If you are only allowed one in a certain amount of time
then it would make teams seriously think about using the clause especially since they are still on the hook to pay that money. That being said I don’t see very many teams actually using the clause. If teams agreed to the amnesty I would assume tax threshold tax would jump significantly.