Angels righty Garrett Richards is headed to the 10-day DL with a biceps strain, as Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register was among those to tweet. Reliever Mike Morin has been recalled to take his spot on the active roster.
An MRI did show that Richards has not suffered an elbow injury, Pedro Moura of the Los Angeles Times reports on Twitter, but “irritation” in the biceps muscle will nevertheless force him to take a rest. The move was backdated to yesterday, when Richards left his first outing of the season early with the injury.
Indications immediately after the game were that it wasn’t terribly concerning, and today’s news does not seem to change the prognosis. That said, any arm issues will receive added attention in Richards’s case given that he’s returning after treating and rehabbing a partially torn UCL.
While the non-surgical course allowed Richards to return much quicker than he would have, it seems reasonable to anticipate that the organization will handle him with added care. He was throwing rather well yesterday before the bicep flared up. Over 4 2/3 scoreless innings, he sat in the 96-97 mph range with his fastball and allowed three hits and a walk while striking out for batters.
4 games in angles season is now a right off
Maybe he should be turned into a closer. While his history gives you concern over his ability to stay healthy in any pitching role, maybe less pitches more often is what he needs. Can it be any worse?
I love the new ten day dl. This doesn’t effect anything because the Angels have an off day of Monday. They can simply just skip him in the rotation one time. Breath people, he will be fine.
And that’s the problem with the 10-day DL. In this case, it’s nice for the Angels. But teams will try to manipulate to skip an uninjured pitcher’s start and get an extra player on the roster.
why is that a problem?
Because why even bother have a roster limit if teams abuse the DL to get around it?
so that teams dont have 40 relievers in the pen each game?
Exactly. It doesn’t seem right to have teams manipulating the system. But that’s also how innovation and progress is made. The players being called up still have to be on the 40-man roster and have options to use. Or be passed through waivers. All clubs know the risk of waivers and which other teams want their players. So it’s not like a lottery of who your team will be calling up for these DL stints. It will be better for the game
hopefully you’re right but his track records makes heavy worry breathing reasonable. we’ll know soon enough.
That’s a bit obtuse…
I hope its nothing serious for Richards because we need him to be the ace of the staff, If he can come back with shoemaker the angels have .a chance
Here we go again
This team has no proven ace….. It’s really as simple as that unfortunately.
If Artie Moreno didn’t have to spend big on Hamilton , they would of signed a proven ace. Also putting talent around trout in the line up
There’s $160 million left on their payroll after Hamilton’s contract. Those big contracts are a poor excuse. And Richards developed into an ace and is homegrown any way. They shouldn’t have to go out and sign an ace. But Richards has encountered major injuries and that’s just unfortunate.
Interesting comparison would John Lackey on April 6, 2013. He was making his first start after actually undergoing Tommy John Surgery, and had was throwing fine for 4 1/3 innings against the Blue Jays, but developed a bicep cramp that turned out to be… a biceps strain. He went on the DL then came back on April 28 and threw 6 innings, giving up just one ER to the Astros. He ended up logging 189 1/3 inning with a 3.52 ERA, a 3.86 FIP, and 1.157 WHIP.
This is probably just one last bump in the road for Richards trying to get his arm to full strength again.
One would hope this is one of his last hurdles. I can’t think of a time when good young talent deserves to be injured or written off