Pirates right-handed reliever Nick Burdi has undergone surgery to relieve symptoms of neurogenic thoracic outlet syndrome, Rob Biertempfel of The Athletic reports. Burdi will miss the rest of 2019, though the hope is that he’ll be ready to resume baseball activities by next spring.
The 26-year-old Burdi hasn’t pitched since April 22, when he exited an outing against the Diamondbacks with what looked like a catastrophic injury. Burdi was then diagnosed with a nerve issue, thus avoiding a second Tommy John surgery. Burdi, a second-round pick of the Twins in 2014, underwent TJS in 2017 and has also dealt with other arm injuries that have kept him from realizing his potential in the majors.
While Burdi avoided another Tommy John procedure, TOS surgery is ominous in its own right. Regardless of how much time Burdi ends up missing because of this surgery, it’s the latest significant step back in a career that hasn’t gotten off the ground because of injuries. A Pirate since they acquired him during the 2017 Rule 5 Draft, Burdi has thrown just 10 major league innings so far.
Guy cant catch a break
He’s probably done for good. It would take a Jonny Venters-level comeback for him to end up with a real big league career.
He’s likely retiring after this, yeah.
Him and his brother and pretty much the majority of pitchers to come out of UofL have been a huge bust.
At this point in time the Burdi “busts” have had more to due with injury than production. Unfortunately, the White Sox just placed brother Zack on the 7-day minor league IL once again, retro-active to June 23rd.
I hope he can get healthy. It must be demoralizing to have so many injuries and finally get back on the mound again, only to have another major injury.
A college reliever is having durability issues? Shocking
He’s still under rule 5 restrictions going into year 3 with the Pirates. He has to be on the major league roster for a fair stretch of time when he comes off the IL next season, so I’ll be curious if Pittsburgh keeps him.
I am curious as to whether the Pirates could put him on the extended ML roster in September even though he could not play.They would be eating a 40 man roster spot but it would cut off another month of the six that they need to keep him on the ML roster.
That would give him about three months ML time with this team and would enable them to send him to AAA mid year next year if he comes back.
Bye bye Burdi
Burdi is done. It’s really a shame, but the chances of coming back after TOS surgery just doesn’t seem good at all. Couple that with all Burdi’s previous durability issues and his window is almost completely gone.
He’s TOAST. Will be the next former Twins pitcher to retire.