MAY 26: No surgery for Plesac, but he’ll miss a good amount of time. The Indians will re-evaluate Plesac every seven to 10 days, and he’ll take three weeks to begin a throwing progression, Mandy Bell of MLB.com tweets.
MAY 25: The Indians will place starter Zach Plesac on the 10-day injured list with a non-displaced fracture in his right thumb, Zack Meisel of The Athletic was among those to report. He suffered the injury while “rather aggressively taking off his undershirt,” manager Terry Francona told Paul Hoynes of cleveland.com and other media.
It’s unclear how much time Plesac will miss, but the 26-year-old isn’t someone Cleveland can afford to go without for too long. After all, for the third straight season, Plesac has been one of the Indians’ top starters. He owns a 4.14 ERA/4.43 SIERA with a 16.2 percent strikeout rate, a 5.1 percent walk rate and a personal-high 52.7 percent groundball rate over 58 2/3 innings. Among Indians hurlers, only reigning American League Cy Young winner Shane Bieber and Aaron Civale have amassed more frames this year than Plesac.
Cleveland is in more-than-capable hands with Bieber and Civale as a one-two punch, but the rest of its starting staff loses quite a bit of luster thereafter. Triston McKenzie, whom the team optioned on May 22, as well as Logan Allen and Sam Hentges have struggled over a combined 15 starts. The Indians also demoted Allen a few weeks ago, but he or McKenzie could be candidates to come back with Plesac out of commission.
Gee whiz. I can’t leave you guys alone for a minute without someone getting hurt! I ignore MLBTR for an hour or two to get some work done and half the teams in MLB (exaggeration) put someone on the IL! Wow, so many guys keep getting hurt. Maybe it it the availability of the 10-day IL, but maybe not.
Welcome to MLBILR
Ok, how many more IL placements do you think we’ll keep seeing until the end of the day?
5 more IL placements
See to have 10 figures of payroll, 20+ projected WAR, & a dozen players on the IL is pretty much standard fare when you are a Yankee fan.
I see some fan bases are struggling with this reality. It sucks. I get it. But Yankee fans & haters alike have just come to expect that this is what a baseball season looks like.
At this rate the bat boys will be in the lineup.
The Indians are also down a lot of pitching options. They still haven’t announced a starter for tomorrow, McKenzie’s spot, but I imagine that will be either Jean Carlos Mejia (who was added to the bullpen but was stretched out as a starter before that) or Eli Morgan.
Logan Allen is in AAA but he still hasn’t seem to come around. McKenzie hasn’t even started down there yet. Scott Moss is on the 40 but was pulled after his last start with some sort of injury.
The only other option on the 40 is Cal Quantrill. But they would have to work to stretch him out enough.
Beyond the 40, the next guy up in AAA would be Kirk McCarty. He’s done really well this year in 23.2 IP (4 starts), he’s got 14 ks to 5 walks, 3 HRs. Just a 2.66 ERA. He’s not considered a high ceiling prospect but if Moss is hurt and they don’t think either Quantrill or Mejia is stretched out enough, he might have to do.
Bullpen day?
McCarty has been really impressive. You’re right that he isn’t a top prospect, but he’s definitely earned a shot. Digging deeper, Tanner Tully might be an option too if they need a spot starter.
Tully is going today for Columbus, so he’s not an option for either Wednesday or Friday for the Indians. They will need a 6th starter on Monday for a doubleheader.
I apparently missed where Jean Carlos Mejia threw an inning of relief yesterday. Which would mean he’s likely not going to be able to start Wednesday, but maybe could Friday. I would assume that would be an abbreviated start, maybe with an eye on building him back to a starter after that (this is how they handled Hentges earlier in the year).
Apparently Allen is also hurt for Columbus. Worth noting that they can bring back McKenzie now because of the Plesac IL placement.
Imagine fracturing your thumb, taking off your shirt…………Derp!
Not that hard to picture – pissed off over how poorly he pitched, rips off his shirt and hits his thumb on a chair. Not quite Ynoa-level stupid, but pretty close.
Thanks for the injury update, but don’t leave me waiting —
did Zach get out of the undershirt?
You would think his old man would have taught him how to wear a big league uniform. Maybe he skipped the lesson on undressing.
Tell me this damned team isn’t cursed.
Need some Jobu action.
i’ll get the whole chicken
The Curse of Rocky Colavito.
sufferfortribe 2, Have you read these three books? I’ve always wanted Don’t Knock the Rock but could never find it. I’m also curious about Bob Dolgan’s The Sportswriter Who Punched Sam McDowell.
1. Don’t Knock the Rock (Gordon Cobbledick, 1966)
2. The Curse of Rocky Colavito (Terry Pluto, 1994)
3. Rocky Colavito: Cleveland’s Iconic Slugger (Mark Sommer, 2019)
No, never have. But the one about Sudden Sam sounds interesting. That’s a big dude to be punching.
The Curse of RC is a good read
Anything from Terry Pluto is a good read.
Bring up Kirk McCarty, maybe?
OK, a guy breaks his thumb taking off a shirt and we all know about it, but telling us someone has COVID instead of “undisclosed reasons” is violating HIPAA?
As part of their contracts, players consent to the release of information about workplace-related injuries, like a broken thumb. Non-injury medical conditions, including COVID, can’t be discussed without separate consent, which is why details of some player illnesses (both COVID and others) are reported and others aren’t.
The longer explanation: “An elbow injury and a positive COVID-19 test are treated differently because of HIPAA, the ADA, and MLB’s collective bargaining agreement and standard player contract. MLB players and clubs must operate in accordance with the health information disclosure rules as currently codified under Article XIII.G.(1) of the collective bargaining agreement known as the 2017-2021 Basic Agreement (the “CBA”) and by Paragraph 6(b)(1) of each standard player contract, known as the Uniform Player’s Contract (“UPC”). Under these agreements, each player is required to execute a HIPAA-compliant authorization for the use and disclosure of health information about the player. By signing the UPC, the player authorizes disclosure of employment-related injuries. … If a medical condition, other than an employment-related injury, prevents a player from playing and the player has not provided the club with specific written authorization to disclose information about the medical condition, the club may disclose only that a medical condition is preventing the player from playing and the anticipated absence of the player from the club. COVID-19 status, therefore, is not deemed to be an employment-related injury that would allow an MLB club to disclose details regarding prognosis and treatment. Although a player may authorize a team to disclose his COVID-19 status, such authority is not automatic under either HIPAA or the documents governing the employment relationship..” https://www.wilaw.com/covid-19-raises-privacy-issues-for-major-league-baseball/
Something I would have never researched.
Hat tip for the info, @BBB.
Lol well as crazy as things are I lifted a bag with 3 2 liter sodas in and dislocated my elbow last week. Year of freaky incidents. (Granted my elbow has been jacked since a work injury back in ‘16 lol)
Oh my, it appears they’ve recalled McKenzie to start on Wednesday. Ugh.
Plesac needs to grow up. He’s very immature. Two years in a row he’s missed time (and starts) due to none baseball activities. He should pay more attention to and try to learn from Bieber and Civale. I hope he’s docked for the time he misses.
So I take it you’ve never gotten angry in your life and done something that turned out bad?
Everyone has. And mostly everyone gets punished for it.
The difference is he will make a lot of money while he is ‘punished’.
missing super two is getting punished
I’ll be more worried when a guy does poorly and shows no emotion. Not like he’s a hothead and put his hand through a window, it got pissed and jammed his thumb ripping off his shirt. Not great, but I’ll give him a pass on this one.
considering how Luzardo injured himself, this is very rational and tame.
He should have learned from his old man!
We all should, but maybe he could have also learned from his Uncle Dan who also pitched in the majors…
With some of the failures and injuries on the pitching staff lately,what Tito said certainly holds true. Every time you think you have enough pitching go out and get more. You can’t disagree with him there.
I’m sorry, this reminds me of the Carl Pavano.
More of a porn star injury, I woulda thought.
I wonder what really happened.
Does it really matter at this point? They’ve already given more of a description than I’d expect in such an incident leading to an injury. If they were trying to remain deceptive they could have said nothing other than he injured his hand.