Two notable Guardians players are likely to start their 2022 season on the 10-day injured list. Reliever James Karinchak has a strain in his teres major muscle and will be shut down for 7-10 days, while Luke Maile has a left hamstring strain. (MLB.com’s Mandy Bell was among those to report the news.)
Maile is a lock to hit the IL, as he will be out of action for three to four weeks. Karinchak’s timetable isn’t yet known outside of his shutdown period, as if he returns after seven or even 10 days with no ill effects, he might only need a minimal 10-day IL stint at the start of the season to get fully ramped up.
It all depends on the severity of his strain, as teres major muscle issues can vary greatly in terms of necessary recovery time. Cleveland fans have become all too familiar with the teres major muscle in recent years, as Mike Clevinger, Emmanuel Clase, and (just yesterday) Cody Morris have all spent time on the IL due to similar injuries.
The Guardians surely hope Karinchak’s injury is just a matter of days or weeks rather than months, as the hard-throwing righty’s big strikeout numbers hint at his potential as a dominant bullpen arm. Karinchak has a huge 38% strikeout rate over his 87 2/3 career innings, as well as a 3.49 ERA. However, Karinchak also has a 13.4% walk rate, and both those control problems and the home run ball led to a dropoff in production last season after a strong start. Cleveland ended up optioning Karinchak to Triple-A for September, in an effort to try and get him sorted.
Maile only joined the team two weeks ago on a one-year, $900K free agent deal. The veteran backstop’s guaranteed deal gave him a leg up on minor league signing Sandy Leon in the battle to be Austin Hedges’ backup, though Leon may now have the inside track on breaking camp. Depending on what other names become available as other teams make their spring cuts, the Guardians could possibly add another experienced catcher to add further depth, or as more competition for Leon.
The arbitration process hurts relievers more than anyone. So many relievers get burnt out or injured before they ever get a chance to cash in on free agency..
Karinchak will be another example.
Would you rather have given Josh Hader a contract 2-3 years ago or after this season?
@downser30
Are you saying that the arbitration process is the actual cause of the injuries discussed here? Forgive my confusion as nothing was mentioned about arbitration.
It’s notable that the Guardians have 14 guys on their 40 man roster without and MLB experience. They usually prefer not to start rookies on the MLB roster for service time reasons. They also prefer not to put such rookies on the 60 day DL and start their service clock.
Morris and Carlos Vargas have already been place on the 60 day DL. They hadn’t done that for a player without service time since Jared Goedert.
If Karinchak and Maile are on the DL, they will mathematically have to start at least 2 rookies on the opening day roster (which, remember is 28 players for the first month of the season).
They were going to have to make trades to build a functional roster even if everyone was healthy. But they sat on their hands.
‘zat right? So they go in every day, kick off their shoes, lean back in their comfy office chairs, and play solitaire on their laptops until it is time to go home.
OR, is it MORE plausible that teams are playing chicken with us and thinking we’ll blink because ADHD-addled fans like you are “demanding action, dammit!”
I’ll stick with the CLE deep thinkers on this one, pal…they’ve shown their brilliance making trades and I’d rather they make no deal than a bad deal, 100 times out of a 100. There’s no intrinsic virtue in action, and if you look around baseball at some of these stupid signings, there sure as heck is damage wrought by feeling you have to “do something” to placate fans.
No participation trophies for leaking the press that you were “in on” trade target X or free agent Y who went somewhere else.
Awww…it’s tough on you that they didn’t offer more for mediocrities like Luke Voit, or limited, oft-broken down ballplayers like Jesse Winker? Wake up.. No one should care what a bunch of talentless hacks whisper just to fill their lousy columns with rumor and innuendo.
Ahh yes…I’m more excited about the above average proven performance of Bobby Bradley and the sterling health and performance of Bradley Zimmer, far preferable options over Voit and Winker. In fact they should trade.Jose for more infield prospects now because the front office never loses trades.
Newsflash Blaster: front offices arent the “leaks”, agents are. Pretty flawed theory you have, especially from the perspective of a keyboard Johnny GM.
Hey THE downvoter: you have zero proof that trade rumors only come from agents. It’s actually on the record from Cleveland beat reporters that the front office confirmed they tried to acquire Winker and Olson. Zack Meisel said so on podcasts. That’s where my info is from, someone who was stating his information was from front office contacts
But he is right in that it really doesn’t help your client if the word goes out that Cleveland, Cincinnati or Miami is talking to them. Its not really going to help their asking price, so why would the agent leak it?
@mathblaster
Jesse Winker has never had more than 400 PA in a season in his life. And do you know why? Because he’s often hurt and because lifetime he’s .188/.305/..295/.600 vs. LHP. He also can’t run or field his position, which is why a platoon of Zimmer and Mercado or DJ and Mercado would have just as good a chance of putting up WAR equivalent to Winker playing every day (if he could even muster it). You see these are the kind of considerations that completely elude a fellow like you, who simply sees Winker mash against some meatball RH pitcher and you think, WOW!, he’s Mickey Mantle! Until he plays for you, and his limitations become all too apparent (just like the guys we already have). Sure, would I mind having a Winker or Voit if someone handed them to us and I didn’t have to pay them a ton but there we go with those “complex” considerations again that smart teams pay attention to and you can’t be bothered with.
So apparently, “leak” to you is some rando in the FO, well after the fact, saying “yea, we tried.” Got it.
For the most of the balance of the world, “leaks” during or before transactions overwhelmingly come from agents, not FO….and thats fact. If you would like to dispute it, then thats your issue.
Maybe Dolan really is gearing up to sell the team so he doesn’t care about Super 2 status for many of these guys in a few years. I was wondering how they’d handle Kwan in that regard. The pitchers are easy to shuttle back to AAA, no excuse needed except rest, but if a position player makes a good start and doesn’t let up then it looks mighty suspicious to pull the plug later on.
But pulling anyone back for ten days or two weeks to get an extra year does seem the more sensible thing to do. And you’d be paying for the privilege so no foul.
Hasn’t the DL gone back to 15 days?
I was just thinking that. I think pitchers 15 days and hitters still 10
*Tribe.
Do you do this to people in real life too? Go away troll.
*SPIDERS
And the now the nominees for Worst “Just Can’t Get Over It” comment are:
Suffer for Tribe
sufferfortribe 2
48-team MLB
48-team MLB’s seven burners
The Mercado goes to …
Might as well add yourself to that list, seeing as you can’t seem get over people complaining about the name change.
Seriously, just let them vent and die out if you don’t like them. Complaining about them to their faces isn’t going to stop them from complaining, hell it probably encourages them to keep doing what they’re doing.
And if you don’t want to hear any more from them? Mute them and move on. No one is forcing you to listen to their complaints, unless your pushing yourself to do just that.
Jacob, nice hammering. Spot on.
Nope. Dude can make his own posts about the anguish he is SUFFERING through all he wants. Needs to stop “correcting” folks because he’s triggered by them being called the new name.
Sure, great idea. Now, if only the mute button worked, especially on the petty curmudgeons that shake their fist at change.
Terrible news for baseball. Those are the faces of the game and they won’t be playing on opening day. No we have to watch washed up players like Trout, Acuña & deGrom.
Terrible baseball joke. There are over 900 players on opening day rosters, not all are superstars.
It wasn’t a joke. Guys in this report are the face of the game not washed up players like Trout, Acuña & deGrom.
Guardian s as a team name is mediocre at best. The winged baseball logo is horrible. It looks like a really amateur bush league logo. What a shame.
It’s sad they couldn’t pick something more distinctive of Cleveland, but what? I was born and raised in Cleveland and remember the statues on the bridge but never heard them called Guardians of the traffic. My Dad was a history fan and never mentioned it. It’s a phony symbol of practically nothing. Not meaningful. If you’re an East sider, you probably never went over that bridge.
Cleveland Commodores
I didn’t like the name change, but it has happened. Constant comments here add nothing to the baseball discussion.
By the way, I was raised in an eastern suburb and have never crossed that bridge. Also, Spiders would have been a lousy name as well.
If we take it back to where it all began, Native Americans are only called Indians because Columbus mistakenly thought he’d found a shorter route to India and landed in the East Indies. Cleveland is known as the Mistake by the Lake.
It all ties together.
If you don’t like the new name, how about the Cleveland Mistakes?
Sure thing Dink Void…