Brusdar Graterol Unlikely To Return In 2025

Flamethrowing Dodgers setup man Brusdar Graterol underwent shoulder surgery back in November and hoped to be able to pitch in the season’s second half, but manager Dave Roberts indicated to the Dodger beat yesterday that the big right-hander’s chances of making it back to a big league mound in 2025 are slim (link via Mike DiGiovanna of the L.A. Times). Graterol is with the team’s staff at their spring complex in Arizona but has not yet resumed throwing a ball, with just over six weeks of the season left.

It’s been a discouraging couple years for the 26-year-old Graterol, whom the Dodgers acquired in a 2020 trade that sent righty Kenta Maeda to the Twins. Graterol was one of Minnesota’s top young arms at the time, but the Twins felt comfortable dealing him due to the remaining four years on Maeda’s contract and perhaps in part due to concerns about shoulder troubles with Graterol.

Early on, it looked like a win-win for both parties. Maeda was the AL Cy Young runner-up in the shortened 2020 season. Graterol immediately seized an important role in manager Dave Roberts’ bullpen. Injuries to both pitchers would significantly cut their workload with their new clubs, however.

From 2020-23, Graterol pitched 173 2/3 innings of 2.69 ERA ball for the Dodgers. He’s never missed bats the way one might expect from a pitcher who sits 99 mph with his sinker and regularly ramps it up into triple-digit territory, but the big righty is also one of the sport’s premier ground-ball pitchers. During that 2020-23 peak, he fanned just 18.9% of his opponents but also turned in a terrific 5.5% walk rate and an elite 62.5% ground-ball rate.

Strong as the results were in that time, Graterol was also on the injured list five different times for elbow or shoulder troubles with the Dodgers before finally undergoing surgery to repair the labrum in his right shoulder. He pitched just 7 1/3 innings last year and seemingly won’t get back on the mound in 2025.

Graterol is being paid $2.8MM this season and is under club control via arbitration for one more year. Arb-eligible players who miss an entire season due to injury typically agree to sign for the same amount the following year, assuming they’re tendered a contract. Given Graterol’s strong results when healthy and minimal cost to the deep-pocketed Dodgers, they’ll likely retain him and hope for a healthy year in 2026 (assuming there haven’t been any notable setbacks in his rehab).

It’s not all bad news with regard to the Dodger bullpen, however. Roberts told reporters last night that righty Michael Kopech will begin a minor league rehab assignment today (link via The Athletic’s Fabian Ardaya). Kopech opened the 2025 season on the injured list due to a shoulder impingement that ultimately sent him to the 60-day IL. He returned in June and came roaring out of the gates with seven shutout frames, but something was clearly off in his final appearance, as he walked three of the four batters he faced before being lifted and placed on the injured list to inflammation in his knee.

Kopech initially downplayed the severity, but once the inflammation subsided, imaging revealed a torn meniscus. He underwent surgery and was quickly transferred back to the 60-day IL. He’s been on the injured list since July 1, so Kopech isn’t eligible to be activated until the very end of the month. It’s encouraging that he’s already setting out on a rehab stint, as he’ll have a runway of more than two weeks to build up before he’s first eligible to return.