Under The Knife 7/24/24

Dodger Dilemmas, Full of Footnotes

Long one today so let’s get right to the injuries:

ENTIRE DODGERS ROTATION

The Dodgers aren’t stupid. The coaches, the front office, their data department - all very much not stupid. So when they make a move that goes against what we think we know, it should force us to question our assumptions rather than just say “that’s stupid.” Dumping James Paxton - the DFA likely means they’ll get a trade done given the dearth of pitching and the relative low cost in return* - only makes sense if they not only get Tyler Glasnow and Clayton Kershaw back, but also Bobby Miller and Walker Buehler.

Walker Buehler acknowledged what many had known. He went to Cressey Performance in Florida while he was away, though the fact that Eric Cressey is a Yankees employee is a bit overblown. I’d consider this on the level of Neal ElAttrache being the Dodgers team doctor and other players going to him for treatment. Cressey is a professional, well regarded, and has had a relationship with Buehler going back to his Vanderbilt days. Buehler’s hip issue and overall mechanical issues are something that the CSP team excels at. If the hip issue is cleared - and a source tells me that it is - then getting back to Buehler’s original, pre-injury mechanics should be possible. That’s not to say it’s easy, but again, the Dodgers made a move based on their belief that Buehler will be back shortly and is a better option than James Paxton for the rest of the season.

Miller remains almost as intriguing. He has been lights out his entire career, an overperformer when called up early last year, but has struggled first with a shoulder injury and then just not being good. He was optioned down to Oklahoma and has been better, but not great. The team still says all the right things, but no one thinks the shoulder isn’t better or that his mechanics are out of whack. In other words, he’s not Buehler, but that means they’re not sure why he’s been bad. Again, the Dodgers have every resource at their disposal, so not having an answer is a bad thing. Worse, it means that expecting him to come back and be good isn’t a matter of fixing something and waiting for it. It seems to be hoping he figures it out.

The team has been creative, using openers, short starts, and bullpen games to augment what they have and to protect it from itself. The young starters especially haven’t been exposed as much, with some creative use of off-days and scheduling to put them in situations where they’re not seeing the same teams and matching them up in ways that I can’t recognize from the outside, but there’s data driving decisions. But all that is a band-aid and they’re running out of those.

All of this relies on not only getting four pitchers back soon, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto at some point - pretty much the entire Dodgers rotation ** - but keeping them healthy the rest of the way. It’s no good to get Kershaw back from his shoulder surgery only to see his back act up. There’s depth in the young pitchers to pick up a spot start or two, but another major injury to any of these with the current roster puts the team in a real bind and would force moves with long term consequences.

One other thing to keep in mind as we head into the trade deadline is that while many storylines will compare the Dodgers and Orioles and contrast the farm systems, it might be the checkbooks *** that matter more. The Dodgers are certainly willing to spend, even after their big off-season and could take on more contract. Patrick Corbin’s deal would be one that could be packaged, as an example. The White Sox are more likely to want the prospects for a rebuild rather than salary space, but there are teams out there that do.

On Landon Knack (100 IP last year), Justin Wrobleski (102 last year, in the Carolina League), and River Ryan (104 last year), I want to talk about innings limits. (The Dodgers obviously like to keep even their starters at around 100 on the minor league season!) I was talking to a baseball insider yesterday who asked how far I thought a particular young pitcher could go this season. My answer was that innings limits and things like the 30-inning rule of thumb I created back in 2003 shouldn’t be the way we do things now. With simple Acute/Chronic Workload Ratio alone, we can do much better than innings and the Dodgers have extensive resources to do even more, if they so choose. All three are young pitchers and you only need to look over at Emmett Sheehan, Buehler, and Dustin May to see that they break down. (Interesting thought: what makes Gavin Stone different? He’s the only healthy one and should probably be included in the innings increase discussion.)

*One source tells me that a Paxton deal in principle has already been agreed to before the move, but that Dodgers owners wanted to see if there was better out there, which is interesting if true.

**I am more and more convinced that Shohei Ohtani will pitch in a game before the end of the season. Maybe in the playoffs, to be clear, but before we put the 2024 campaign to bed. He’s progressed too far and is simply too competitive. And good. I do think it will be as a short reliever.

***Dated reference alert! Who even has a checkbook any more? What’s a better metaphor for comparing the resources of a team’s owner?

MOOKIE BETTS, IF LAD (fractured hand)

The Dodgers do get some good news, with Mookie Betts back to swinging a bat. That’s a big step, with only the added force of hitting things to come.* There’s some question about whether this announced clearance is what most of us would actually consider the first time he’s swung a bat. There have been “no bat swings”, where he watches pitches with no bat in his hands. There’s been “hold bat swings”, where he can start to swing, but not actually at the ball. Anything else on that spectrum? I didn’t get that granular because it doesn’t matter. I’m looking for signs Betts is progressing towards a return, not putting together a murder-board timeline.

What this doesn’t tell us is when Betts will be back. There’s progress, there’s hope, and there’s no reason to think that a fractured bone won’t heal properly with time and … well, pretty much just time. The six to eight week timeline is in play, as it normally is, and again, it comes down to how fast Betts progresses through the next phase rather than what we assume is normal, standard bone healing.

*How much force is that? I asked Claude and the answer - while I can’t be sure if it’s correct - is darned interesting. Seems right. I still don’t know the answer to my batting practice fastball at the Home Run Derby question.

MIKE TROUT, OF LAA (torn meniscus/rehab)

Late word came from SLC that Mike Trout left his first rehab game with knee soreness. Video of him running looked labored and his one at bat was a K. There’s no details yet on why, but it is not unusual after a partial meniscectomy to have further problems. This could be nothing. This could need another surgery, though another meniscectomy shouldn’t cause significant short term problems. (Long term? Different story.) Without details, I don’t want to speculate, but I’ll be covering this in the next UTK. More and more, I keep feeling that Ken Griffey Jr comp is accurate. One older scout I spoke to reminded me that the comp for Griffey was Frank Robinson, who had a down year at age-32. Looking at all three of their B-Ref pages is pretty astounding.

You know what? Let’s make this one free today, because I feel like more people should read this stuff. Why don’t you share it with a friend?

GARRETT CROCHET, SP CWS (no injury)

I mentioned the conversation before about Garret Crochet and how far he could go this season. Again, I’m not locked in on innings counts and I’m certainly not one that thinks pitchers should be on strict limits after coming back from Tommy John surgery*. He had the surgery in early 2022 and came back in normal time, making a cameo in 2023. As a reliever most of his career up to this point, he’s been a revelation this year as a starter. He wasn’t even regularly a starter at Tennessee, though he was slotted to be their ace in the 2020 Covid season.

There’s not a lot for guidance and adding in the complication of the surgery, there’s almost none. While relievers have converted for much of baseball history, most have been starters internally. Someone like Adam Wainwright or Chris Sale did relieve, but it was due to need or was in the Earl Weaver “we’ll start you off in the pen to get your feet wet” kind of mode.

Pedro Grifol used the word “detrain” during a media scrum in late June, but I do not think that’s the correct term. Deload, maybe. The actual plan isn’t disclosed, but Grifol talks about per-inning efficiency, which implies there’s pitch counts or something similar. The White Sox have been one of the worst teams for health after having been one of the best, so I have less confidence they can do this, even though they have very smart people around. Being heard? That part I can’t know from out here.

I don’t think there’s any hard and fast way to put some arbitrary number on it. This feels a bit like training to run a marathon and then deciding to just run the first twenty miles. If that’s the case, couldn’t you run faster? With the Olympics coming up, the concepts for training in other sports come to the fore as we get those sports we only think of every four years front and center, so it’s a tough time to get the experts in training techniques to answer emails, but this is a topic I’ll go back to in the off-season.

In a season where Crochet is far from the only successful reliever conversion, alongside Seth Lugo, Ronel Blanco, and more, I’m wondering if there’s a way to see what relievers this year might make good candidates for next year. Is it a type, stuff, a pitching coach that makes it work, or just an opportunity to succeed in the new role, meaning anyone could conceivably do it? My guess is a lot of AGMs are doing this work right now.

*Here’s a trivia question I don’t know the answer to: Who was the last Tommy John surgery done by Dr. James Andrews?

**A very good point from long time reader West Coast.

JULIO RODRIGUEZ, OF SEA (sprained syndesmosis)

Julio Rodriguez bounced off the outfield wall and hobbled off the field. The injury is one that most wouldn’t have expected, a sprained ankle. Normally, that’s one where you step wrong or step on something. However, video helps this one:

Shoot in landscape, people. You can clearly see that Rodriguez’s cleat catches in the padding and rotates out. That’s a high ankle mechanism in many cases, which is not better or worse, just different. The equivalent-grade high ankle sprain often takes longer to come back from, but it’s a matter of function and this is not a common baseball injury. We don’t have grading on Rodriguez yet … and literally as I’m writing this on Tuesday night, the M’s just pushed Rodriguez to the IL with a high ankle sprain. Nailed it!*

Because this is an unusual-for-baseball injury, the timelines are all over the place. While we don’t have grading, the function is also a question. Rodriguez doesn’t have to cut and stop the way a football player does, but he does have to rotate and run. I could see him coming back quickly if he responds to bracing and I could see this one running long if he doesn’t have a stable base. In other words, broad range and it’s better to wait. He’s out at least ten days, likely more, and I’ll keep working on this one.

*I’ve often wondered what it would be like if I could write UTK in real time - like I type it, you see it. It would be a shambolic experience for most, probably, but you’d get to see the stuff I delete. There’s a LOT of stuff I delete.

RYAN PEPIOT, SP TBR (infected knee)

I doubt the Dodgers regret trading for Tyler Glasnow, but I wonder if they’d like Ryan Pepiot back given the state of their rotation. Did the Rays ask for anyone else and negotiate down? I could see the Rays FO wanting one of the younger pitchers like Sheehan or Ryan, but the deal is done and Pepiot has been your typical make-better Rays project, and he wasn’t even broken.

Pepiot has been really good for the Rays, but somehow got an infection in his knee. It was treated and appears to be cleared, but the drugs used means he needs to be down for about a week. He should be ready at the minimum with no issues, but the infection itself is intriguing. The most common way for an infection to happen is an injection, which we certainly don’t know about and would indicate something else going on in the knee. It could be a drainage (which isn’t technically an injection; the opposite) or an anti-inflammatory. None unusual, but not noted.

The other way this can happen is turf and while the Rays do play on turf, they were on the road when this appears to have happened and his last start at home was July 14. I watched that game on FF and don’t see any play where Pepiot scuffed his knee on the turf, but maybe he was shagging balls or who knows what. Locker rooms are dirty places too, so this is one of those unknowns out here, but my guess is they have a much better idea down there. The Rays will have no issues filling in until he’s back in early August, which could include Jeffrey Springs’ return.

ROBBIE RAY, SP SFG (sprained elbow/rehab)
ALEX COBB, SP SFG (torn hip labrum/strained shoulder)
KEATON WINN, SP SFG (inflamed elbow)

The Giants aren’t where the Dodgers are in terms of their rotation, but they could get some pieces back. Robbie Ray is a true addition, a quirky trade that could upgrade their second half rotation, while Alex Cobb and Keaton Winn could add depth. At least one of those is likely.

Cobb was up at Triple-A for his first start at that level and fifth of his rehab. With the jump, it was his best. 60 pitches, five innings of scoreless ball, and no sign that either the hip or shoulder was an issue. The Giants could have him make one more rehab start with a goal of 75, or they could just bring him up and toss him back in the rotation. If it’s anything close to the efficiency and effectiveness of that last start, why wait? The hope is that Cobb can solidify the back end, where Hayden Birdsong has supplanted Jordan Hicks.

For Keaton Winn, he’s the downside play here. He was shut down with elbow soreness after it recurred with throwing. The nerve issue is along the lines of what Max Fried and Gerrit Cole dealt with - not identical, but similar - and if he needs eight weeks, well, that’s about what the season has left. It’s unclear what the next step is, but every day that he’s not progressing towards a next start makes it less likely it happens in 2024.

Back to the positive! Ray is scheduled to make his Giants debut and return from Tommy John on Wednesday. Given how he’s looked and what he’s done on rehab, there’s no reason to think he can’t go back to being a dominant starter, though we’ve seen more trouble with post-TJ guys getting back to their previous levels and even seeing mechanical breakdowns (see above). If Ray locks in behind Logan Webb and Blake Snell keeps looking like Blake Snell, this is a real rotation again, and the depth, if there, is a plus.

Errata: In all the confusion about when Tyler Glasnow and Clayton Kershaw will be back, I got it backwards in Mondays column. Glasnow on Wednesday, Kershaw on Thursday. The rest of the information was correct.

Quick Cuts:

Kenley Jansen will not travel to Colorado. He told the media he’s needed heart procedures after three trips there and isn’t willing to take the risk. Smart … Jacob deGrom through a pen with up/downs, so he’s getting close. Bruce Bochy said he was mid-90s, also a good sign. If he makes it through his next scheduled pen on Friday, we’re likely to see him on rehab next week … Royce Lewis (groin) played seven innings in a rehab game at 3B, going 0-2 with two walks. He’s expected back Friday … Christian Yelich came out of Tuesday’s game with back tightness and yes, broad range of outcomes … Jorge Mateo collided with Gunnar Henderson on Tuesday. A clean x-ray on his arm is nice, but the fact that they need an MRI to diagnose it tells me more is going on. Follow this one … Jared Jones is expected to get back on a mound this weekend. Positive development and good sign the lat is healing well … Kris Bryant (oblique) was activated Tuesday and went 0-3 with 2 K. Surprisingly, he played right field instead of DHing as expected … Yoan Moncada (groin) had his rehab “paused” for “expected soreness.” Not sure I’m buying what Pedro Grifol is selling, nor was I able to find out if this stopped his rehab clock … JP Crawford joins Rodriguez on the IL. What was described as a pinky fracture is listed as a “hand fracture.” My guess is that’s a technicality and regardless, it comes down to grip strength and #paddedgloves … There were rumors of another setback for Tommy Edman (wrist) but it looks like he’ll be active Wednesday. At this stage, it’s very literally a Missouri “show me” with his performance … If the Reds sell off Nick Martinez and Frankie Montas, who steps in? Is it crazy to think that Rhett Lowder and Chase Burns could team up right now? Probably. Chase Petty? Maybe.