And yet another Tiger player is headed to the disabled list. Fernando Rodney, who hasn’t pitched the last few games due to shoulder stiffness was placed on the DL retroactive to May 21st. Zach Miner will take his place.
While the Tigers have weathered the losses of Kenny Rogers and Joel Zumaya, you wonder just how many more injuries this team can handle. The offense has helped cover up the bullpen so far, but there’s probably a limit. The Tigers who had 2 set-up men last year (who many believed should have been closing) have lost both of them.
With so many pitchers getting injured, you really have to wonder about this team’s training staff.
Yeah, what is the deal? Didn’t the Yankees can their trainer after all of their pitchers went down with injuries? Maybe he was just rumored to be fired.
Anyway, you can only afford so many holes in the boat before you can no longer keep up with bailing it out.
I don’t think you can blame the staff. It’s the same staff that kept the team completely healthy all last year, right?
With all these injuries, we probably won’t be able to win the division, but we should have no problem with the wild card. All of the injuries have been short-term, so we’ll have a lot of fresh arms for the stretch run.
I think it is a stretch to connect these injuries to the training staff.
Kenny is out because he had a blod clot in his shoulder. I’m not sure that you can blame any sort of conditioning or lack there of for a blod clot.
Joel is out because of what every source that I’ve read calls a “freak” or a “fluke” injury. I don’t know how any could have predicted, or acted to prevent, a snapped tendon in his middle finger.
Fernando, on the other hand, has an injury that, if it were to become a pattern amongst the pitchers on the team, might make you want to take a look at your training staff. The Yankees, for instance, had a string hamstring injuries (Wang, Mussina, and Hughes), leading people to question their strength and conditioning practices.
For the Tigers, since two of the three injuries are fairly bizarre, I wouldn’t look too hard at their training staff.
The injuries suffered by the Tigers are mostly different: clot (Rogers), blister (Bonderman), dislocation (Zumaya), and 2 tendinitis-type injuries (Wilson and Rodney). Rodgers’ and Zumaya’s injuries are certainly of a freakish nature; we couldn’t blame the training staff on that one. Blisters and tendinitis just happen in baseball. The Yankees fired their strength coach after a bunch of hamstring injuries, most by players NOT following the team’s training program . The Tigers have been free of the recurrent injuries, which indicates that the training staff has a good program and that the team has the faith to follow them. If anything, the willingness to place Rodney and Bonderman on the DL is a sign of the competence of the training staff; they are protecting the players rather than allowing them to play through an injury and causing further damage.
Mike F,
Great point. The Kitty’s have been real cautious with their pitchers. I think if we can stay with the Indians, when these guys get healthy and with adding Miller, we should be pretty set for Aug, Sept, and the playoffs.
-Sam
Well, here I am on my Rodney rant again. Close game, Rodney in, Tigers lose. I did some figuring this morning:
Rodney has pitched 4.3% of the total innings so far this year (that’s figuring 9 inning games, and since we have played in several extra inning games it is probably closer to 4%).
That comes out to about 1 inning pitched every 3 games.
Yet, he has 18.5% of the Tiger losses this season.
He has one less loss than Verlander, Maroth, Durbin, and Bonderman…combined.
He has an ERA of almost 6, which does not count the inherited runners he has let score.
Rodney Danger-in-the-Field “don’t get no respect”, and he doesn’t deserve any. It’s waaaaaaayyy past time to send him and his crooked hat in Mesa’s direction. Like I said before, if he goes in with less than a 2-3 run lead, forget it. Worked on his mechanics in the offseason…didn’t help. Went on the 14 day DL…didn’t help. Hopefully Leyland will give someone else a chance and deal Rodney while he still has some value. Don’t know if that’s possible based on his contract, though.