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.

The news wasn’t good out of New York this afternoon. Joel Zumaya, who injured his hand warming up Saturday night, has a ruptured tendon in the middle finger on his throwing hand. It will require surgery which Zumaya will have performed by Dr. Charles Monroe on Thursday. Zumaya is expected to miss 12 weeks.

Getting by for a couple weeks is a lot different than having to cope for half of a season. Rodney is certainly capable of picking up a good deal of the slack, but who picks up Rodney’s slack? With the combination of set-up men Jim Leyland could either double up their innings on a given night, or have them each pitch one inning shortening the game to six innings. That luxury is gone now.

Jose Mesa will be called on, as will the lefty duo of Wil Ledezma and Bobby Seay who will likely see more LOOGY situations.

I’d expect that the Tigers will not rely on Aquilino Lopez and will either a)reach down to the minors and select one of their starting pitchers (like Virgil Vasquez or Zach Miner) or look to acquire another arm.

The other possible side effect of this is that Jim Leyland stays with his starters deeper into games. The additional workload on each starter would probably amount to no more than 5-6 innings total. As long as it doesn’t invoke pitch counts of 120+ regularly that wouldn’t be so bad.

The longer term ramifications aren’t as pleasant to think about. The middle finger is the last part of the pitcher’s body to have contact with the baseball. Any lack of feel or confidence could be devastating. This isn’t a shoulder which exists to generate a ton of torque, this is the delicate part. I’m neither a doctor nor a pitcher, but I fear that coming back from this particular injury will be much more difficult than just having the doctor go in and fix it up.

Joel Zumaya has been placed on the 15 day disabled list. It appears that he dislocated a finger on his throwing hand while warming up. Aquilino Lopez had a very short sojurn with Toledo and has been recalled.

Unlike the Jose Mesa injury, this one is going to sting. Fortunately, Fernando Rodney seems to have corrected his earlier problems. This will mean more high leverage situations for both lefties, Wil Ledezma and Bobby Seay, as well as Jose Mesa. I’d anticipate seeing Jim Leyland playing the platoon advantages more often now without Zumaya available to shut down the 8th inning.

The Tigers placed Jose Mesa on the 15 day disabled list retroactive to April 17th. Mesa’s injury is a groin pull. Aquilino Lopez’s contract was purchased from Toledo to take Mesa’s spot. Lopez has 4 saves and 6 1/3 scoreless innings this year. He’s only allowed 1 hit and 2 walks while fanning 6. Lopez is a right hander and will turn 32 tomorrow (nice birthday present).

Edward Campusano was transferred from the 15 to 60 day DL to free up a spot on 40 man roster.

I’m thinking the impact of this will be minimal. Mesa only has a couple of appearances and only one came in a game that was still in question. He wasn’t a key cog in the pen. If anything it may mean a little extra work for Bobby Seay. Given Mesa’s performances this year this could be a good thing (although I’m not someone to root for guys injuries).

As an aside, every time I hear about a groin injury I can’t help but think of the Cheers where Sam Malone filled in as a sportscaster and rapped “g-g-groin, g-g-groin, g-g-groin injury.’

So I’m watching the game on ESPN and they announce that Kenny Rogers had successful surgery to remove a blood clot and fix 2 arteries. I run to the computer and my site goes down. So I’m sorry if you were trying to hit the site between 1:30 and 4:00. It’s also the reason I’m so late to the blog with this.

D-Town Baseball seems to have the authoritative link round-up, so if you’re looking to see who said what, he’s got it.

Rogers of course is expected to miss half the season. It will be 6 to 8 weeks of rest, and then hopefully he can start throwing again. Being that he’s an athlete he may heal a little quicker than a typical person. But being that he’s 42 he may heal a little slower than a typical athlete. In any case, it will probably take him a minimum of 6 weeks to build the arm up once he can resume activity.

So while it wasn’t a worst case, career ending injury (not yet anyways), it is a far cry from needing a week or rest and some aspirin.
Continue reading Kenny Rogers out 3 months →

I fully expected some players to go on the DL this week, like Roman Colon and Edward Campusano. Didn’t see Wilson and Rogers as part of the mix though.

Wilson has been bothered by some tenderness in his elbow and it has landed him on the 15 day DL. He played yesterday, but I’m guessing he didn’t feel to good today.

Mike Rabelo will assume back-up catching duties. He’s already on the 40 man roster so it won’t require additional moves.