AJC > Sports > Braves > Blog > Archives > 2008 > May > 02
Friday, May 2, 2008
Are pitchers doomed to injury?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Hear me out just a minute….Hey, you have to, it’s my blog. Well, it’s David O’Brien’s blog, but I get to commandeer it from time-to-time (hint, Coach, this means it’s not DOB at the wheel today).
All these arm injuries piling up got me to thinking. Yes, I know they’ve always been part of baseball, all the more in recent years, but it’s been on the brain quite a bit with all the Smoltz news, the Peter Moylan news, the Soriano news, and the fact that I just got back from extended spring training where I saw Tommy John survivors Mike Gonzalez and Anthony Lerew.
Let’s just say that If I had a dime for every time I’ve typed “elbow,” or “shoulder” or “reconstructive surgery,” I’d be, well, you know, able to afford gas.
So my thought? What is up with baseball?
In other sports, when players get hurt, isn’t it very often for doing something fluky? Something bad happens. A running back gets tackled low as he’s making an awkward cut, or a lineman rolls up on some unsuspecting somebody’s knee. Or a linebacker goes in head down on a tackle, and God forbid, breaks his neck.
Or a quarterback makes a perfectly good throw, somebody hits him just as he releases, at just the wrong angle, and the shoulder pops out of joint.
Or in basketball, a power forward goes up to make a rebound and comes down on somebody’s foot. There goes the ankle.
But in baseball, aren’t these pitchers just doing exactly what they’re supposed to be doing? They’re pitching. They’re doing their job, and then boom, things inflame, ligaments blow.
There’s nobody bum-rushing the mound and trying to pull anybody’s arm out of socket - it’s just how it is. Nothing has to happen. Shoot, a guy like Moylan can throw the best inning of his life - hitting 97 mph on the radar gun, striking out Ryan Zimmerman and collecting the second save of his career - then he wakes up the next day and his elbow is toast.
And Moylan throws side-arm, which I’m assuming (hey, I was pre-med, but I only got a C in organic chemistry) is healthier for his arm, a safer way to throw.
The only answer we can really point to is innings thrown, perhaps (or something from his wacky Australian childhood cricket games). But that’s nebulous too. Who’s to say had Moylan had thrown 75 innings instead of 90 last year he wouldn’t be where he is? If it were so black-and-white about pitch counts, how come all the minor league guys who come up so protected are blowing ligaments left and right too? Mark Prior, Kerry Wood, anyone?
So what is the problem? Is throwing a baseball - or at least throwing one 95 miles an hour or with a disgusting break - just a completely unnatural thing to do? Ever take a hard look at photos of pitchers as they’re just about to let the ball fly? Maybe it’s just those of us who’ve had shoulder surgery, but geez, sometimes I have to look away. The torque, the way the arm bends back. (And more often than not, the scar that’s exposed right there in the photo, in all its ugly glory.)
Is this a completely unnatural thing we’re watching or what? Gosh, I know, I’m about to start sounding like a woman, here. (Just saving you guys from saying it first.) What can I say, the over-protective instincts come with the extra X chromosome. And yes I think NASCAR is a mostly-stupid sport (sorry). I have my issues with boxing too.
But is there anything to be done, short of drafting players at age 12 and making them pitch their formative years underwater? (Weird, I know, it just came out.)
All pitchers can’t be born to throw like Maddux and Glavine who settle into pitching in the 80s, and at least from the look of it, and the history, do it without putting so much stress on the arm.
I wonder too if the game is conspiring against the pitchers. The bandbox ballyards, the shrinking strike zone, the tightly-wound balls, the radar gun in every ballpark (though, I appreciate those, I have to say).
And the mound is so low. I know. I walked over one once in the bullpen along the left field line in San Francisco on my way to a Division Series press conference in some room under the left field bleachers. Maddux, who was walking out to the press conference too, saw me sneak a step up onto the mound and said: “Not as high as you think it is, is it?” No.
Baseball is doing its part now to take the ‘roided-out hitter out of the equation, and maybe some ‘roided out pitchers have had their own issues. But is there anything more to be done, or are we on a cycle now that means we’d better just suck it up? Pitchers are going to miss time, have multiple surgeries, and that’s the way it goes.
Maybe it’ll just become part of the routine - and maybe it already has - for pitchers like Gonzalez to have a bionic arm, having had surgeries on both his elbow and shoulder. And Smoltz, who blew out his elbow, to then have problems creep up to his shoulder.
Or is there a way out? Doctors like Dr. James Andrews and the Braves own Dr. Joe Chandler have been preaching “No curveballs until you shave” to anybody who will listen. They urge kids to take three months off from any overhand throwing. They want parents and coaches to get the damn radar guns off their 13 and 14-year-olds who are trying to throw 85.
And these are guys who get paid for fixing these things. But shoot, they’re overworked. And both happen to be gentlemen, with real concern for pitchers’ health, but hey, let’s not interrupt this blog with goo-goo, gah-gah.
I’m not really sure where else to go with this other than to throw it open for anyone who’s interested in chipping in. All I can say is it perplexes me. But at least I feel a little better for saying so.
Home sweet home: The Braves are 8-4 at Turner Field and 4-11 on the road this season, so the Braves at least have that going for them tonight when they kick off a six-game homestand against the Reds.
Or perhaps this: the Braves are 7-13 with DOB covering, and 5-2 with moi. I got today and tomorrow, and I’ll be taking bribes to cover Sunday as well. (Kidding. Let’s not give the boss man any ideas.)
Doggie-snatcher: It doesn’t appear Maddux will be going for No. 350 in our presence. He’s scheduled to pitch Sunday in Florida and not in the three games the Padres will play at Turner Field Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.
The 12-17 Reds are no pushover: And the Braves should remember that from last year, losing six out of seven to them. And this kid Edinson Volquez going tonight, who came in a trade from Texas for Josh Hamilton is leading the National League with a 1.23 ERA. Perhaps National League hitters are still trying to adjust. Or he’s just really good.
The trade’s not working out too bad for Texas either. Hamilton is leading the majors with 32 RBIs, hitting .322 for the Rangers with six homers. He’s ranked sixth in the AL with a .947 OPS.
Stop the madness: Sure the Braves are a well-documented 0-9 in one-run games this season. But did you know this? Here are the guys they gotta beat to stay out of the cellar for record in one-run games over the course of a season since the start of divisional play in 1969. And they’d better get cracking.
(The numbers come compliments of former AJC scribe Gerry Fraley, whom you read an old story by in a DOB blog last week.)
1999 Royals 11-32 .256 1975 Astros 16-41 .281 1981 Padres 12-30 .286 1985 Rangers 11-27 .289 2007 Orioles 13-31 .295
Come back on board tonight, I’ll be keeping you in the loop on the latest stuff. That is, if you can tear yourself away from the Hawks game.
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