SAN DIEGO –– Another day, another round of discouraging pitching injury news for the Dodgers.
This time, manager Dave Roberts said Monday that both Tyler Glasnow and Brusdar Graterol had “flare-ups” in their backs recently.
For Glasnow, it likely means he will miss at least several more weeks. For Graterol, the prognosis might be much more grim.
Glasnow is almost two weeks removed from a back spasm episode that landed him on the injured list, and was initially expected to incur only a minimum 15-day absence.
Instead, Roberts said Glasnow’s back flared up on him again recently. General manager Brandon Gomes added that he is “gonna take a few days off from throwing, completely kind of reset and re-evaluate.”
Gomes noted that the team still has “no concern long-term” with Glasnow’s recovery, and framed his situation as simply being “a little slower on the front end than we expected.”
Still, with Glasnow set to remain out for the foreseeable future, the Dodgers are planning to insert newly-acquired veteran left-hander Eric Lauer into their rotation at some point next week; ensuring they will maintain a six-man group to balance workloads for the rest of their starters.
“Part of the thinking is to not create this domino effect of chasing our tails,” Gomes said. “(We’re) trying to maintain a similar schedule as we’ve had, and when we can get guys extra days’ rest, do it.”
The news on Graterol was significantly more worrying, following his move to the 60-day IL on Sunday.
After missing all of last year recovering from shoulder surgery, then starting this year on the injured list after struggling to regain his typical velocity during spring training, Graterol was pulled off his minor-league rehab assignment this week with what could be a serious lower back injury.
While the team is still consulting with doctors to determine Graterol’s next steps, Gomes acknowledged that surgery could be on the table for the hard-throwing reliever.
“He’s worked really hard,” Gomes said, “so we’re trying to exhaust all options.”
The Dodgers had previously been hopeful of getting Graterol back somewhat soon, especially amid all the other injuries currently impacting their bullpen (from Edwin Díaz to Brock Stewart to Jack Dreyer and Ben Casparius, who was also transferred to the 60-day injured list Monday).
Instead, they have been forced to continue cycling fresh arms through their relief corps.
The latest reinforcement: Five-year veteran Jonathan Hernández, who signed on Monday and added to the active roster a day after being released from a minor-league contract with the Philadelphia Phillies.
“Never,” Gomes quipped when asked if he was surprised by the team’s latest wave of pitching injuries. “We’ve dealt with this in the past. It’s the reason why you try to go in with as much depth as you can, knowing that things can happen. You hope that they don’t pile up all at the same time, which has happened as of late. But we’ll keep navigating it. We’ll work through it.”
The one piece of good news on Monday: Blake Snell’s scheduled Tuesday surgery to remove loose bodies from his elbow is expected to utilize the less-invasive NanoNeedle arthroscope, Gomes said. If all goes as planned, that means Snell could miss up to a month knocked off his timeline to return, which is typical 2-3 months for normal loose-body removals.
“Obviously, we don’t know 100% until they’re in there,” Gomes said, “but that’s what we’re expecting.”
