The Orioles hope that starting pitcher Zach Eflin’s right shoulder fatigue isn’t serious. Eflin left Monday night’s 5-1 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks after throwing just 73 pitches in six innings.
The 31-year-old right-hander, who was acquired from the Tampa Bay Rays last July 26th, spent 15 days on the injured list last August with right shoulder inflammation. If Eflin goes on the injured list, the Orioles hope it won’t be for long, but those things are hard to predict.
The Orioles have seven pitchers on the injured list. Kyle Bradish and Tyler Wells, who had season-ending elbow surgeries last June, are on the 60-day injured list and won’t pitch any time soon.
On Monday, the Orioles transferred right-hander Albert Suárez from the 15- to 60-day injured list with a strained right subscapularis, the largest and strongest muscle in the rotator cuff. Manager Brandon Hyde told reporters in Phoenix that the 35-year-old’s injury is “going to be months, so hopefully just a few months.”
Starting pitcher Grayson Rodriguez is on the 15-day injured list with right shoulder inflammation. He hopes to return in the next several weeks. Also on the 15-day injured list are right-hander Chayce McDermott (right lat strain), left-hander Trevor Rogers (right dislocated kneecap) and reliever Andrew Kittredge (cartilage removal from left knee).
In recent years, more and more pitchers have spent time on the injured list. Currently, every major league team except the San Francisco Giants has pitchers on the IL. The Philadelphia Phillies and St. Louis Cardinals each have one.
The teams that met in last fall’s World Series, the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees, have a combined 20 pitchers on the injured list. The Dodgers have 12 and the Yankees eight. Another Orioles’ American League East rival, Boston, has six.
The Orioles began the season with Eflin, 41-year-old Charlie Morton, who will start on Tuesday night at Arizona, Dean Kremer, 35-year-old Tomoyuki Sugano and Cade Povich in the rotation.
At the beginning of spring training, Rodriguez was thought to be at the head of the rotation with Eflin, but after his second Grapefruit League start, he was shut down.
Executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias announced Rogers’ injury when spring training began. McDermott’s was disclosed in the first few days of camp. Neither pitched in Grapefruit League games.
Suárez, who pitched in the second game of the season and landed on the IL two days later, was competing with the 24-year-old Povich for the last rotation spot, and was sent to the bullpen when he wasn’t chosen as a starter.
Had he been healthy, Suárez would have moved into Eflin’s spot. Now, the Orioles are in a quandary if Eflin is going to the injured list.
Because of offdays on Thursday and next Monday, they could stay with four starters and add a reliever until a fifth starter is needed on April 19th, but who would that starter be?
Rodriguez won’t be ready, nor will 37-year-old Kyle Gibson, whom the Orioles signed on March 21st. Both conceivably could be ready around May 1st, but that’s three weeks away.
Gibson is scheduled to make his first start for Norfolk on Thursday.
In order to fill the gap, the Orioles could recall a reliever from Triple-A Norfolk. They have four relievers and two potential starters at Norfolk.
Left-handers Craig Wolfram, who was acquired on Monday from Milwaukee, and Luis González, and right-handers Colin Selby and Kade Strowd are on the 40-man roster. González, Selby and Strowd were in spring training with the Orioles, and Selby pitched in three games last season and was on the Wild-Card Series roster.
The two potential starters are Cody Poteet and Brandon Young. Poteet, who was purchased by the Orioles from the Chicago Cubs on March 29th, has pitched only an inning in relief. Poteet has 13 major league starts, four for the New York Yankees.
Young, last year’s Orioles’ minor league pitcher of the year, is scheduled to start on Friday. He allowed four runs on seven hits in 6 1/3 innings, with three walks, five strikeouts and two home runs in three Grapefruit League games. In two starts for Norfolk, he’s pitched 11 1/3 innings without allowing an earned run.
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