CHICAGO—Oriole starting pitcher John Means, who was placed on the 15-day injured list on Thursday, is back in Baltimore meeting with doctors and discussing next steps.
“We haven’t gotten the results back yet,” manager Brandon Hyde said. “He’s meeting with them this afternoon, and we’re hoping for the best.”
Means, who left Wednesday’s game in St. Louis after three innings, has a left forearm strain.
Wednesday was just his eighth start since having Tommy John surgery in April 2022.
“It’s disappointing because he’s worked so hard to get back,” Hyde said. “He was a huge boost for us in September last year after the long road back. He was throwing the ball well. You could tell something was off yesterday. Hopefully, we’ll get good news …”
After four starts in September, Means was not put on the roster for the American League Division Series against Texas because of soreness in his left elbow. The team delayed his season for a month as a precaution.
“It’s in the elbow area,” Hyde said. “I don’t know if it was exactly the same soreness or where he was feeling it, but it was in his elbow.”
Hyde said he didn’t see anything wrong in Means’ first three starts.
“For us, it was the first time it was noticeable,” he said. “The velocity was down a little bit. He felt like he could still push through. He still wanted to pitch.”
Hyde had been talking about a six-man rotation since the Orioles have just two offdays between now and July 1st, but he’s not thinking long-term now.
“We’re really waiting to see what happens, kind of with the news, maybe the timetable on John,” Hyde said. “It’s so fresh we haven’t mapped out what we’re doing yet … Anything could happen going forward, too. That’s why it’s so hard to plan too far ahead. That’s why I’m always a little wishy-washy on my answers about when we’re going to do certain things because things like this come up. You kind of just roll with it.”
Cole Irvin, who had been moved to the bullpen, pitched in relief of Means and presumably will slide into his rotation spot.
“It was nice that Irv was able to go out there yesterday,” Hyde said. “You want to have starting pitcher depth in this league right now and, hopefully, ours does well.
“You can’t have enough starters. You can’t have enough pitching, period. We’ve still got a long way to go. A lot of things can happen. We’re going to be relying on our depth. We’re going to be relying on guys in Triple-A. We feel good about the roster we have. Hopefully, they can pick up the pieces.”