LOS ANGELES — In addressing the state of the latest injury to ravage the Los Angeles Dodgers’ pitching staff, Andrew Friedman acknowledged a reality and standard workplace hazard.
“I think if you MRI any pitcher’s arm in September, they’re not pristine,” the Dodgers’ president of baseball operations said as rookie Gavin Stone — the lone Dodgers starter not to miss a single turn through the rotation — landed on the injured list with right shoulder inflammation.
Attrition has come for the Dodgers, who are struggling to come up with much of a foundation to survive three rounds in October. Tyler Glasnow is on the shelf, with a thin margin for a return this season. Yoshinobu Yamamoto is nearing a return after being out since June. Clayton Kershaw’s status is uncertain. Emmet Sheehan, Dustin May and River Ryan are all out for the season.
Stone on Friday became the 12th Dodgers starter to land on the injured list, joining eight others still currently on it. Friedman didn’t rule out Stone returning this season, but the odds are slim. The spate of injuries has torn the Dodgers’ offseason plan of addressing their pitching in sheer numbers and left them as uncertain as ever. Twelve arms have made full-fledged starts (not including openers) for the Dodgers this season. Which four start will in October is a different story.
“We’re gonna have enough pitching,” manager Dave Roberts said Friday. “The names might be a little bit different. I don’t think anyone knows who and who won’t be a part of it.”
Friedman sat in triple-digit heat in the home dugout at Dodger Stadium on Friday with little in terms of answers for how his pitching staff has become so whittled down by injury, leaving the organization with serious rotation concerns for the second consecutive postseason.
Andrew Friedman said he doesn’t anticipate Clayton Kershaw needing offseason surgery to address his bone spur in his big toe: “We need to figure out for him to throw 80-90 pitches in a comfortable enough way.”
— Fabian Ardaya (@FabianArdaya) September 6, 2024
He’s not alone. The Atlanta Braves have managed to remain in postseason contention without reigning NL MVP Ronald Acuña Jr. — and without ace Spencer Strider for the season, as well as Reynaldo López and Max Fried missing time. The Tampa Bay Rays have been without ace Shane McClanahan all season and have been without Shane Baz, Drew Rasmussen and Jeffrey Springs for significant stretches. Kyle Bradish, John Means and Grayson Rodriguez — all significant parts of the Baltimore Orioles’ pitching plans — are out with injuries.
Friedman acknowledged industry-wide concerns but noted the Dodgers will spend time investigating and “reimagining” inward this winter when it comes to their pitching development and protocols.
“It’s been a really challenging year on that front and something that we’re going to need to spend a lot of time on this winter to really dig in on,” Friedman said. “From when we onboard a pitcher, when we draft or trade for him, through the development path, at the major-league level, obviously, it’s a problem in the industry, and the injuries that are happening to us, we feel.
“Injuries that are happening to other teams, we don’t feel as much. It doesn’t hit home quite the same way. And so we’re going to do everything we can to put ourselves in the best position going forward.”
Stone, in many ways, has represented a developmental success for the Dodgers. After getting blasted for a 9.00 ERA in 31 innings in his first taste of the big leagues a year ago, he emerged at the end of spring as a surprise to make the club’s Opening Day rotation. It took until Friday for him to leave it, making 25 starts with a 3.53 ERA to go with a professional career-high of 140 1/3 innings. Tweaks to his delivery, and notably to his arsenal, unlocked some of the ability that had made Stone a top-100 prospect just a couple of years ago.
To curb his workload, Stone hadn’t thrown more than 90 pitches in an outing in more than a month. Then, after throwing 84 pitches over five innings Saturday against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Stone complained of discomfort in his right shoulder.
“He is a great story,” Friedman said.
It had a familiar ending.
As the Dodgers sort through answers, all there is right now are theories.
“If someone says, ‘I have it figured out,’ I wouldn’t listen to them,” Kershaw told The Athletic earlier this year.
“I just think throwing a baseball, especially pitching, is not a motion that’s normal,” Ryan Pepiot, a former Dodgers prospect, said last month. “It’s just not. I just think it’s a combination of a lot of things. Could the pitch clock be a thing? Yeah, it probably could. … Guys are trying to throw as hard as they can, trying to spin the ball just to try to miss bats.”
Friedman’s theory?
“I think a lot of this starts at the youth level, and it’s a little bit circular from amateur players thinking what major-league teams want and trying to seek that at a point either with not the right instruction or too young with growth plates still open,” Friedman said. “There are a lot of factors, but then we can’t control that, or at least I cannot, the Dodgers cannot. And it’s really about understanding when we’re onboarding a guy. And the one thing I know for sure is there’s no one-size-fits-all approach, and it’s how to really be able to individualize how we bring pitchers along, and it’s getting to know how they recover and things that we’ve been trying to track and know.”
Friedman pointed to their propensity for giving starters extra rest. Since he took over in 2015, the Dodgers entered Friday with 1,265 games started by pitchers who were on extra rest — at 129 such starts this year, they were on pace for the most in a single season in that period.
Since 2015, there have been 232 instances where relievers have made 70 or more appearances in a season. Just eight have been by Dodgers, and none since Blake Treinen had 72 games pitched in 2021.
“I can’t imagine there’s a team that has their guys go on extra rest more than us,” Friedman said. “Looking at bullpen usage, we’re near the more conservative, near the top in terms of being conservative. That’s not helping in terms of staving off injuries.
“And so all of this, we need to re-evaluate and be thoughtful about and acknowledge and appreciate what we don’t know. There’s some we know, and there’s a lot we don’t know, and just do everything we can to more thoughtfully create this individualized program. And we started some, it’s hard when we’re going through a regular season and the volume of games, but we’ll put together a group and be really thoughtful about it this offseason, and rethink some of how we bring our pitchers along, and the bet that it will be anywhere from somewhat productive to incredibly productive.”
Answering that question might be impossible.
(Photo of Gavin Stone: Christian Petersen / Getty Images)
