26
2012
Video: Pelfrey To Have Tommy John Surgery
An article by 
(Video courtesy of SNY)
Mike Pelfrey will undergo Tommy John Surgery on his right elbow, and miss the remainder of the season.
His recovery and return could be anywhere between 12 and 18 months depending on how the elbow responds and any potential setbacks. Pelfrey does have youth on his side which could bode well for him.
Pelfrey was placed on the 15-day disabled list yesterday after an MRI revealed swelling in his right elbow on Tuesday.
Andy Martino of the Daily News later reported that Pelfrey’s MRI was sent to Dr. James Andrews in Birmingham, Alabama for a second opinion. But now he’ll fly down to see Dr. Andrews tomorrow and have the surgery to repair the UCL in his elbow.
Today I responded to a MMO Mailbag question that asked:
Have we seen the last of Mike Pelfrey?
Difficult to say right now because his diagnosis and treatment has yet to be determined. If Pelfrey can avoid surgery I’m certain he will be back. But if it’s determined that he will need surgery to repair a torn ligament in his right elbow, then Pelfrey may have pitched his last game for the Mets. Pelf is owed $5.8 million for this season and has one more year of arbitration left. Under the rules of the CBA he cannot be tendered less than 80% of his current salary if the Mets want to bring him back. That would mean paying him $4.6 million without any guarantee that he will be back before August of next season. He would most definitely be non-tendered after this season, making him a free agent that Scott Boras will showcase whenever he is throwing off a mound again.
Tough break for Pelf…
About the Author: Joe DeCaro
I'm a lifelong Mets fan who loves writing and talking about the Amazins' 24/7. From the Miracle in 1969 to the magic of 1986, and even the near misses in '73 and '00, I've experienced it all - the highs and the lows. I started Mets Merized Online in 2005 to feed my addiction. Follow me on Twitter @metsmerized.
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|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Mets | 27 | 40 | .403 | 12.5 |
| Marlins | 22 | 48 | .314 | 19.0 |
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At least they have 2 starters to go to with Schwinden for now since they can’t call Hefner up for 7 days I believe. Then Hefner down the road if needed.
Meanwhile Young now has the opening in the rotation as soon as he can show he is ready to be called up.
he could come back up because it was for an injury replacement. He only has to wait if they are just swapping around healthy players.
Ahh OK, thx for the info Any.
And the 2010-2011 hammer drops early, is this for real, the only, I am going to hate myself for this, pitcher over the last run of starts that has looked good is hurt, hope it is not the dreaded 3 words pitchers don’t want to hear, “Call……..”!
Now the depth in Mets minors will be revealed or disappear
As I said all winter, giving Pelfrey $6 million was a BIG mistake! To all those who cited him being a workhorse after he got that deal, all that wear and tear for a mediocre talent wasn’t worth the investment.
he is not that old. should not have too much wear and tear.
based on that logic, you would never sign any FA pitcher, and the Phils must have been insane to sign 2 ancient guys to huge, LT deals, with way more miles on their arms.
A 1 year deal for a 28 YO that has not had any injury issues is about as low risk as you can get in MLB.
What do you mean “with that logic” just because he offered his opinion on Pelfrey doesn’t mean he feels that way about all pitchers. Everybody is different.
you totally missed his point regarding Risk/Reward!
He did say a lot of miles on an arm that hasn been mediocre at best!
The Phillies arms have a lot of miles but none ar mediocre!
Does the Mets organization know you’re available for the GM job?
He was pitching so well that I knew there had to be something wrong with him!
Anyway, we’re in trouble. We’ve got no depth at all. Ah well, it’ll still be fun watching all the kids play this year. Maybe. I hope.
Not that I’m a fan of his, but if that was Mike Pelfrey’s last start as a Met, at least he went out in good fashion.
Looks like he pitches better hurt than if he is fine.
HHHHHHHHHhhhhhAAAaaaaaahAHAHAHAHAHAhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaa,
Ohhhhhhhhhhh this is just great!
What a fun year this is going to be!
What a shame. I’m no fan of Pelfrey, but he did pitch fairly well so far this year. The question is, what bum will replace him? The next Nelson Figueroa, Miguel Batista, et al.
Mets officials are aware that Mike Pelfrey has suffered a partial tear of the ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow and are bracing to lose the right-hander to season-ending surgery, a major league source told ESPNNewYork.com.
http://espn.go.com/blog/new-york/mets/post/_/id/43539/source-pelfrey-had-partial-ucl-tear
Pelfrey has a non-guaranteed contract does this mean he does not get paycheck now?
he still gets paid. the contract was guaranteed once the season starts. besides, they can’t lose it (or get sent down if eligible) while on the DL.
Damn. Three guys on the DL in the space of 24 hours. One likely out for the season.
I actually feel bad for Pelfrey.
This is shaping up to be some season already.
Wow…so Pelf pitched very well while injured…but, when he is healthy he pitches like garbage. Maybe he should just go with it. Either way, Schwinden or Pelf…whatever…one stinks and the other is an unkown. Better off going with the unknown in this case.
I wonder if all of the people who rushed on here to knock “sabermetrics” and “pitch counts” when Pelfrey was taken out and not allowed to finish the game are now taking back their comments since they didn’t know anything about what was going on?
I’m not sure what sabermetrics has to do with pitch counts but Pelfrey really hasn’t been allowed to throw an inordinate amount of pitches throughout his career and he still got hurt.
Right, maybe if Pelfrey like other pitchers were conditioned to go longer in the minors or even when he first came up instead of being babied he may have a stronger arm.
Never seen so many injuries in my life, and i’m talking about all of baseball. I can’t remember pitchers getting hurt so often growing up. Never like this – and complete games were the norm not the exception.
He barely had a cup of coffee in the minors, maybe if he actually spent some time there and conditioned properly you’d be right. Just another player rushed through the system.
“Right, maybe if Pelfrey like other pitchers were conditioned to go longer in the minors or even when he first came up instead of being babied he may have a stronger arm.”
Quick Bayonne! Pelfrey wasn’t conditioned in the minors because… why? Because he pitched in 33 games in the minors.
Also, lets not act like Pelfrey’s conditioning at a young age is why he had this injury. He 785 innings in 4 straight years in the big leagues. He was a workhorse, so I’m not sure why you’re preaching about conditioning when he pitched a ton of innings.
the ACL is not a conditioning issue anyway. this is a wear item. If anything, pitching more is going to wear it out faster.
Bad mechanics probably has more to do with many pitcher injuries than not pitching enough.
This! You can not build up ligaments you can wear them down and you can tear them making them do movements they are not meant to do but there is no way to build up a ligament.
In fact working out can have the opposite affect where ligaments are concerned.
Build the muscle mass TOO Much and the ligament can not handle the mass and will suffer!
All ligaments do is hold the bones and joints together and give the joint stability!
Add more Muscle mass to the bones the ligaments are supposed to hold puts more stress on them and make them fray and snap!
Just one more thing to point our regarding your statement on Mechanics….
I have said for a long time now that Pelfrey is all arm and has no leg drive in his mechanics.
That means whatever velocity he is getting is due to arm whip and that almost ALWAYS leads to arm issues of one sort or another!
It should be noted that pelfrey changed his windup this year.
I have to think that it added some more stress in his Arm Whip which is probably what caused this injury!
A Pitcher really needs to use his lower body to generate the velocity the way Seaver did.
And I can’t understand why this isn’t being done in our MiL development.
And Halladay has 968 Innings pitched in the last 4 years (2008-2011) Thats more innings in the last 4 years than Pelfrey has in his entire career!!!!
So whats was your point about Innings and Injuries again?
It probably has nothing to do with it, but if it rains out one it gets blamed on the saber – goons. Whatever that means.
Oh please he felt it from the first inning so no amount of Pitch counts would have helped!
He did this before the game probably in his last start or BP session!
So unless your insinuating that the pitched too much the previous game your pitch count defense doesn’t hold even a spittle of water!
ligaments fray over time. It might finally snap or tear, but it isn’t a case of being perfectly fine and just spontaneously failing by throwing a couple of pitches too many.
I know stick, was just trying to stop the crap that Limitng pitch counts stops those things from happening because the really don’t!
Only thing that can stop that is extra rest between pitching truthfully.
This inury has probably been a long time coming, has nothing to do with how many innings or pitches pelfrey has thrown and could be the simple matter of a rough bone fraying that tendon over time!
We will lose him but thankfully elbow surgeries are not the great mystery they once were.
And for a guy like Pelf those surgeries can even help his stuff better in some cases.
Only Power pitchers really suffer from Elbow stuff. Pelf is not really a power pitcher and it might add some sink to his sinker!
I guess the next team that he plays for will find that out.
Kind of sucks for him if he finishes out his FA season on the DL, rehabbing from TJ. Will anyone sign him for next year?
I’m sure someone will take a chance on him…
There is always one GM out there who thinks he is smarter and better at developing players than everyone else who will take a shot on Pelfrey thinking he can fix him.
He probably won’t get 5 Mil though, just a MiL contract until he shows he can pitch.
Agree, this has little to do with pitch count – not if Mike admitted he felt a tug from the get-go on Saturday. If pitchers used to have shorter careers and became less effective in the late innings due to fatigue, I would agree more with the pitch count. But that wasn’t the case. It was common for starters to pitch over 200 innings and start on three days rest, not four. Yes, they also spent their time on the disabled list but not like it is today.
Yes, Tommy John and other types of surgeries do enable pitchers to prolong their careers where decades ago it would have meant looking for another job, however, with all the modern medical and training methods available to pitchers today, one would think there would also be less injuries, not more. And today’s players keep themselves in shape all year, not like it was decades ago when spring training also meant getting back into shape (I remember a Daily News article from 1972 with the back page full of pictures of Tom Seaver and others after they arrived in training camp – the paper was so amazed at how trim and in shape they already were that it was the sports headline for the day).
No, the increase in arm trouble has to stem from something else. Again, it’s not that they are not in shape and perhaps it has little to do with physical strength as it does with the arm itself not getting enough work to build up endurance toward the unusual strain of throwing a baseball.
I do recall a study that proclaimed statistical analysis showed those who pitched a few less innings a season extended the efficiency of their arm toward the latter part of their careers. If that is the case, then why would teams bother with pitch counts with their younger pitchers since players rarely spend an entire career with one team? Why not let it be some other general manager’s headache instead? After all, I do not remember that study saying a few less innings had any real impact on a player during his prime. And it wasn’t rare to see a pitcher in his mid thirties still throwing well before the days of the pitch count, either.
If I had to take a guess at what caused this I would guess it was Pelfrey who worked so hard in the offseason (remember the stories in Spring?) that he never really rested the arm enough to heal from the wear and tear of last year.
People somtimes forget that the workout isn’t what builds the muscle it is the rest in between the workouts where the muscles add mass and repair (making them stronger in the proccess) the damage from the workouts.
No Bay or Pelfrey to annoy the heck out of me..Things are starting to look up.
too bad–because as much as Pelfrey frustrates me, Schwinden flat-out stinks.
Nickname time…
Chris Schwinden – South Park
Scott Hairston – Gummy Bear
Lucas Duda – Boo Radley
Niewenhuis – Captain Kirk
Any others?….
Ike Davis- Ike Cold lol
i always thought that hairston looked like the” thing” from the fantastic four.
My guess is that after Schwinden’s start, either they retain him in the rotation or bring back Hefner. I liked what I saw from Hef and would like to see more of him on the big league level.
Anyone taking bets on when Harvey or Familia will hit the big time?
not soon.
and wait, you mean Buffalo isn’t the big time? Who knew!
It is for Beef on Weck and those little chicken flappers.
Not till August the earliest!
and even then I would bet not until September.
Only way I see one of them getting promoted is if they Trade Santana which almost looks possible if he keeps pitching like he did tonite.
I knew Chris Young would eventually be needed on this team. Now if he could just hurry up and make a few quality starts for us before he goes down again with shoulder problems because this Chris Schwin kid suxx. Seriously. Hefner should be the temporary answer until Young is ready and then The Return of The Great Meijia.
MOISES ALOU!!!!!
So was that Pelfrey’s last start as a Met? If he is sure to be out for TJ surgery then there is no way the Mets offer arbitration at the end of the season. I am sure they will maybe try to bring him back on a lesser deal but…
assuming TJ, will any team sign him for next year? maybe on a cheap 3 year deal, with the expectation you get nothing in 2013, and a below market rate for the next 2 years?
Or he may just rehab as a FA, and sign mid-season if he can prove to be ready to go.
really crappy timing for him though, that is for sure.
He’s for sure not getting a multi-year deal. I am guessing the Mets will treat him just like Chris Young. Let him get healthy, try out for teams and hope that he really loved being around NY. I don’t expect him to even get an MLB deal. Stinks for him I guess.
Who was that guy the Yankees signed some years back like this? He was hurt, and going to miss most if not all of the next season, but they signed him for a 2-3 year deal (on the cheap), basically planning to stash him on the 60day DL for the 1st year, while hoping to have him back, effective, for the rest of the contract on the cheap?
But in this case, I think you are right. pelf will be a FA until mid season, though with all the rehab time and building back up, wouldn’t it be considered normal for him not to be back (for real) until 2014?
Yeah but with him having a year of arbitration left, I think? Maybe some team will sign him after to a deal in the middle of next year then look at offering him arbitration?
That was Jon Leiber. They signed him even though he was unable to pitch but they locked him up on a 3 year deal. Only the Yankees would do something like that.
Still waiting on the ticket prices to drop to absolutely nothing. Should be able to get some nice deals in another week or so.
Come on – stay positive. This team will be there all year long.
LOL…..
And in a month they will start paying us to come to games
Dr. Andrews has made millions off of the MLB….Does this guy ever get over booked during baseball season???
Talk about monopoly
I’m surprised Fred Coupons didnt send Pelf to N’awlins to the witch doctor Madame Zelda
I don’t know if Pefrey’s future will be with the Mets but I wish him well on his surgery. Hopefully he comes back stronger just not whenever he faces the Mets if it comes to that.
well, citi field will then be an NL east road game, so no chance of that.
So we still are paying Pelfrey for no wins.
Too bad about Pelf despite his early season pitching.
I wish him a quick recovery and health and being able to pitch again.
I wonder how long the wear and tear that finally necessitated Mike having to undergo Tommy John surgery might have been affecting his pitching Could it have been brewing last season which could in part explain his lousy season?
Just asking, not making a statement.
Hi Joey D,
I don’t know if you remember but Pelfrey at the start of last season did reveal that he played through pain in his shoulder for if I remember a large part of 2010. Though his problem now is in the elbow your original question of if it could have been brewing since last season is plausible and like in 2010 he just never said nothing. Of course this is highly speculative on my part but something worth consideration.
Thanks North,
I did remember that but not having such knowledge of the medical field I was not sure if the shoulder problem was directly connected to or could have caused extra stress to the elbow leading up to his injury today. We do know that he started off well in 2010 and after a shaky start, the same in 2011 but faltered the latter half of both seasons.
Agreed on not knowing if there is a correlation between the shoulder issue and the elbow. Merely pointing out the plausibility in your speculation of the elbow issue brewing since last season in that if indeed the case their is precedent of him keeping quite with past injuries.
In many cases minor injuries lead to mechanical flaws that can then create more major injuries elsewhere!
Pain in the shoulder could force him to use his shoulder/upper arm less and his lower arm more which could lead to increased stress on the elbow.
This is almost often seen with Knee and Leg Injuries with Pitchers.
They lose some drive from the injured leg, struggle to maintain velocity and stress the upper body and wind up with shoulder and arm problems.
The body is a remarkable machine that can handle and disperse stress in a variety of ways all across the parts. But injury to one part can upset that apple cart rather quickly and cause undue stress elsewhere and the entire system breaks down!
Hi Metsi,
Thanks for you insight. To be honest, I just did not have the desire to take on the sabers and pitch count supporters on this one and that’s why I left it an open question instead of a hypothesis.
Not that I wanted to avoid a friendly exchange of perspectives – I’m just tired of being on receiving end of sarcastic personal remarks or playing with words once again instead of just having reasons presented to prove me possibly wrong. And that’s the shame of it all.