Walker Buehler will miss “a good bit of time,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said, after the pitcher was put on the injured list Saturday because of a right forearm strain.
Exactly how long he will be out won’t be determined, however, until the team receives the results of an MRI exam Buehler took Saturday afternoon in Los Angeles.
Buehler was injured during his start against the San Francisco Giants on Friday night, when he said something “grabbed” in his elbow while he threw a breaking ball in the third inning.
“This was just a little bit different,” said Buehler, who added he has regularly experienced various feelings in his elbow ever since he underwent Tommy John surgery as a prospect in 2015. “[It is] something we need to check out.”
While Roberts didn’t yet know the specifics of Buehler’s injury before Saturday’s game, he said his estimation that the pitcher would be out “a good bit of time” was based on the “part of the arm, the history with it, how it manifested last night, knowing that we a lot of times take the conservative approach to get a player back.”
On Saturday, Clayton Kershaw will make his return from a monthlong absence caused by a back injury. Andrew Heaney could be back from a shoulder injury as soon as June 19, with the left-hander scheduled to make one more minor league rehabilitation start Tuesday.
His ERA was 4.02, the highest it has been through 12 starts in his career. His strikeout rate and walks plus hits per inning pitched (WHIP) were at career-worst levels. And he had pitched into the seventh inning only twice, something he had done with regularity last season.
Buehler said his elbow injury wasn’t to blame for his subpar performance, though, and didn’t even believe it impacted his pitches at the end of Friday’s start.
Roberts agreed with that assessment Saturday. The manager also said that, while Buehler had been tinkering with his mechanics in recent weeks in search of more productive results, he couldn’t say whether it had any impact on Friday’s injury.
What the Dodgers do know is that, for at least the foreseeable future, their rotation will be without its opening day starter and supposed 27-year-old ace — a pitcher whom, up until his elbow started to hurt Friday, they were still heavily counting on this season.
source: Los Angeles Times
