Michael Pineda Diagnosed With Torn Labrum
According to MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch, Michael Pineda has been diagnosed with an “anterior labral tear”, and surgery is set for May 1st. Compared to elbow surgery, which has become almost routine at this point, recoveries from shoulder problems have not gone nearly as well. Since we don’t know the extent of the tear, it is impossible to say that this is the worst case scenario for the Yankees, but it’s certainly not the news the team was hoping for.
Given that he’s having shoulder surgery next week, it’s probably safe to say that Pineda is done for the season. Even a minor procedure is going to put him on the shelf for months, and it’s not clear that there would be enough time left in the minor league season for him to build his arm strength back up to get back to where he would need to be to pitch in the Major Leagues. And, of course, this might not be a minor procedure.
Given that the Yankees parted with prized prospect Jesus Montero and an interesting young arm in Hector Noesi, this is definitely a setback for the franchise, but it’s worth noting that Jose Campos – the other arm received in the deal – has been extremely impressive for class-A Charleston and offers significant value to the franchise himself.
Pitchers are always a risky investment, and any time you pay a significant price for a young arm, you know that it could blow up on any given pitch. However, the consensus at the time of the deal is that it was a smart move for the Yankees to make, and an organization can’t entirely avoid acquiring pitchers simply due to a preference for risk avoidance. If you want a good pitching staff, you’re going to have to take some gambles on some young arms. The Yankees did, and in this case, it didn’t work. That doesn’t make it a bad idea, or a move that the Yankees front office should be criticized for making.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
Mariners win this round. Montero may be off to a bad start, but he’s still young and at least he’s playing in the majors.
No. This trade has half a decade to play out, no need to preemptively declare “winners” and “losers.”
If Will Carroll is to be believed, his career is probably over.
http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2004/05/labrum_it_nearly_killed_him.html
It’s an older article though, so maybe there’s a new treatment option.
No, Ray, he’s toast. Labrum = kiss of death.
Keywords: “this round”
The Blue Jays are still waiting for Mike Sirotka to come back from his torn labrum. This is horrible news.
Good comparison seeing that he had both a torn labrum and torn rotator cuff.
While this is a serious injury and his return to form is a crapshoot, the rotator cuff was clean and there was no shoulder capsule tear.
When people draw comparisons to other torn labrum injuries, maybe they should see if they are actually the same; often the injury involves other damage in the shoulder.
Roger Clemens had labral surgery in 1985. Curt Schilling had labral surgery in 1995. Chris Carpenter had labral surgery in 2002. They did pretty well.
It’s a crappy diagnosis for Pineda and the Yanks. But to predict that this will end his career is premature.
Chris Carpenter, and Casey Jannssen also aong the few pitchers who have returned to form after labrum tears.
That’s right, Greg. And also Chris Carpenter.
Little known fact: Chris Carpenter has successfully returned to form from labrum surgery
bottom line… The list of recoveries is thin, and includes some pretty special pitchers… It’s not unreasonable to jump the gun in saying that he could be lost, because if he does recover and reclaim most of his ability, he would be beating some tremendous odds.
I read somewhere that after recovery about 70% of these guys make it back to the majors for at least a year of service time and less than a third make it to 3 or more years of service time.
Gotta give Jack Z credit. He knew he had to ship Pineda ASAP and got a great haul for him. Maybe not the most ethical move, but gotta appreciate the killer instinct.
Obvious Jack Z fanboy is obvious. Noesi is completely crapping the bed and Montero can barely play the catcher position.
Let’s see how great his haul was when Jose Campos debuts for NY in a few years.
Yes you at least have to wonder: did the Mariners smell something, and that was why they did the deal?
I guess no one will ever know. As a side note, it would hurt the M’s reputation (and ability to do deals) in the long run if people think they’re unloading injuries.
Not a Mariners or a Yankees fan, but I’m heartbroken. 🙁
I’m a Yankee fan, and this news didn’t surprise me at all. We’ve mostly written this guy off ever since spring training; I posted on here a few days ago that I’d take the under on an o/u of ten career Yankee victories for Pineda.
We Yankee fans had already assumed the guy’s career was over; confirmation of that fact doesn’t really change anything.
This is yet another example of why Yankees’ fans are so reviled.
You do not speak for all Yankees’ fans, Jim.
When the Hell did “JimNYC” (?) become the official spokesperson of Yankee fans?
I’m not a Yankee fan, in fact, I hate them, and for some reason as soon as this trade happened I thought Pineda was going on the shelf this year
He is the black Carl Pavano!
I don’t understand this “heartbroken” business that’s going around (see also http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/23510/sad-day-as-pineda-is-out-for-the-season). Unless you have some personal connection to either the player or the team, what’s to be heartbroken about? Because something bad happened to someone? Much worse things happen to many more people every day, and you can read about them in the newspapers.
Is this something they can go back and find in the medical workups prior to the trade? Seems like he was damaged goods from the start of spring training.
From experience. Labrum can be extremely hard to diagnose. MRI will often not detect it.
Maybe Pineda got hurt during the off season helping his father move some boxes out of the attic and didn’t tell anyone…
Any chance the mariners knew and they missed it in the physical?
Very good chance. They probably didn’t know for certain, but had suspicion. As I mentioned earlier, labrum tough to diagnose.
Say rather that there’s a very good chance that the Mariners knew Pineda was predisposed to shoulder injury in general. It’s doubtful that anything had happened at the time of the trade in terms of actually injuring him. After all, he passed the Yankees’ physical, didn’t he?
Why? Did he show any symptoms of a labrum tear (decreased velocity, shoulder weakness) last season?
Big Nachos, yes, he did show decreased velo.
@BigNachos: Not in the publicly available data, but as has been noted in a recent article, teams do collect a lot of more specific data than we ever see. It’s almost impossible that they couldn’t detect some sort of predisposition, in the sense that “if he gets injured from normal pitching activity, it’ll be his shoulder” rather than the sense that “he’s slightly injured already in his shoulder.” Regardless, he was well enough to pass the Yankees’ physical, so it could just as easily be the result of a mechanical change their coaching staff told him to make.
we don’t have to guess about whether his velocity declined.
http://www.fangraphs.com/pitchfxo.aspx?playerid=5372&position=P&pitch=FA
the velocity charts show a blip on pineda’s last start of the season. i wouldn’t look at one start and say “that’s a labrum,” rather than “that’s random noise.” regardless, pitcher velocity is publicly available info; if i could find it, so could the yankees.
Shades of the David Wells for Mike Sirotka deal between the White Sox and Jays after the 2000 season…
That chart shows a clear downward slope culminating in a drastic drop in his final start. By his own admission, Pineda admitted throwing with reduced velocity to start games in the 2nd half. he claims it was by design, but me thinks he was either in denial or engaged in deception.
Wow are the Yankees lucky they got Campos too, although I thought it was a pretty fair trade at the start.
Campos is probably 25, so don’t hold your breath.
This REEKS of a SEA cover-up. They knew they were dealing damaged good. Guarantee it.
It might dirty, but if it’s against the Yankees, then bravo Jack Z!
If Pineda was hurt before the trade, its the Yankee’s fault for not seeing it during the physical and rejecting the trade.
As I mentioned earlier, many times labrum tears pass thru MRIs undetected.
But the lost velocity and poor 2nd performance were clear warning signs.
Totally. The Mariners knew he was a 22-year-old pitcher and didn’t tell the Yankees.
Cashman was already pissed at Jack over the whole Cliff Lee trade. Jack has been very open about the fact that he wants his trade partners to feel like they are getting a good value. Otherwise, they’ll stop trading with him, which hurts the organization in the long run.
So no, I don’t think the M’s knew about this. They maybe knew that he was a risk, as he was a young flamethrower and there were concerns about his durability even when he was called up. That was probably part of their decision to sell high, along with the fact that the only way to get quality hitters to play in Seattle is if they have no choice in the matter.
It’s not worst-case for the Yankees. Worst case would have been rotator cuff.
Well, not according to the article that was posted in the comments above.
Labrum tears are much worse than rotator cuffs. The entire history of pitchers with torn labrums coming back to be effective pitchers is Curt Schilling and Chris Carpenter — and that’s it.
The guy’s career is over; you accept it and move on. I’m honestly more concerned about Manny Banuelos’ control problems.
Roger Clemens, and Ted Lilly say Hi
Despite misinformation to the contrary on some sites, Clemens didn’t have a torn labrum. He had a rotator cuff.
And hoping that Pineda turns into Ted Lilly is worse than expecting his career to be over.
Al Leiter had the surgery and was hitting 97 the next year
Erik Bedard came back from a torn labrum, and pitched pretty good last year. It took him like 2 years to come back, but he did it.
Erik Bedard is not the same pitcher he was before his labrum injury. It is wrong to say he won’t return to his prior form. He may, it happens, but the success rate is a lot lower with labrum injuries than elbow injuries. Nobody was that concerned about Strasburg returning from Tommy John surgery. It would have been unusual if he didn’t make it back. There’s a reasonable chance that Pineda never throws another major league inning. I hope he’s Chris Carpenter or Curt Schilling. I feel cheated not to have been able to see Webb or Prior continue their once bright careers.
Fire Cashman.
its odd that of all the people commenting on this thread, you would be the one to want cashman fired. you do know how much he loves to overpay washed up lefty relievers, dont you?
Please don’t start the “Seattle knew” nonsense. It isn’t based on any sort of fact, and it also assumes that the Yankees didn’t do their homework when their medical staff examined him. Anyway, here’s some more.
Per Bryan Hoch on Twitter: “Cashman says Yankees physicals/MRI at time of trade were clean. Not damaged goods. Tear happened in extended spring game”
Per Mark Feinsand on Twitter: “Cashman said the MRI taken at the time of the trade and the MRI taken in spring training were clean and had no sign of a shoulder tear.”
Injuries happen, especially with pitchers. They are always one pitch away, and Pineda threw his. It’s obviously unfortunate, but to blame the M’s baselessly is ridiculous.
Sorry, Frank (“Mr Expert”)…
Please tell me how come the MRI’s didn’t detect anything in MY shoulder? Tell me why I went from throwing 90-91 to 85? And why MY shoulder hurts too?
I lived this.
Guys pass MRI’s and medical evals, injured, all the time.
What the hell are you talking about?
I was a professional pitcher with a torn labrum, so I know a little about the whole deal. Ya dig?
But you’re not saying anything relevant. Why does your experience lead you to believe that Seattle knew?
John, what was your xFIP? They only give the good MRIs to pitchers with an xFIP in the low 3’s.
When was the last time a 22-year old rookie pitcher, who just made the All-Star team, was traded?
john, while everyone loves personal anecdotes on internet forums (rolls eyes), you’re not even making sense in yours.
That’s a pretty slender reed from which to hang a “guarantee.”
Viva – Close to 6 ERA in short-season A. So I definitely wasn’t in the Pineda machine! lol
what john’s doing is appeal to authority, right? i know it’s some logical fallacy, just not totally sure which
Jim,
Appeal to incorrect authority, basically (hey, I’m a guy who once threw a baseball, and even though I don’t have a medical license or know any of the specifics about Pineda’s situation, you should totally trust my evaluation of it from afar) or a hasty generalization (“It happened one time so that proves my case”).
Fallacy of Illocution maybe? He’s appealing to his own authority so it isn’t an appeal to authority.
DL80, you assume he has actually thrown a baseball
It’s a serious allegation saying that Seattle knew. Seattle traded Pineda. Pineda got hurt. Therefore, Seattle traded him because they knew he would get hurt or was hurt. This is the kind of thinking that sabremetrics is all about discouraging; Correlation vs. causation and all that stuff. Young pitchers get hurt a lot. The Yanks rolled the dice and lost. It was a reasonable gamble. Cashman is to blame to the degree that he should have resigned Colon or done something as insurance against this possibility. A team with the Yanks payroll should not be overly dependent upon the health of a young pitcher. They could be in trouble. Sabathia is great, Kuroda has a good track record, but after that, they have major risks. Nova and Garcia are not as good as they showed last year and it’s been a while since Hughes was reliable starter. The Yanks and BoSox are weaker than they’ve been in a decade. Maybe this year neither of the evil teams makes the playoffs?
Can’t wait for the first Mike Sirotka mention…
A cranky shoulder at the time of the trade would better explain the Campos/Noesi portion IMO. A healthy Pineda for a healthy Montero seemed like a fair trade by itself and the Mariners, despite its minor league depth, need high-end guys like Campos more than they need a generic MLB ready guy like Noesi. They could have filled Pineda’s rotation spot with anyone.
In radio interviews after the trade, Jack Zduriencik was insistent on getting a major league starting pitcher as he was giving one up in Pineda. Brian Cashman also wanted something in return for Noesi, which ended up being Campos.
Completely right. Both teams clearly had the same feelings about Noesi, which is the key. That a lot of the media thought Noesi was a meh guy is not the fault of the teams for evaluating Noesi as a right now mid rotation starter.
Jay Buhner for Ken Phelps all over again.
More like Edgar Martinez for nothing at all.
LOL, and here we go with the absolutely ridiculous Edgar Martinez comps again.
Stinks for them, but there is absolutely no blame to go around here. Even as a Sox fan, if I were Cashman, I’d have made that trade 99 times out of 100 considering the team’s makeup. They had a surplus of pitching and a deficit for starting pitching.
This doesn’t look good for Pineda at all. He didn’t train properly over the off-season and showed up to camp overweight and out of shape. His fastball suffered as a result. Instead of getting into better shape and gradually coming along, he tried to overextend himself and wound up tearing his shoulder. From the day he came to Spring Training, it hasn’t looked like he has the work ethic to recover on the low-end of any estimates.
It’s tough to compare his recovery to others because we don’t know how bad the tear is. I’m assuming it’s not as bad as Santana’s or Wang’s, but Santana took 1 1/2 years to recover and he’s not what we used to be, and Santana is a bulldog.
Only reason why Pineda didn’t work out over the winter is he was instructed not to by SEA. Not because he is lazy. He wore down over the course of the season. The Mariners plan was for him to take the winter off to rest then show up early in ST. The trade screwed up that plan.
Did not know this. Gaining weight in the offseason is such a common thing for young players it’s natural to think Pineda just chose not to put in the effort.
His shoulder hurt, how could he work out.
MRI will pick up rotator cuff tears, but usually not SLAP tears. Labrum is often tested with Biceps Load, O’Briens, and stability tests. But even they aren’t fool proof.
Buyer beware. I do recall Pineda’s velo down late last year.
Expected one year recovery – timeline on his return is May 1st next year.
It’s 12 months until he can start throwing, not being on the mound in a major league game — best case scenario. Under the best case scenario, no setbacks, he’d be major-league ready around the All-Star break, 2013.
My guess is that he’ll actually be ready for spring training, 2014, although I’m not optimistic about him ever being able to pitch in the majors again.
There goes 2 years of service time!
its 4 months till he can start throwing.
This is a real shame, and man if I hated the Yankees any more I’d burst into flames. Pineda is a good guy, but didn’t stay in shape. That plus the pressure to live up to expectations are the culprits I suspect at this point. I’d really hate for this to limit GMs’ willing to deal with Jack Z because I really don’t think he had any clue he wasn’t trading away a future #1 or #2 starter.
I’ve never heard of conditioning being a culprit for labrum injuries. I’ve heard overwork and erratic work being culprits but not conditioning. As an example, Sidney Ponson never tore his labrum and the only conditioning he ever got was in punching judges.
With how good Campos has looked, and considering that Montero may still be nothing more than a DH defensively, the Yankees could still win this trade. Had everyone stayed healthy and lived up to their median projections, it would have been a solid ‘win’ for Cashman.
Unfortunately, the landscape of MLB is littered with guys who had this injury and never came back at all or were a fraction of their previous ability years later. Brandon Webb and Ben Sheets come to mind. Wasn’t Webb hitting about 83 when he came back? Hope Pineda beats the odds for the good of baseball but I’m sure the Yankees are planing like he’s done.
This right here is why guys like Matt Moore sign the contracts that they do.
Girardi’s comments today implied that he, at least, doesn’t have high hopes of ever seeing Pineda pitch again. I’d imagine that Cashman probably feels the same way.
Brandon Webb did not have a labral tear. He had a rotator cuff injury that involved a tear to his teres minor muscle. I don’t think Webb is a good comp for Pineda, unless you simply assert that all shoulder injuries are the same. We know they are not.
It is true that a lot of pitchers never make it back after labral surgery. Mark Mulder immediately comes to mind. But Mulder had substantial damage to his rotator cuff as well, so his case appears to be different than Pineda’s.
The key is going to be how well Pineda rehabs from the injury. Roger Clemens, Curt Schilling, and Chris Carpenter all became better pitchers with an increase in velocity after labral surgery. But Clemens, Schilling, and Carpenter are not ordinary pitchers, and all of them were known for their work ethic. The fact that Pineda reported to spring training overweight is not a good sign, but perhaps he will devote himself to rehab and become an even better pitcher like the three I just mentioned.
Can’t believe nobody has brought up that “Pineda” and “hurt” weren’t used together in a sentence until Girardi started talking about Pineda’s reduced velocity, and the possibility that Pineda be sent down to work on it. Shortly afterwards Pineda was making a s/t start throwing as hard as he could, and shortly after that, he was shut down. It’d be a real pity if Pineda hurt himself trying to do something his manager called him out on.
Pineda said he had shoulder soreness before the last start of ST, so it’s not possible overthrowing in that start caused the soreness.
Plus, loss of velcocity is one of the signature symptoms of arm problems
The injury probably goes back farther than just the last pitch he threw in extended spring training. I think he was hurt all spring, possibly going back to his last start of 2011.
That said, I don’t blame Seattle, because I have no evidence they knew he was hurt. Labrum tears are apparently hard to detect.
It happens. It really, really, really sucks. But it happens. It does reinforce the feeling that many of us Yankees fans have that the Yanks don’t know what they’re doing with young pitchers (pitchers in general really). The list of poor pickups and failed prospects is long.
Just to ask, and in the interest of evidence, anyone know the last time a young All-Star caliber pitcher was traded? I’m sure there are examples. Pedro Martinez for Delino DeShields perhaps?
Billy Beane has dedicated his career to trading young, All-Star caliber pitchers as soon as he has to pay them more than the league minimum.
Latos, Gonzalez have top rotation talent, and were moved this past offseason. Dan Haren two years ago….the list goes on an on
It’s only a discreet tear so he only has to get a scope. His capsule and rotator cuff are fine. It’s still a nightmare, but its pretty much the best case scenario.
so is the injury from which Johan Santana is recovering worse than Pineda’s?
Or Chien-Ming Wang?
I’m not a doctor, but if I understand correctly, than yes. They both had capsule tears (though on different sides I believe).
It’s always tough to lose a pitcher for a season plus, but those saying Pineda is toast are idiotic. It’s a microscopic surgery. There’s a very high long term recovery rate from this procedure. Perhaps he’s not 100 percent until 2014 — he’s still younger then than Dellin Betances is now.
Which gives some hope for Pineda, but really hurts the Yankees. They gave up one of the best positional prospects of the last few years for a guy who was supposed to be a cost controlled number two with five years of control remaining. Now it’s looking like two of those five years may well be lost entirely in a best case scenario.
Again, nobody’s fault on this, but that is a terrible turn of events for them.
I assume there’s going to be a follow-up to this article.
He had a good chance of ending up on the DL:
http://www.fangraphs.com/fantasy/index.php/curve-ball-and-slider-pitchers-and-the-dl/
Obviously Seattle pulled a fast one. They knew the Yankees were rubes without the wherewithal or resources to check out the lemon they were dealing. Jack Z is a regular Lyle Lanley, shipping out broke down arms as if he were selling monorails. He’s a real song and dance man.
Did you just say “Yankees” and “lack of resources” in the same sentence?
I believe there is some sarcasm somewhere.
it put ogdenville on the map!
It’s funny to read these comments about Montero being nothing but a DH while watching him catch Felix.
It’s also funny to watch the loop tizzy the NY fans have gone over this trade- from a solid “win”, to being ‘robbed’ when Pineda shows up overweight, to a conspiracy they got damaged goods…meanwhile Montero is “just a DH” who happens to wear a catcher’s mask and squat behind home plate.
The trade made sense for both teams, guys. And as Cameron points out, dealing with pitchers is always risky. All sides did their due diligence. Montero appears to be a moderately acceptable catcher. There’s not much else that needs to be said.
Well just about everyone is just a DH compared to Posada
Wow… what an utter catastrophe for Pineda and the Yankees. It’s almost impossible to feel sympathy for the Yankees, but this is one of the situations where you do. While TJS has come a long way over the last couple decades, shoulder injuries remain a terror. The shoulder is an extremely complicated joint, making an unpredictable rehab process the reason why labrum tears are the pits.
Who cares if they did know. That’s gamesmanship as far as I’m concerned.
JW- Yes, he’s been at catcher, but the jury is still decidedly out on his defense. Just because he has been playing there doesn’t mean his defense is good enough to keep him out of DH’ing. We just don’t know for sure. I am waiting with bated breath for the first statistical returns and what they think of him.
Miguel Olivo will make him a better catcher . . . than the Mariners’ options.
OK but call me when we have great measures of catchers defense.
Great baseball fans here… I’ll wait for the advanced stats to come out to decide if a player is good! Sounds fun. I like movies. I wait until the box office receipts are in to tell when a good movie has been released.
300- then people should stop writing that he’s a DH. Because he sure is a funny looking DH with that mask on.
And, given what they’ve had in Olivo for the past few seasons, I’m not too concerned about what Montero brings. Based on what I’ve seen so far (every game Montero has caught), he looks acceptable/basically average. Like you say, too soon to call, so folks should stop calling it.
However, you can’t ignore the fact that those who know his current ability the best, still haven’t seen fit to have him replace Olivo full time defensively, which considering how putrid Olivo is known to be, is not exactly a ringing endorsement. While no one knows for sure, I still think the probability he stays at C long term are less than 50%.
Eric Wedge has a incomprehensible raging Olivo boner. I wouldn’t use how Wedge doles out playing time as any sort of talent gauge.
How did he tear his labia?
Awesome.
That’s what I used to say about Mark Prior … he suffers from elbow and/or shoulder vaginitis.
Dude went from the ultimate high, being traded from SEA to NYY, to the ultimate low of experiencing a possible career-threatening injury. Damn.
Anyone wants to bet Seattle knew of suspected of this?
Sorry, forget it. Should’ve read the posts first..
Hello New York!!!
And the Yankees will never deal with Jack Z again…
Is it really necessary for his surgery to be performed by the Mets’ team physician. I mean come on. He’s gonna come out of that thing with an amputated leg or something.
Young lady, I am an expert on humans. Now pick a mouth, open it and say “brglgrglgrrr”!
So, this means the Yankees might be looking for a pitcher. I happen to know a guy in Atlanta who has a bunch of those. Coincidentally, he needs a bat, which New York has, so…….Delgado and Jurrjens for Gardner? Maybe Delgado/Jurrjens/Prado?
Another thought, maybe this expands the field of potential teams Epstein can trade Garza to.
nobody with half a brain wants anything to do with jair jurrjens
In my fantasy world we find out that Jurrjens had a strained something, goes on the DL, come back sitting low 90s again, has 2 stellar rehab starts, then pitches well in the Majors from June-All Star Break. Then the trade is made.
I WISH Jurrjens would be awesome now. As a Braves fan, I wouldn’t want them to give up Delgado. Stupid Jurrjens having to ruin everything.
Jack Z: “Hey Brian, I know you were mad when I back out of the Cliff Lee deal and sent him to Texas, and when I traded you a pitcher that may have been injured…. but I have this guy named Chone…”
Cashman: “SECURITY!”
When the Yanks made the trade for Pineda, Dave wrote a lengthy analysis here that concluded the Yankees had paid below-market rates — and in that analysis there was not a single word about Pineda’s injury history or injury risk.
Here’s how Dave concluded that analysis:
“Maybe Montero’s good enough by himself to justify being the sole piece of value, but based on what other teams were paying for good young pitching this winter, I would have expected the Yankees to have to surrender a bit more than they gave up. The Yankees should not only be happy to have added a big time arm to their rotation, but should be excited that they didn’t have to decimate the farm system in order to do it.”
While its true pitching prospects as a group carry a higher risk of injury than do hitting prospects, the fact is that Pineda carried a higher risk than a typical pitching prospect. A reasonable analysis of the trade would take that into account.
Now Pineda is lost for the season and his future beyond is in considerable doubt. Is that a guarantee that the Yankees will lose the trade in the long run? Of course not. But just as a sudden burst of runs changes the win probability in a game, Pineda’s injury makes it far more likely than not that the Yankees will regret this deal when all is said and done. To suggest otherwise is like arguing the merits of the trade when it was made without mentioning Pineda’s injury history or concerns that he would hurt himself again.
Hindsight is 20/20. Any sensible GM in Cashman’s position would make that trade. They had a surplus of offense and a deficit of hitting and they managed to get a cost-controlled number two/three pitcher AND quality prospect in Campos.
Exactly, rotofan. This idea that Jack Z knew he was injured and somehow the Yanks didn’t is silly. Both sides knew there was an injury risk in Pineda. That’s why both sides agreed to the trade values involved.
I think there was an article here on Fan Graphs showing that teams know their own pitchers better than anyone and frequently get the better of trades of pitchers for position players.
Teams do all kinds of monitoring on pitchers which include shoulder strength tests. I am sure Pinedas drop in velocity and results in their monitoring of his shoulder strength as the season wore on triggered suspicions. Not saying they had a confirmed clinical diagnosis, but they certainly knew Pinedas situation better than the Yankees.
Otherwise, how do you trade a pitcher with Pinedas upside and great first 1/2 with 5 more cost controlled years for an unproven DH prospect, plus giving up a top pitching prospect in Campos (assuming he is not older than they say) for Noesi.
Because they had three solid arms in AA/AAA and the batters they employ couldn’t even hit their own butts with a shovel if they tried.
Montero wouldn’t bat higher than 8th in NY, whereas they are so pathetic, they have the rookie batting cleanup. Also, they seem to be living up to their word that they would use Montero as the back-up Catcher. Good deal for Montero as the Yankees didn’t really value him that highly with the stick or the tools.
The kid was one of the most exciting young pitchers in the game, and there’s at least a decent chance that his career is over. I’m not a fan of either team but it is devastating news.
The big problem is that Pineda’s success was pretty much based upon 2 reliable pitches. Not too say that he won’t recover his velocity but this certainly isn’t good news for a guy with a lack of repertoire. I loved Pineda in Seattle and I truly hope that he makes a full recovery.