So… how many injuries have there been recently? Spring Training hasn’t even started. Santander, Carroll, Holliday, Lindor, Schwellenbach, and many others have all been injured. It’s all been so recent… and I think everyone’s expecting to check twitter nowadays just to see a Jeff Passan tweet saying “Your franchise player is out for months with surgery.” From injuries to bones no one has ever heard of, to everyone’s pitching staff getting hurt, a lot has happened within two chaotic days.
He injured his hamate bone? What even is that?
Corbin Carroll, Jackson Holliday and Francisco Lindor have all had injures to one bone in their hand, called the hamate bone. It’s a hook shaped bone right underneath your pinky.
It tends to be a bone that breaks via repeated stress, most likely via swinging. While the recovery isn’t typically long, hitters report struggling to regain their power, taking months. So what does this mean to their respective teams? The Mets will be without their star shortstop. Does this mean Bo Bichette starts the season at shortstop? Corbin Caroll’s injury hurts the Diamondbacks, but they still have a very potent offense featuring Gerlado Perdomo, Ketel Marte, Nolan Arenado and others. His defense will be missed in outfield, as Carroll is one of the stronger defensive outfielders in baseball. The Orioles were expecting Holliday to improve on his solid sophmore/rookie season, so him being injured hurts them. Expect them to still be a strong hitting team, as they are led by Gunnar Henderson, Pete Alonso, and Jordan Westburg.
Also, Corbin Carroll will miss the WBC. The US is expected to call up another outfielder. Some names include Wyatt Langford, James Wood, and Kyle Stowers. Me personally, I would love to see them call up Mike Trout.
Other notable injuries
Spencer Schwellenbach will begin the year on the 60-day IL due to elbow inflammation. Deja vu of 2025, anyone?
The Braves rotation faces some PTSD from last season… remember when their entire opening day rotation was on the long term-IL? Their rotation still looks decent headlined by Chris Sale and Spencer Strider but losing their No.3 guy hurts them.
Anthony Santander requires surgery and will be out for a few months. Bowden Francis is also out for the season. For the Blue Jays, losing someone who was expected to rebound after a poor season to replace Bichette sucks. Okamoto becomes less of a luxury and more of a necessity. Francis was not projected to be in the Jays’ opening day rotation anyway, so this is not a major blow to the Toronto rotation. If anything, it opens up a path for Ricky Tiedemann, to the majors, however Toronto will be careful with him as he is also coming of surgery.
Shane Bieber will not be ready to start the season as he is dealing with forearm fatigue. The Blue Jays rotation will go down to something like Gausman-Cease-Yesavage-Berrios-Lauer-Ponce. It does not seem like anything to serious, but Toronto will be careful with him.
Josh Hader is dealing with arm soreness and has stopped his throwing program. The Astros hope to get him back before Opening Day. If he is not healthy by Opening Day, Bryan Abreu is expected to take over closing duties (i believe?). Losing their All-Star closer in Hader will hurt, but Abreu is still a very good reliever.
Kris Bryant is injured (again). Sucks, he was one of my favorite players growing up. Him and Trout are my two big what ifs for baseball. Is his or Rendon’s contract worse? Me personally, it’s both. Both deals set both franchises back.
Oh, by the way, all these reports came out in the span of around 2 days. Thanks for reading!
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