Well, as we suspected almost from the beginning, Jason Schmidt of the Dodgers had "major shoulder surgery" yesterday. Of course the question will arise, how could his shoulder be so bad (torn labrum, frayed biceps tendon, inflamed bursa) and (1) he was still able to even throw; and (2) the doctors and MRI didn't see this weeks ago.
Well, shoulders are funny things. I remember a former Dodger pitcher, Doug Rau, who had only one win in 1979, after five very successful years. The win was nearly a no-hitter against the Houston Astros. He pitched a one hit shut out. Not long after that he had major shoulder surgery and his career was over (he did attempt a comeback in 1981 with the Angels, but only won one game). He nearly pitched a no hitter with a shoulder that was in shambles. In Schmidt's first game against the Padres after being on the DL, he took a no hitter into the fifth and ended with six scoreless innings and only allowed one hit.
My own experience with shoulders was a couple of years ago. I always knew there was something wrong with my left shoulder (since I crashed it into a fence making a catch in the outfield when I was a senior in high school) but finally it started to really bother me when I was building a room addition onto my house. I went to a shoulder specialist, he looked at it, we did an MRI and everything else. He finally decided to scope my shoulder, but told me he would have to cut it open if there proved to be some significant damage, but he wouldn't know until he could see it. Well, six hours of surgery later he (and another doctor they had to call in during the operation) repaired what was left of my left shoulder (torn rotator cuff, three torn tendons, one tendon in the wrong place, frayed and damaged bursas, and a few other odds and ends). He told me later it was the worst shoulder he had ever seen in 25yrs of practice. But until that point I had been pretty functional, spent 15 yrs on the LAPD, played on the department baseball and fast pitch teams, played golf, and built two room additions. Shoulders are funny things.
There is just no way to know how bad a shoulder might be damaged without actually looking inside. This makes me wonder about Curt Shilling of the Red Sox. He nearly pitched a no-hitter a couple of weeks ago and then his velocity dropped and he pretty much got shelled two straight games. He's on the DL now despite the fact that the MRI found nothing (which for shoulders I think is fairly meaningless).
The only good news for Schmidt is that the surgery and rehab procedures are a lot better now, but it is probably still not realistic to expect him pitching in regular games until after the All-Star break next year.
Posted by Narnia3 at June 21, 2007 7:42 AM | TrackBack