Aug. 5: Kahnle’s surgery was performed yesterday, Heyman tweets.
July 31: Yankees manager Aaron Boone announced Friday that right-handed reliever Tommy Kahnle will undergo Tommy John surgery, Marly Rivera of ESPN reports.
This isn’t surprising news, as MLB Network’s Jon Heyman reported just minutes ago that Kahnle was probably going in this direction. Still, the fact that it’s now official is unfortunate for him and the Yankees. Kahnle, 30, has been an important part of their bullpen since they acquired him from the White Sox in a 2017 blockbuster trade. Since rejoining the Yankees, who selected him in the fifth round of the 2010 draft, Kahnle has logged a 4.01 ERA/3.23 FIP with 12.58 K/9, 3.69 BB/9 and a 44.8 percent groundball rate over 112 1/3 innings.
While Kahnle won’t be easily replaceable for the Yankees, the World Series contenders are well-equipped to soldier on without him. After all, the team also has Aroldis Chapman, Zack Britton, Adam Ottavino and Chad Green as other prominent late-game arms.
Kahnle’s season-ending injury takes a quality option away, though, and now it’s in question whether he will pitch for the Yankees again. Considering the timing of this surgery, Kahnle may not be ready to return until very late next season or at the beginning of 2022. In the meantime, the Yankees will have to decide whether to tender him a contract for his final arbitration-eligible season in 2021. He’s on a prorated $2.65MM salary this year, and that number should stay the same next season.
this team is cursed
Dumb
The Yankees??? Cursed with what? Continued financial success??
Cursed? Have you looked at the Sox, Braves, or Marlins rosters?
Sorry to hear
someone jinxed it in the last article mentioning him….someone poo in their breakfast cereal
What a shame.
Hopefully he come back
This is on the Mlb, this entire season is unnecessary and has cost a lot of good player’s.
Yep. Let’s hope no one else gets hurt between now and Sunday night if Olberman’s report is correct.
Ridiculous
When it comes down to it, every MLB season is “unnecessary” when you think about it.
Players get hurt every year. This year can be blamed for a lot of things, but the last time I looked there were a lot of pitchers getting TJ last year and the year before and the year before that. You can’t blame MLB for that one.
If the season continues, more Will injured. Some will be natural but some will be caused by the change in how they are used. Each game is obviously more important than in other years. I predicted the Yankees like many others to win it all because I said their bullpen won’t be overused like in past years. Injuries though could change the equation. Given their deep everyday roster, they’re still my choice but who the heck knows in this strange year? I’ve watched the games to be entertained but this country as a whole needs to get our act together and in all honesty, games aren’t important if the teams can’t be protected. For baseball, it’s mainly the travel I’m concerned about.
Almost as if throwing a baseball repeatedly in an unnatural position to play a child’s game is unneceesary.
The game was invented by men and played by men. Your argument is more childish than the game is.
Big Sexy is sitting by the phone (Probably “snacking” on a 24 bag count of Cheetos)
Sure, just when we finally figure out how to pronounce his name correctly.
Good luck TK.
Never a dull moment being a Yankees fan
These comments are so dumb. The Yankees are cursed? Gimmie a break. This is baseballs fault? You think he wouldn’t have blown out that ligament regardless? It’s because they started the season late? So dumb.
Thoughts and prayers
As the manager of his own business, I think he’s been throwing and keeping in shape because there was always talk of the season starting. This man knows his body and if there was a problem wasn’t there an option to sit out? Aren’t guys pitching in July and August normally?
What happens when a guy gets hurt in October and then comes back in July and August because of the injury he missed the first part of the year?
Clarke Schmidt/Deivi Garcia time?
Right? Happ just ain’t gonna cut it this year and they gotta see what these kids can do eventually.
See you in 2022 TK.
I knew it
shoot. hurts a lot less than Severino, but still a bummer anyway.
I don’t see him not getting tendered
Final year of arbitration next year and it looks like he’ll be back in August of 2021 at the earliest. Can’t see them spending that money on a pretty big risk, especially when they have other arms to fill in.
$2.5M gamble that he pitches 15 innings tops in 2021 in the best case scenario? I love Kahnle but that would be money poorly spent.
Ahh, this really sucks. I mean, I don’t ever actively root for the Yankees but Kahnle was a guy I grew to love in his brief time here on the South Side. This is a bummer. I hope he can return quickly and still possess that nasty fastball/changeup combination.
I saw that he has been throwing around 94 mph on his fastball so I had a feeling something was wrong.
Well, if he’s non-tendered, I’d love him on a Garrett Richards type deal back with the White Sox. I know the team liked him a lot when he was here and Hahn wasn’t keen on giving him up but the Yankees insisted.
Yet Hahn did, and didn’t get jack back in return.
Yankees won that trade running away, even with this injury.
Hahn put way too much value in dumping contracts in that deal. I remember hearing we were asking for Clark Schmidt initially in that deal but they thought highly of Tito Polo and Clarkin still had some prospect shine.
That trade looked bad to me immediately. The Yankees played Hahn by selling him on Blake Rutherford.
Now they miss Betances. You never have too much pitching.
Boy, probably better if he had sat out. Curious if this lay-off will show more injuries since guys maybe were inactive for too long.
Such bad writing. The one thing I hate about this site is that one player can hit .256/.375/.500 and depending on the day could be “having a really solid season” or “really hasn’t been able to put together a season”
He has not been an important part of their bullpen for at least two years. He was god awful last year.
Sorry, god awful two years ago. He was manageable last year.
Excellent in 2017. Very good last year. High K rate. Tough on lefties. The last part is key as the Yankees weren’t carrying a situational lefty. He’ll be missed, but the Yankees construct bullpens about as well as any team. Someone will step forward.
The loss of Tommy Kahnle will definitely hurt, but thank goodness for Johnny Lasagna. Who should be able to come in and take his place. And the Yankees got Deivi Garcia who should be close to ready as a reliever.
This guy was lights out a few nights ago against the Nats. What happened?
See you in 2022 too…. Makes it the 3rd one this week
Maybe he’ll make it back by September next year, but more likely 2022. Tough timing to have TJS in August. Hard throwing reliever who doesn’t depend on command. High chance he’ll come back effective. A righty who is tough on lefties. I don’t see the Yankees tendering him a contract at his current salary, but they or some other team would probably get a good value signing him to a two year deal, low base next year.
Not sure the Yankees miss Bentances that much after what happened in Atlanta last night. Definitely a tough break for TK. Time to see if Garcia lives up to the hype.
Another job created.
Call the Red Sox. They have a lot of pitchers.
Hate to see injuries. Tendering without knowing he’d ever pitch for you again is a tough choice, although they could work out a two-year deal. Whenever I read complaints the players make too much, that service-time manipulation is a good thing so you keep longer control, I try to keep in mind that this sort of stuff happens. The odds are fairly good he can come back, but prime earning opportunities may be now put off for quite some time–and may never happen.
No
I hope that the surgeon can fix the spelling of his last name to make it more reasonable.
You can’t read either? Explains everything.
Lighten up, Francis.
In other news, Tommy John is expected to undergo Tommy Kahnle surgery on Thursday.
This is what happens when you think this season isn’t meaningless. You throw some guy out there because you have to win the game and boom he’s out for a season. Meaningless.