The Astros announced that they have placed right-hander Justin Verlander on the 15-day injured list due to neck discomfort, retroactive to June 16. Right-hander Nick Hernandez has been recalled from Triple-A as the corresponding move.
Verlander, 41, was supposed to start for the Astros on Saturday but was scratched due to the discomfort in his neck. The pitcher told Chandler Rome of The Athletic that the issue has been bothering him for weeks. “When I was out there, I felt like it wasn’t really bothering me, but when I go home and sit down and really think about it, I think it’s too much of a coincidence that my mechanics were really thrown off at the same time I was dealing with this,” Verlander said Saturday afternoon.
The hope seemed to be that Verlander would recover with a few days of extra rest. “If this was playoff time, I’d like to think I’d be out there,” Verlander said. “But that pattern where it’s every day getting a little bit better, I think with the off days, it’s best to let it fully resolve itself and I hope it does.”
Unfortunately, that hasn’t come to pass. Earlier today, Rome relayed on X that manager Joe Espada told Matt Thomas of SportsTalk 790 that Verlander’s progress has been “slower than we expected.”
It seems that the decision has been made to let him rest up and get the issue taken care of. Verlander had a 3.26 earned run average on the year before his last two starts each resulted in four earned runs allowed over five innings, bumping him up to 3.95. Perhaps there’s good sense in giving him a quick breather to get healthy as opposed to continuing to send him out there when he’s not at his best.
Though it may end up just being a brief stint on the injured list, it’s still notable for the Astros, as rotation health has been the unfortunate top story of their poor season to this point. They have known since last year that they would be without Luis Garcia and Lance McCullers Jr. for most of this season, as they both underwent significant surgery last year. Since the season started, they have lost Cristian Javier and José Urquidy to Tommy John surgery.
Verlander has also been away from that group, as he started the season on the IL due to right shoulder inflammation. He was reinstated in the middle of April but is now back on the shelf again. That leaves the Astros with a rotation consisting of Framber Valdez, Ronel Blanco, Hunter Brown and Spencer Arrighetti. Valdez and Blanco have been good and Brown has recovered from a rough start, but Arrighetti is currently an ERA of 6.37.
The larger concern may be the lack of exciting options to step up and join that group while Verlander is out. J.P. France is on the 40-man roster but hasn’t pitched since late April due to a shoulder injury. Blair Henley is also on the 40-man but has uninspiring results in Triple-A this year and was lit up in his major league debut earlier this season. Eric Lauer is in the system on a minor league deal but has a 6.30 for Sugar Land at the moment.
Thanks in part to the ongoing rotation problems, the Astros are 33-39, their worst start in years. They are seven games out of a playoff spot and still have time to turn things around but Verlander’s absence will exacerbate a problem that has been going on all year.
These modern day pitchers.
Always injured. Probably because they just throw and don’t pitch.
Excuse me sir, do you even know who Justin Verlander is.
Brittle?
Verlander has made 10 starts this year. Put against his $404M career earnings, that’s over $40M a start. For all that money the guy can’t chuck a ball every five days. Kids these days.
Dumbest comment award goes to you.
raisinsss
Yes. Thank you for asking.
Missed basically two full seasons in 2020 and 2021. Missed about a third of 2015. Fewer than 30 starts it would appear the last 3 seasons. They just don’t make them like they used to. Do they?
Instead of just insinuating it, just say it:
Justin Verlander does not know how to pitch.
raisinsss
Hmm…when you say it like that. It makes no sense
Nor does it make sense when people say any other major league pitcher doesn’t know how to pitch.
Thanks for helping me to see the light
It’s pretty well accepted that enough velo will get you a shot and that the only meaningful correlation with pitch style and injury is velocity.
But Verlander is hardly an example. For one, he’s a superior pitcher in addition to having velo. For another, he’s very very old. Knowing what we know, this strikes me as an old man injury.
raisinsss
None of us on this board is qualified to judge whether or not a professional pitcher knows how to pitch.
@raisinsss: “only meaningful correlation between pitch style and injury is velocity.” Plenty of pitchers who didn’t throw hard w/max effort have been injured. Tommy John Surgery is named after a soft tossing lefty. Pitchers have been injured for countless other reasons than pitch velocity since the inception 0f the game.—shoulders, wrists, elbows, knees, etc.
Hey nashville,
Thanks for the anecdata.
Would you mind researching any actual academic studies that have been done on this? Let me know what you find.
Thanks!
40 is the new 40.
41 is the old 41. Father Time is calling. JV keeps letting it go to voicemail. Eventually he’s going to have to answer the call.
You would too if teams kept throwing money at you.
@nukeg. Jamie Moyer was a young man at 41 with 1300 more innings in his arm. I want JV to go until he’s 50.
when I go home and sit down I feel something like “I will take your money but I need to think of another reason not to pitch “
Was on pace for about 132 innings before this. 25 option, half paid by the Mets, vests at 140.
While baseball is better with JV pitching, the Mets are better with him pitching < 140 innings this year.
Better to take it easy coming back; Astros going nowhere this year.
raisinsss
“Was on pace for about 132 innings before this. ”
That’s one way to calculate pace. Maybe not the best way.
For example, imagine if a pitcher missed the entire season up until the last month. When they made their first start, they would be “on pace” for like 1.2 starts.
That doesn’t make sense. We know, if they are now expected to be a regular member of the rotation, that they are really going to get 5 to 6 starts.
FanGraphs, prior to the injury, projected Verlander for 17 more starts and 102 more innings.
Say he misses 3 starts for this injury. That would give him 14 more starts and 84 innings. Giving him a grand total of (57+84) 141 innings.
He’s almost exactly on pace for 140 innings.
You’re entirely right. It was my 18 second projection using ip/g.
Thanks for diving in!
Let’s hope these 3~ starts are the only ones he misses and averages 6ip over the next 17 starts and doesn’t miss any other time seeing as he’s a relative grandpa.
Steve Cohen is rooting for Verlander to pitch 139 2/3 innings this season.
Verlander still chasing 300 wins. He may fall short like CC.
If I’m Justin, stay home now and retire. Your hot wife is waiting for you unless she has a side piece
He’s 40 wins away. There’s no way he’s making it to 300 wins.
He’s had a great career and there’s no shame in hanging it up if he does.
Great career indeed. Verlander, a three time Cy Young Award winner, had a 14 season run where he had fewer than 28 starts only once. In 12 of those seasons he threw more than 200 innings topping out at 251 in 2011.
Older pitchers like Justin V. & Max S. get $40M+/yr to whirlpool, massage, rubdown and rehab constantly. It’s pretty good “work” if you can get it.
Great for the Mets. I will say this. When the Mets signed Verlander originally, I thought the move was one of the worst things iv ever seen. Why give a 40 year old 120 million dollars? Didn’t make any sense to me. Verlander only came here for the money. With that being said, he was a good sport and was very nice with the fans and the media. Contrast that with Scherzer, who showed up fans, never would interact with the fans, and always sounded like he never wanted to be here. JV was a class act. Scherzer is not welcomed back here
I’d have a sore neck too if I was married to Kate Upton. And some other sore muscles as well.
MU
the imagination is not a muscle.
On the contrary, all of my muscles are imaginary.
Instead of just forearm inflammation.
In that case, the Tommy John Surgery might be worth it.
Verlander just needs some time at home with Kate, and he’ll as good as new in two weeks!
It’s starting to feel like it’s a wrap. He’s had a great career, and it’s in decline. The off season is not long enough to get healthy anymore it seems for him. 300 wins would have been nice and he’s a long way from getting his 150 innings too. Well the Astros should trade him if he gets healthy again this year. Save a few bucks if he does qualify for the next years contract.
c’mon justin you got nothing left to prove. 1st ballot hof’er
go spend the rest of your life on some beach with kate
Why do so many people feel the need to push guys like this to retirement?
If he enjoys playing, wants to keep going, and has someone willing to offer a spot, why shouldn’t he continue? Obviously he’s not the same pitcher he once was but that’s unrealistic to expect. Plenty of teams would love this kind of production. (Of course he’ll get paid less in a hypothetical next contract)
The problem is, he’s still trying to pitch like he used to. His body is not holding up to it, however. Adapt and overcome. Or spend the majority of the season on the shelf. Even CC learned to the work the corners more and not try and over power everyone.
Same people would have run off Jack Morris prior to his 91 Twins season as he had 2 down years before it. I don’t think Morris would have made the Hall without that duel vs Smoltz and the resulting WS championship. Verlander is in the Hall no matter what but most of us would enjoy seeing him throw a beauty in postseason.
perk – There’s definitely some ageism around here. Quite often players are expected to greatly decline in their 30’s and retire before they reach 40. It’s ridiculous to ignore the many proven exceptions.
They’re probably Mets fans. We don’t want the Mets to pay half his salary next year if he pitches 140 innings in 2024. Otherwise, he can pitch until he’s 90 as far as I’m concerned.
Surprised a 41 year old kid like Verlander didn’t heal quickly.
Nolan Ryan and Carlton Fisk say keep going, you got 5 more years in you, Justin.
It just gets worse. Blanco and Arraghetti have never had a full season MLB workload before. It might not be an issue with Mccullers and Garcia back, but there are no guarantees the way this season has played out.
No 300 wins for him and I think a bleak future for Houston. One of the weakest farm systems in baseball and payroll spent in all the wrong places. 51M & 85M plus what they are paying for Verlander equals future bad mediocre seasons. Get used to it.
Pretty weak sauce. On a recent edition of Name That Astro, it was noted that Nolan Ryan pitched 13 innings, threw 235 pitches and struck out 19. (He got a No Decision in that game.) He struck out 19+ three (3) times that season. I wonder how many times in his career Ryan took the ball when his neck was sore? #SMFH
This is kind of scary because “neck discomfort” is what Christian Javier came down with right before he tore his UCL.