Dodgers News: A Positive Update on an Injured All-Star
For the Dodgers and injured right-hander Tony Gonsolin, the injury bug bit at the worst time. Set to make his final start of August, Tony was a late scratch while dealing with some forearm soreness.
At the time, the hope and expectation was that the 2022 NL All-Star would spend the minimum amount of time on the injured list with the issue.
We're now at the end of week three on the sidelines.
After a couple setbacks and lateral steps, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts had some more optimistic news on Gonsolin.
The righty hurler put together an "encouraging" bullpen session on Wednesday in Arizona. Moreover, his fastball ticked up a couple miles-per-hour in the velocity department from his last attempt a few days prior.
So what comes next?
“My messaging to Tony was let’s come out with a net positive each day. If we can continue to do that once we get closer we’ll know what we have. For me to speculate what it looks like now is just not fair.”
Reading between the lines of Dave's words -- the ones above and the ones coming up -- it feels like the calendar may be putting the team in a position where Gonsolin might not be able to 100 percent handle a starter's workload entering postseason play. So, there could be some role changes ahead for the pitcher.
“Everything is on the table – as it should be. But it’s all contingent on how he’s feeling. It’s about winning a baseball game, winning a series, preventing runs, scoring runs. So however we can do that – whether it’s a little bit more creative or not normal, I don’t think we’re concerned about it. Nor are our players.”
The Dodgers are certainly never short on creativity with the pitching staff. Thankfully at this point in his career, Tony Gonlsolin has all angles of experience as a Major League pitcher in October.
