Noted Baseball Injury Expert Shares Optimistic Outlook on Seattle Mariners' Logan Gilbert

This past weekend, Seattle Mariners ace Logan Gilbert was placed on the injured list with a Grade 1 flexor tendon strain. When the diagnosis came out, it sounded like good news, but it's also the same diagnosis that Robbie Ray got in 2023 before undergoing flexor tendon surgery and Tommy John that caused him to miss a year and a half.

So, what exactly is a flexor tendon strain and what exactly is the prognosis moving forward for Gilbert?

We caught up with noted injury expert and baseball injury author Will Carroll on Tuesday's edition of the "Refuse to Lose" podcast to get those answers, and the answers are surprisingly optimistic.

Carroll essentially says that anytime you have a "strain," you have suffered a tear. So, Gilbert has suffered a tear in his flexor tendon. However, the question is, did he tear a very small amount of the tendon or a very big amount? So far, all indications are that it was a small amount and it can heal itself, hence why the Mariners are giving him a two-week shutdown.

"...And talking to people within the Mariners organization. One of the reasons they pulled him is they saw his mechanics had changed. Now, with the Hawkeye cameras, with other cameras, I don't know what they had on him, uh, specifically, but they saw biomechanical changes. So was there fatigue? Was he making unconscious changes because of that, that tightness that he felt? Was he making unconscious changes because that he didn't know? Again, they used all the technology available. They caught it early. They made what they hope is a good decision and that they can get him back here in just a couple weeks rather than losing him for months or even seasons."

I encourage you to listen to the full conversation in the podcast player below:

The Mariners will be in action on Tuesday night at 6:40 p.m. PT against the Los Angeles Angels.

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