OT - Dombrowski: Verlander could miss start of season

Submitted by Cold War on

Justin Verlander is still early in the recovery process from core muscle surgery, and general manager Dave Dombrowski said Thursday there is a possibility the right-hander could miss the beginning of the season.

"He's doing great," Dombrowski said of Verlander, who underwent surgery on Jan. 9. "I'm not concerned for him being out an extended period. If he misses any time of the season, it would only be a very short time period. I'm not ready to say that he will. But he's doing very well."

Verlander, who turns 31 in February, aggravated a pre-existing abdominal injury in December while doing conditioning drills. His initial recovery time was expected to be six weeks, and the Tigers anticipated he would be ready to pitch at the beginning of the season...

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article/mlb/tigers-gm-dave-dombrowski-says-justin-verlander-could-miss-start-of-season?ymd=20140124&content_id=67067760&vkey=news_mlb

Hello_Heisman

January 24th, 2014 at 2:05 PM ^

is the reminder that JV is already 31.  I still think of him as a 23 year old high end prospect, but that was 8 years ago now.  Crazy to think that the Tigers have now been a legitimately good team for the better part of 8 years, considering what transpired from 1989-2005.

LSAClassOf2000

January 24th, 2014 at 2:20 PM ^

It is good to know that his recovery is going well all the same, and as others have said, the baseball season is too long to be even considering rushing him back out there and risking further problems. Hopefully, he'll take the time he needs and rejoin the rotation as soon as he feels comfortable doing so. 

JamieH

January 24th, 2014 at 2:21 PM ^

If this was a pre-existing injury it might be better that he hurt it worse now and could get surgery during the off-season instead of trying to go the whole season on it and hurting it in June or even worse, hurting it in September or something.

denardogasm

January 24th, 2014 at 2:33 PM ^

The first I heard of this surgery they were saying he'd probably be back in time for spring training.  Now it's missing the start of the season?  That's a pretty big range in recovery time.  What the heck happened?

Moleskyn

January 24th, 2014 at 2:34 PM ^

The only thing that concerns me about this news is my fantasy team. I can keep 3 players and was planning on making JV one of those. Tough choice now, since I also have Cabrera, Trout, Harper, and Scherzer.

jsquigg

January 24th, 2014 at 4:50 PM ^

Pitino has obviously made some bad choices in life, but I thought he was a class act last year and very gracious in victory.  Then again, I'm not as judgmental as many are (not saying Magnus is).  I prefer to check myself before I write off others.  There are exceptions, of course, especially if someone were to go through my Borges commenting history......

bronxblue

January 24th, 2014 at 8:36 PM ^

Sounds like a prudent move.  Nobody is going to run away with the Central in the spring, and I'd much rather see Verlander get healthy and be a nice addition to a pitching staff that should be able to hold up pretty well without him for a short time.  Also, the offense should be able to shoulder more of the load even with Fielder being gone.