New York Yankees star at odds with team over return from injury
New York Yankees pitcher Luis Severino has aired their frustrations about how the team have handled the player's return to action from a lat strain.
Severino, 29, strained the latissimus dorsi muscle during the final week of spring training and has been sidelined with the problem ever since. Initial predictions were that the two-time all-star would only miss three or four starts, but it is now likely to be a nine or ten-game absence.
The pitcher was due to begin a rehabilitation assignment last week with the team's Single-A affiliate, the Tampa Tarpons, but the Yankees held him out. Instead, he threw in a simulated game on Friday, the same day New York played the Tampa Bay Rays.
Severino was not in agreement with the decision. “I think it was unnecessary not to throw in Low-A, but I do whatever they tell me to do,” he said Sunday morning, via the New York Post. Asked whether the team explained why they held him back, a grinning Severino replied: “They tried to, but whatever.”
“In the end, if I’m the only one who wants something and they don’t agree with that, they’re not going to let me do something. But hopefully, from now on, they trust me more and try to let me compete more.”
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After coming through the simulated game, Severino will pitch with Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre later this week. Yankees manager Aaron Boone has said Severino's injury history played a role.
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"But it’s also an approach of building starting pitchers up conservatively and understanding that those pitches, whether it’s between 40 and 60 and 70, are the times you gotta be mindful,” Boone added. “When you make big jumps, history will tell you those are the times that pitchers can be a little more vulnerable to injuries.
“The bottom line is we want a healthy Luis Severino back in our rotation impacting us. We’re all looking forward to that.” The Dominican pitcher suffered another lat problem last season that kept him out for 60 days.
A return for Severino would be another welcome one for the injury-hit Yankees. Slugger Aaron Judge is due back from a right hip strain this week.
Last season's American League Most Valuable Player, who signed a nine-year, $360 million contract extension to remain in New York during the offseason, is set to come off the injury list against the Oakland Athletics after missing eight games with the problem. "I think he's doing really well," Boone said about Judge before Saturday's game against the Tampa Bay Rays.
"I think we're going to be in a good spot come Tuesday to where he's done everything for several days. That was the calculus in this weekend.
"It's like, do we want to push him back out there if he's 85, 90 percent? I wasn't comfortable doing that just because I don't want a strain to turn into a bad situation where we're talking six, eight weeks."
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