Taijuan Walker will pitch three to four innings Thursday night for Single-A Clearwater, with the plan for the Philadelphia Phillies righty to throw 60-65 pitches in his first rehab appearance.
Where the 31-year-old’s next rehab appearance will take place at is unclear, but unlike Orion Kerkering — who will pitch Thursday evening at Clearwater also, and could return to the Phillies as soon as Sunday — Walker is just getting started in his rehab. Phillies manager Rob Thomson said on this past roadtrip that the team hopes to build Walker up to over 100 pitches in rehab outings before having him return to the Phillies, which likely means three or four minor-league games.
These days, teams have plenty of justification for being very patient with their pitchers. Gerrit Cole, Justin Verlander, Shane Bieber, Spencer Strider and Framber Valdez are among the game’s elite pitchers currently out with elbow or shoulder injuries. Bieber, the former AL Cy Young Award winner, is set to undergo season-ending Tommy John surgery soon. Though the Braves are keeping their cards close to the vest with Strider, there seems to be a very real chance he either has already had or is going to have Tommy John surgery, which would be the second time he’s undergone the procedure.
Before Thursday’s series-opening matchup with the Pittsburgh Pirates, Thomson was asked if he’s surprised that with how much teams have invested in pitchers that no club seems to have mastered keeping key pieces from having major elbow and/or shoulder injuries.
“Well, it’s difficult,” Thomson acknowledged. “You’re gonna have arm injuries, it’s just the way it is. And you try to get guys rest. I have my own formula, some other people have different formulas. I don’t like seeing guys go four out of six days. If they go three out of four, I give them a day off, at least one. It all depends on how many pitches they throw in those outings too. So, try to take care of them as best you can. But I don’t think there’s a perfect system to avoid all injuries.”
No. 1 overall prospect Andrew Painter isn’t going to factor into the 2024 season as he recovers from Tommy John surgery. The Phillies have had a few relievers no longer in the organization — David Robertson and JoJo Romero, for example — undergo Tommy John surgery in the last few years. So the Phillies haven’t been immune to the major injury bug for pitchers.
But when you consider that since the start of the 2020 season Aaron Nola and Zack Wheeler are third and fourth in regular season innings pitched, the Phillies have done about as good of a job as possible at keeping their major arms healthy. The only two pitchers who have thrown more regular-season innings during that time are the aforementioned Cole, who is currently injured, and former NL Cy Young Award winner Sandy Alcántara, who is out for the season as he recovers from Tommy John surgery.
Seranthony Domínguez has largely stayed healthy since undergoing Tommy John surgery in July of 2020. José Alvarado had two injured-list stints last year with left elbow inflammation, but despite regularly throwing around 100 mph, he’s been able to avoid any major surgeries and taken on hefty workloads in each of the last two postseasons.
Is there something specific that the Phillies training staff is doing that’s allowed them to have largely positive outcomes with their key arms?
“I think they do a great job in total recovery,” Thomson said. “That’s as far as working their arms … massage … just different things that they do to help these guys in between starts.”
Striking the balance between wanting to get the most out of your pitchers, but doing right by them so they stay healthy in 2024 and beyond brings us back to Walker, and the dilemma some have created wondering what will happen to Turnbull when Walker returns.
Turnbull has a 0.00 through his first two starts of the season, and naturally, Thomson was asked Thursday if the righty could pitch himself into remaining in the rotation even once Walker returns.
“Sure. I mean, if he keep putting up zeros, that’s tough to take him out of the rotation,” Thomson said. “But, we’ll see.”
It feels pretty unlikely that the Phillies would send Walker — who is in the second season of a four/$72 million deal — to the bullpen when he returns. Cristopher Sánchez has a 3.56 ERA since the start of the 2023 season, so he’s done nothing to lose his spot in the rotation. But if Turnbull continues to pitch at a high level, the Phillies will have to make a decision.
That could mean going to a six-man rotation for a period of the season, or piggybacking two starters.
But don’t be so sure what appears like it will be a problem in a month actually will be an issue when the time comes. Walker could have a setback. Turnbull could come back down to Earth, which would make moving him to the bullpen an easy choice.
Even if Turnbull is still pitching at a high level, he may ultimately be the pick to go back to the bullpen. He missed all of the 2022 season recovering from Tommy John surgery, and pitched 57 total innings between the minors and majors a year ago. The last time he pitched more than 60 innings in a season was 2019. Given how little he’s pitched over the last four seasons, how careful do the Phillies need to be with Turnbull?
“Really,” Thomson admitted. “I think it factors into a lot of our decision-making moving forward, because the last couple years, he hasn’t had many innings.”
How much of a year-over-year innings increase is Thomson comfortable asking of a pitcher?
“Yeah, usually [it’s] 40 innings, 50 innings, somewhere in there,” Thomson said.
The 40-50 inning estimate isn’t set in stone. Could Turnbull log 60 more innings in 2024 than he did in 2023? Probably. But will he make 33 starts and log 150+ innings? Probably not. So at some point this year, Turnbull probably won’t be in the starting rotation.
Knowing how much Thomson is comfortable having pitchers increase year-over-year is worth filing away, though. Not just for Turnbull, but for any young pitcher who comes up and/or is returning from a major surgery during the remaining time he’s manager. The inexact science of having to manage a pitcher’s innings and make sure they don’t get injured (or re-injured) is an unfortunate part of the job right now.
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