I’m not a huge Milton fan, but this isn’t good at all. Milton left the game with “stiffness” in his elbow, but it’s looking much more serious than that:
“It’s been sore for a while, but in the fifth inning I felt it on one slider,” he said. “I don’t know what to say. It’s painful and we’ll see what the MRI says tomorrow.”
Milton has never had arm trouble before. If this injury is serious, the Reds are looking at a weekend one-two punch of some combination of Jason Johnson, Sun-Woo Kim and Chris Michalak for Saturday and Sunday starts at Wrigley Field.
Guys and gals, that’s a flat-out ugly prospect, if those are our pitchers this weekend. Ugh.
I have no problems questioning the batting order, bullpen calls, or other decisions concerning big leaguers, but this is different. It is a risk any time you’re asking a 20 year-old to extend his season like this, and I think it is best left to those coaching and watching him regularly.
I had always thought that Baker ran Prior’s ragged in ’03, but 211 IPs isn’t so bad. Even the playoffs didn’t add that much; the Cubs only played that one series, starting Prior (and Wood) twice. Prior pitched a total of 14.1 innings in the playoffs.
in somewhat related news…Milton is up for the noteworthy distinction of Hometown Bum on espn.com. Of course, my vote went to Marge Schott…
Point taken, Al, though I remember Kriv saying for much of this year that Bailey was absolutely not coming up in ’06. If he’s changed his mind bc he feels that Bailey can handle some more innings, fine, but his decision shouldn’t be affected by the status of the rotation.