Cardinals experiencing a Carpenter delay

June 17, 2008 · Paul Raymond · Jump to comments

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St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Chris carpenter was shut down last week after experiencing soreness in his surgically repaired elbow. The pitcher visited Dr. James Andrews on Monday, the same doctor who performed his Tommy John surgery. There was good and bad news from this visit. The bad news well there wasn’t much just that he’s experiencing normal pain in the recovery just at a later stage then most people. The good, well the good is pretty much the same as the bad. How’s that so? Well it means that its normal pain associated with the surgery and he won’t need to have more.

“Everybody is different,” Carpenter said at Busch before Tuesday night’s game. “Unfortunately mine went through pain at 10 ½ months. If I had this issue in February when I first started throwing, there would be no issue. … My ligament and my reconstruction looks good. Everybody reacts differently.”

The visit to Andrews originally stemmed from some pain Carpenter experienced after throwing a 60-pitch simulated game. He had met with team doctors and then they felt he should get a second opinion with Dr. Andrews just to make sure everything was alright. Carpenter described things as being “good”. Unfortunately, all of this will setback the timetable on his return.

General Manager John Mozeliak initially expected Carpenter to be back by the All-Star break, but now they are shooting for an August return. They’ll be giving the pitcher more days off in between throwing sessions as well as having him throw fewer pitches during them. “We’ve changed his throwing program a bit,” Mozeliak said. “We’re hopeful he can pitch in 2008.” It’s pretty smart for them to do this as a healthy Carpenter could still be as good as any in the game. Bring him along slowly this year and you can have him back to full strength for next season.

In other Cardinals news, Mark Mulder threw his second rehab start on Saturday. In the appearance, he went 5 innings giving up five hits, no runs and striking out three. Supposedly his fastball was consistently hitting 90mph on the radar gun too. As long as there are no more setbacks with him there is a chance he could help the Cards rotation by mid-to-late July, all pending how many rehab starts they’d like to get him.

Here’s a link to St Louis Dispatch and more Cardinals news.

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