Once again the Yankees have managed to find themselves in a spot where one of their starters is suffering from an injury that will require missing some time. That being said, right hander Frankie Montas will not be available to begin the season in the rotation. This is not good as Montas is dealing with inflammation in his pitching shoulder.
When I wrote my ,Top 5 Rotations piece a couple of weeks ago I did so with one key word in mind…”health”. The Yankees are now looking at Gerrit Cole, Carlos Rodon, Nestor Cortes, Luis Severino and Domingo German to carry the load the first 4-6 weeks of the season. My issue with this is now you are asking more of the other pitchers on this staff and there are already other injury concerns with this rotation. Luis Severino only pitched in 7 games between 2019-2021 and then followed that up with 19 appearances last year. He looked solid when out there the question is will we get Sevy all season long? Carlos Rodon has also had his fair share of history with injuries.
Montas was a strong pitcher to anchor this rotation with a career 9.3 K/9 and > 4.00 ERA over the course of 592 major league innings. The Yankees are now one injury away from being down two starters to begin the season. I am not wishing injury on anyone but I would say it wouldn’t shock me if we see another arm go down in this rotation at some point.
The good news is this doesn’t look to be a super long IL stint but with shoulder inflammation I would tread lightly to start celebrating. Any bumps or bruises along the way and we could see this lingering throughout the season.
We hope to see Montas as soon as possible but it has been reported by the New York Post that he is 8-10 weeks behind in offseason training.
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