On Saturday afternoon, Minnesota Twins closer Joe Nathan left the team's game against the Boston Red Sox after feeling some tightness in his surgically repaired throwing elbow. The move was made for nothing more than precautionary reasons, as there's no point risking your closer during a spring training game in the first week of March.
Unfortunately, when Nathan showed up in the Twins clubhouse on Sunday morning, the tightness and soreness in his elbow had yet to sort itself out. So now, as another precautionary measure, Nathan is on his way back to the Twin Cities to have an MRI performed on the elbow. "Everything is looking good, as it not being super serious," Nathan said. "As far as tears or anything, it doesn't look like it's anything like that. That's a positive, and I'm going up there with positive thoughts. But we definitely want to be precautionary and make sure that we have all the information we could gather to at least give us peace of mind and know that hopefully nothing is going on." The Twins are hoping that the discomfort Nathan is feeling is nothing more than scar tissue breaking up following the procedure he had on Oct. 20 to remove bone spurs and other loose bodies from the elbow.
Nathan said that he's going to take the next few days off, and hopefully this is all just one of the speed bumps in the road to recovery from the original elbow surgery. No doubt the Twins feel the same way, because if the MRI comes back showing a more significant injury that would keep Nathan out for an extended period of time, it would have a large impact on the team's performance this season.
I agree this is bad news and I dont want to downplay the situation as im a Twins fan and fell bummed out about this.
But this really isnt devastating to the Twins...Closers really are a dime a dozen, just about anybody can come in and save 30+ games..Nathan is an elite closer but you dont need an elite closer to win...Plus the Twins have Rauch who has some closing experience and already have been rumored to be interested in Frasor, Wood, Bell and Smoltz..
Twins still have a very good team and should still be the AL Central favorites and lets face it, even with Nathan the Twins wouldnt beat the Yankees in the playoffs.
Yeah but the whole team chokes against the Yankees, for some reason we play scared against them.
Again, im not trying to downplay the situation, it is bad news and we cant replace Nathan..But the way I look at it, Nathan only pitches 60-70 innings a year..Yeah Nathan saves alot of games but most of those are games with 2-3 run leads, so maybe 20 of those saves are in high pressure sitautions...So its not like closing is the toughest job in baseball.
Plus the AL Central blows, White Sox will be the only competition..Whoever we have as a closer cant be any worse than Bobby Jenks.
I agree that they generally play poorly against them, but Nathan blew the game and there were bad calls in the other games. It took a competitive series and turned it into a sweep.
I think the Twins will be fine. This is the best roster they have had in years, probably since the '91 team. There is good potential in the starting rotation, especially if Liriano can get over last year's problems. Hopefully they will be able to sign Mauer soon. It is nice to have an owner now that is willing to pay the players a bit.
[Deleted User]Sun 3/7/10 6:21 PM
On Saturday afternoon, Minnesota Twins closer Joe Nathan left the team's game against the Boston Red Sox after feeling some tightness in his surgically repaired throwing elbow. The move was made for nothing more than precautionary reasons, as there's no point risking your closer during a spring training game in the first week of March.
Unfortunately, when Nathan showed up in the Twins clubhouse on Sunday morning, the tightness and soreness in his elbow had yet to sort itself out. So now, as another precautionary measure, Nathan is on his way back to the Twin Cities to have an MRI performed on the elbow. "Everything is looking good, as it not being super serious," Nathan said. "As far as tears or anything, it doesn't look like it's anything like that. That's a positive, and I'm going up there with positive thoughts. But we definitely want to be precautionary and make sure that we have all the information we could gather to at least give us peace of mind and know that hopefully nothing is going on." The Twins are hoping that the discomfort Nathan is feeling is nothing more than scar tissue breaking up following the procedure he had on Oct. 20 to remove bone spurs and other loose bodies from the elbow.
Nathan said that he's going to take the next few days off, and hopefully this is all just one of the speed bumps in the road to recovery from the original elbow surgery. No doubt the Twins feel the same way, because if the MRI comes back showing a more significant injury that would keep Nathan out for an extended period of time, it would have a large impact on the team's performance this season.
Rick
HOFer
deenFri 3/12/10 4:38 PM
I agree this is bad news and I dont want to downplay the situation as im a Twins fan and fell bummed out about this.
But this really isnt devastating to the Twins...Closers really are a dime a dozen, just about anybody can come in and save 30+ games..Nathan is an elite closer but you dont need an elite closer to win...Plus the Twins have Rauch who has some closing experience and already have been rumored to be interested in Frasor, Wood, Bell and Smoltz..
Twins still have a very good team and should still be the AL Central favorites and lets face it, even with Nathan the Twins wouldnt beat the Yankees in the playoffs.
So not much of change without Nathan.
VoltFri 3/12/10 4:51 PM
Hopefully they find someone who doesn't choke in the playoffs and blow games against the Yankees.
deenFri 3/12/10 5:14 PM
Yeah but the whole team chokes against the Yankees, for some reason we play scared against them.
Again, im not trying to downplay the situation, it is bad news and we cant replace Nathan..But the way I look at it, Nathan only pitches 60-70 innings a year..Yeah Nathan saves alot of games but most of those are games with 2-3 run leads, so maybe 20 of those saves are in high pressure sitautions...So its not like closing is the toughest job in baseball.
Plus the AL Central blows, White Sox will be the only competition..Whoever we have as a closer cant be any worse than Bobby Jenks.
VoltFri 3/12/10 9:51 PM
I agree that they generally play poorly against them, but Nathan blew the game and there were bad calls in the other games. It took a competitive series and turned it into a sweep.
I think the Twins will be fine. This is the best roster they have had in years, probably since the '91 team. There is good potential in the starting rotation, especially if Liriano can get over last year's problems. Hopefully they will be able to sign Mauer soon. It is nice to have an owner now that is willing to pay the players a bit.