CLEVELAND — Shane Bieber pitched until the pain stopped him.
Cleveland‘s ace will have season-ending Tommy John elbow surgery, a major blow to the Guardians and the 2020 Cy Young winner, who had looked like his dominant self in two strong starts to open the season.
Bieber, 28, struck out a majors-leading 20 and pitched 12 scoreless innings in starts against Oakland and Seattle despite the elbow getting progressively worse.
“Sheer toughness and grit,” Guardians president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti said in describing how Bieber managed the pain and performed.
Bieber, who was limited to 21 starts a year ago due to elbow issues, experienced pain after his Opening Day start against the A’s. The Guardians were concerned and gave him an extra day off while offering him additional treatment before facing the Mariners.
He decided to make the start anyway, battling through six innings while the soreness and inflammation intensified.
Bieber returned to Cleveland for more imaging tests and consultation. Dr. Keith Meister and Dr. Neal ElAttrache, the renowned orthopedist who did surgery on Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson‘s right shoulder, recommended elbow reconstruction.
Bieber made the decision to have the operation Friday night, knowing he will need up to 16 months to recover.
“He’s devastated by it,” Antonetti said on a Zoom call. “He feels as though he is letting a lot of people down. And I tried to reassure Shane that couldn’t be further from the truth because he embodies what it means to be a professional, what it means to be a great teammate and a great leader.”
Antonetti said Meister will perform Bieber’s surgery in Dallas in the near future.
“He really put in a ton of work this winter and throughout spring training, and we all felt he was on a good path to stay healthy and contribute for the balance of the season,” Antonetti said. “But ultimately when he got back into games and faced the stress of the major league environment, it just was too much for him.”
Bieber is entering his final year under contract with the Guardians, who are off to a 6-2 start under first-year manager Stephen Vogt heading into Saturday’s game in Minnesota.
“It’s hard to deal with this,” Vogt said during his pregame availability. “I just first and foremost feel for Shane. The amount of work that this guy’s put in over the last few years, the things that he’s pitched through, that’s a testament to who he is.
“The amount of empathy and pain that I feel with Shane, for Shane, that’s really what speaks the loudest right now. This guy powered through a start the other night and was elite. The things that he can do, even when injured, are really special, so my heart goes out to Shane and his family. This is devastating news for them.”
Bieber is 62-32 with a 3.22 ERA in 134 career starts with Cleveland. He led the majors in wins, ERA and strikeouts in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season. Bieber made the All-Star team in 2019 and was named MVP when the Guardians hosted.
Bieber’s injury is the latest for Cleveland’s pitching staff. Reliever Trevor Stephan recently had Tommy John surgery and Gavin Williams has been sidelined since spring training with elbow soreness but should be fine.
The Guardians are hoping to contend in the American League Central and will need others to step up with Bieber no longer anchoring the staff.
This is the first major setback Vogt has had to navigate as a manager. There’s nothing easy about it, and as a former player, he understands the emotional impact Bieber’s injury can have across the clubhouse.
He urged the Guardians not to run from their feelings.
“Let it hurt. You don’t have to be OK,” Vogt said. “It’s OK to not be OK. But this is what it is. We have an opportunity to still go out and play every day. The next-man-up mentality is what we have to be thinking about. You can’t replace Shane Bieber, but we do have guys that can step up and give us meaningful innings and get a lot of quality outs for us as we move forward.
“We’re all hurting. We love Shane. He’s such a big part of our team, our clubhouse, our culture, obviously our on-field success. That’s why my heart just goes out to him right now. We’ll support fully what he’s doing.”
The Giants are sending starter Jordan Hicks and 23-year-old lefty Kyle Harrison, among others, to Boston in exchange, sources said.
Devers, 28, is in just the second season of a 10-year, $313.5 million contract he signed to stay in Boston in January 2023, however his relationship with the team suffered a significant blow after the star third baseman was reportedly blindsided by a move to designated hitter in the spring.
Tensions flared again last month after Devers refused an offer from the team to move him to first base after starting first baseman Triston Casas was ruled out for the season with a knee injury.
It reached a point where Red Sox owner John Henry met with the disgruntled star, making a rare trip to meet the team on the road and smooth things over after Devers’ pointed comments about the request to switch positions again.
Hicks and Harrison give a pitching-starved Red Sox team more depth on their staff while Devers provides a huge boost to a middling Giants offense.
Devers has more than 200 career home runs to his name and has a .894 OPS for Boston this season.
Manager Dave Roberts told reporters Sunday that Ohtani would throw another simulated game in the coming days that could “potentially” be his last one, and a source told ESPN’s Buster Olney that Ohtani should join the Dodgers’ rotation “sooner rather than later,” potentially within the week.
Ohtani took a big step forward during his most recent simulated game at Petco Park on Tuesday, throwing 44 pitches over the course of three innings against a couple of lower-level minor league players. Ohtani’s fastball reached the mid- to upper-90s, and he exhibited good command of his off-speed pitches in what amounted to his third time facing hitters. Afterward, Roberts said there was a “north of zero” chance Ohtani could join the rotation before the All-Star break.
Because of his two-way designation, the Dodgers can carry Ohtani as an extra pitcher, which means he can throw two to three innings and have someone pitch after him as a piggyback starter. At this point, it seems that is the Dodgers’ plan.
The Dodgers’ pitching staff has again been plagued by injury, with 14 pitchers on the injured list, including four starting pitchers the team was heavily counting on for 2025 — Blake Snell, Tony Gonsolin, Roki Sasaki and Tyler Glasnow.
If Ohtani returns in July — the likely outcome at this point — he will be 22 months removed from a second repair of his ulnar collateral ligament.
The update isn’t as optimistic for Sasaki. He paused his throwing program and is set for a lengthy layoff. Sasaki has not pitched in a game since May 9 and is not part of the team’s long-term pitching plans this season.
“I think that’s what the mindset should be,” Roberts said. “Being thrust into this environment certainly was a big undertaking for him, and now you layer in the health part and the fact he’s a starting pitcher, knowing what the build-up [required to return] entails … I think that’s the prudent way to go about it.”
Sasaki, 23, went 1-1 with a 4.72 ERA in eight starts after joining the Dodgers from the Pacific League’s Chuba Lotte Marines, averaging less than 4⅓ innings per start. He walked 22 and struck out 24 in 34⅓ innings, and his fastball averaged 95.7 mph, down 3-4 mph from his average in Japan.
Roberts said Sasaki was pain free when he resumed throwing in early June, but the pitcher was shut down after feeling discomfort this past week. Sasaki recently received a cortisone injection in the shoulder; Roberts said no further scans are planned.
“I don’t think it’s pain,” Roberts said. “I don’t know if it’s discomfort, if it’s tightness, if he’s just not feeling strong, whatever the adjective you want to use. That’s more of a question for Roki, as far as the sensation he’s feeling.
“He’s just not feeling like he can ramp it up, and we’re not going to push him to do something he doesn’t feel good about right now.”
BOSTON — Aaron Judge blamed himself for swinging at pitches outside the strike zone as the New York Yankees were swept in a three-game series against the Boston Red Sox.
“You got to swing at strikes,” Judge said after going 1-for-12 in the series, which Boston completed with a 2-0 victory on Sunday.
Judge struck out three or more times in three straight games for only the third time in his major league career.
“That usually helps any hitter when you swing at strikes,” Judge added. “Definitely some pitches off the edge or off the edge in, you know, taking some hacks just trying to make something happen.”
Judge had a tying solo homer in the opener Friday night but struck out nine times as the Yankees were swept in a series for the first time this season.
New York scored only four runs in the three games, matching its fewest in a three-game series at Fenway Park, on June 20-22, 1916 and on Sept. 28-30, 1922.
“It’s very hard,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said of facing Judge. “He’s so good at what he does. We used our fastballs in the right spots, we got some swing and misses.”
“Throughout the years we’ve been aggressive with him,” Cora added. “Sometimes he gets us, sometimes we do a good job with that. It’s always fun to compete against the best, and, to me, he’s the best in the business right now.”
Judge’s major league-leading average dipped to .378.
“I don’t think much of it,” teammate Ben Rice said. “If I could have that guy hitting every single at-bat even if he’s not at his best, I would do it. I’m sure he’ll bounce back. He’ll be all right.”
Judge faced Garrett Whitlock with two on in the eighth Sunday and bounced into an inning-ending double play.
“He’s one of the greatest hitters in the world,” Whitlock said. “It’s special to watch him play and everything. We tried to execute and had some execution this weekend.”