Collette Calls: Uh Oh-tani

Jason Collette delivers some grim news to Shohei Ohtani owners, even if the ace pitcher avoids Tommy John surgery. What's the future hold for the phenom?

Updated on June 20, 2018 12:56PM EST

By:

Jason Collette

Updated on June 20, 2018 12:56PM EST

Collette Calls

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My apologies for the short absence as I was away on vacation with the family in Fort Myers. We were able to take in a barnburner 1-0 Rays win over the Jays on June 13, as well as this gorgeous sunset on Fort Myers Beach the evening before we left. Besides the sweltering humidity, constant mosquitos, torrential rains every afternoon and incredibly poor drivers all over the road, the vacation was just what the doctor ordered.

The sun also appears to be setting on Shohei Ohtani's amazing 2018 season as well. We got the depressing news that he now has a grade 2 UCL sprain and that the Angels tried Platelet Rich Plasma injections. They will then evaluate things in a few weeks before deciding whether the he needs Tommy John surgery. Whether you own shares of him or not, the news is terrible. I do not have him in any of my leagues, but it has been fun to watch him pitch when he is dominating a lineup, and I even got to see him hit a home run in person in May. If you do own him, you are upset and wondering what to do with him. In a reset league, I am pessimistic he will have any value the rest of this season.Keeper league payers and dynasty players have to consider what the future holds for Ohtani as he travels down one of two paths: the one he is currently on, or the one that results in Tommy John surgery. Let's look at the data around both paths, beginning with the current path of PRP injections.

All of these names and associated data comes from Joe Roegale's excellent list as he tracks all of the news around elbow issues.

The first documented case of a pitcher having PRP injections was Takashi Saito in 2008. He had the injection in mid-July that season and came back to pitch that September. He went on to pitch effectively in 2009 and 2010 before seeing his 2011 season shortened by injury and his career end in 2012. In total, 17 players have received PRP injections from 2008-17, four of whom ultimately ended up having Tommy John surgery:

PLAYER	PRP DATE	TEAM	LEVEL	RETURN	RECOVERY MONTHS	TJ SURGERY
JC Ramirez	8/24/2017	LAA	MLB	4/2/2018	7	4/17/2018
Anthony Santander	5/9/2017	BAL	A+	7/27/2017	3
Branden Kline	4/15/2017	BAL	AA	5/20/2018	13
Seth Lugo	4/4/2017	NYM	MLB	6/11/2017	2
Victor Arano	2/22/2017	PHI	AA	5/31/2017	3
Keston Hiura	1/1/2017	MIL	Coll	2/18/2017	2
Yimmi Brasoban	11/1/2016	SD	AA	6/13/2017	7
Rubby De La Rosa	9/27/2016	ARI	MLB	6/23/2017	9	8/22/2017
Aaron Nola	8/17/2016	PHI	MLB	4/8/2017	8
Wei-Yin Chen	8/1/2016	MIA	MLB	9/19/2016	2
Garrett Richards	5/16/2016	LAA	MLB	4/5/2017	11
Michael Lorenzen	4/1/2016	CIN	MLB	6/24/2016	3
Tyler Thornburg	8/1/2014	MIL	MLB	4/7/2015	8
Masahiro Tanaka	7/14/2014	NYY	MLB	9/21/2014	2
Chad Billingsley	9/1/2012	LAD	MLB	4/10/2013	7	4/24/2013
Carl Crawford	4/1/2012	BOS	MLB	7/16/2012	3	8/23/2012
Takashi Saito	7/1/2008	LAD	MLB	9/15/2008	2

The average recovery time for the player to return to the same level of competition (not effectiveness) was 5.4 months, hence my gut feeling that Ohtani is likely done as a commodity in reset leagues for 2018. Saito, Chen and Tanaka are what people can hang on. Saito is listed as a "partial tear" while Chen had a "slight tear" and Tanaka had a "10 percent tear."

The table below shows how the pitchers fared after the PRP injection and avoided Tommy John surgery:

That is the list of pitchers who have made it back to pitch a decent amount of baseball post-PRP injection. In the case of Thornburg, he is still trying to make it back to the major leagues after missing 2017 with Thoracic Outlet Syndrome surgery. However, there is an even split among the other pitchers on the list. The first three, all pitchers with extensive experience overseas, did not bounce back to the same level of success they had pre-injection. The US-based pitchers, all younger pitchers, have had better numbers post-injection. Ohtani did pitch overseas, but not as extensive as Chen, Tanaka or Saito, and is younger than any other pitcher on this list. The best-case scenario for Ohtani would be what has happened to Aaron Nola, but Nola was also recovering from a low-grade tear. The more likely case could be what his teammate Garrett Richards has gone through, where it takes him longer to come back because of the severity of the tear. In that case, we would be looking at a return to the major leagues about mid-May 2019. The other path will lead to a longer delay. Through the 2015 season, 267 major league pitchers have had Tommy John surgery. The average recovery time – as in returning to the major leagues to pitch in a game – is 18.6 months.

Some of the more extreme cases on the low end of the spectrum include names such as Ken Dayley, Mike Bielecki, John Tudor, Zach Duke, Scott Williamson, Jason Grimsley and Mike Fetters, who each made it back to a major league mound fewer than 10 months from their surgery date. On the high end, we have Jose Rijo, Jonny Venters, Cory Luebke, Neal Cotts and Ryan Madson to name a few. If there is a silver lining to Ohtani having Tommy John surgery, it is the fact that the odds of returning to the major league level are very much in his favor given his youth. But it is important to remember there are no 100 percent success rates for surgeries and that pitchers do not "come back throwing harder" as much as they come back healthier than they were before the surgery. Roegele's data shows that at least 82 percent of pitchers ages 20-25 return to pitch in the majors. The total sample is 119 pitchers with the average recovery time 19.5 months and the average return to the majors 84 percent.

START AGE	END AGE	AVG MONTHS	AVG RETURN	SURGERIES
20	21	20.6	100%	8
22	23	19.9	82%	38
24	25	18.1	85%	73

In summary, I do not have any good news for those of you in reset leagues for 2018 as Ohtani has likely thrown the last pitch for your team. If he does come back, it will be too late in the season to make a difference on your roster. Even if he avoids the knife, we are still not likely to get a full season from him in 2019 unless he does so as a designated hitter. If he does have surgery, we are then talking about him being out for the rest of 2018 and likely all 2019. A 2020 return does not automatically mean he returns where he left off because command is the last thing that comes back for pitchers who have Tommy John surgery simply because they have missed so much time from the game.