Masahiro Tanaka: What to Make of His Recent Surgery?
By Brad Kelly
Whenever we discuss Masahiro Tanaka in fantasy baseball the conversation always begins with, “if he stays healthy”. By now it is no secret that Tanaka’s elbow has a slight UCL tear scaring Yankee fans and fantasy owners alike.
This cloud of uncertainty was none further relieved today when news broke that Masahiro Tanaka had surgery to remove bone spurs in his right elbow. An injury that he has supposedly battled since his days in Japan.
Fantasy owners can take this news in two different directions. One is that by cleaning up his elbow now and the fact that it wasn’t related to his UCL tear, as a sign of optimism that he will be able to pitch 2016 in relatively less pain and be able to avoid prolonged DL stints.
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On the other hand though, this only further cements another red flag on Tanaka’s resume and causation for owners to ignore him on draft day.
From the pessimistic viewpoint, it is clear to see that news of this surgery on top of the already current injury definitely point to hesitation towards owning Masahiro Tanaka at all in 2016. It is also intriguing that the Yankees knew about the bone spurs since he came over, but never initiated this surgery sooner especially when the recovery is estimated at six weeks.
For me this news points to the fact that the Yankees are trying everything they can do to buy time for Tanaka’s elbow before its possible complete tearing. As much as Tanaka says that there isn’t a psychological effect knowing about the injury, it has to have some sort of impact on how his mentality has to change per game.
Through this gloominess, I do see some sort of silver lining which has me on the cautiously optimistic side of the Masahiro Tanaka’s draft value heading into 2016. Obviously clearing bone spurs anywhere on the body alleviates nagging pain and irritation. Therein lies a sign for optimism in itself.
Hopefully this also reassures Tanaka that even though his elbow may have a slight tear, like numerous other MLB pitchers in the game today, that the pain he felt during the season that caused him to miss time was due to the bone spurs rather than the bigger looming issue.
Unfortunately the dominant Masahiro Tanaka that we initially saw in 2014 will probably never resurface until he eventually has Tommy John surgery. He still shows flashes and has runs where he is tough to hit for sure, so his fantasy value is not completely shot.
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He is going to be overlooked in a lot of drafts for these health reasons alone and just because he isn’t an ace SP1 now, doesn’t mean that he still cannot provide owners with a solid SP3 or SP4 value in the later rounds.
He managed to start 24 games in 2015 even though he missed some time, and his 12 W/3.51 ERA/.0994 WHIP/8.1 SO/9 line, is still respectable. So even if he doesn’t improve at all next season, his baseline leaves owners with clear value.
Masahiro Tanaka’s value has fallen to the point where he now has become an undervalued target leaving astute owners the chance to be patient and fill the rest of their teams out while snagging values like these in the later rounds. Tanaka may have lost some of the hype that he entered into the league with, but do not ignore the fact that he still is a respectable commodity in fantasy in 2016.