Rangers: Jacob deGrom injury update has a hint of bad news

The Texas Rangers placed Jacob deGrom on the injured list a little less than a week ago with an elbow issue, but he has yet to resume throwing.

deGrom isn’t at the point of surgery — nor to we hope he ever gets there — but the Rangers inherited a lot of risk when they signed the right-handed pitcher to a five-year, $185 million deal this offseason.

The two-time Cy Young award winner has suffered several injuries early this season, including the recent forearm and elbow inflammation which placed him on the injured list. That 15-day IL stint could be extended, as deGrom has yet to resume throwing a baseball.

Rangers get injury update on Jacob deGrom

The Rangers are right to be cautious with deGrom, as they’ll ramp him up slowly before his returns to Arlington and big-league action.

“He hasn’t started throwing yet, but he feels great,” Bochy said of deGrom on ESPN’s Baseball Tonight podcast. “We’re in probably that three-week area (for deGrom’s return), and we’re almost a week into that now.”

Suggesting a player “feels great” but hasn’t taken a relatively big step towards recovery hints that he still has a long way to go. Perhaps that time period could be three weeks, but as we’ve grown accustomed to with deGrom, things rarely go according to plan.

It doesn’t help that deGrom left a separate outing in mid-April with wrist soreness as a precaution. He did make his next start, but there are only so many areas of deGrom’s arm left to hurt. Eventually, he will need to address those areas of concern.

Texas GM Chris Young has preached patience with deGrom’s injury woes, saying there’s no real reason to push him.

“There’s no need to push him. He came in today and felt okay, which is a positive, but given how important he is to us and our season, we’re going to play this very cautiously and see how he responds over the next several days to treatment,” Young said when deGrom was placed on the IL.

Hopefully that patience pays off for the Rangers.