Kids today have nothing
to fear about Tommy John surgery. The surgery has become safer than ever, more
and more pitchers each year come back and reclaim their elite status after the
surgery. Out of all the pitchers that receive Tommy John
surgery, 80% make it back to the big leagues. Just take a look
at the New York Mets, the 2015 National League Champions. Five of their best
and most promising starting pitchers have had Tommy John surgery, which
includes Zack Wheeler, Matt Harvey, Jake DeGrom, Steven Matz and closer Bobby
Parnell. Kids today see the National League Champions with a rotation full of
Tommy John surgery recipients, see their success with Tommy John surgery and begin
not to worry about the negatives. Even newly elected Hall of Fame pitcher John
Smoltz had the surgery, the first ever to have Tommy John surgery and make it
into the Hall of Fame.
With so many success stories, many people think that the
surgery has a 100% success rate and pitchers can come back even stronger after
surgery. Without any apparent repercussions for having Tommy John surgery, pitchers
rationalize that a new and fixed ligament will basically give a clean slate
when it comes to wear and tear on the elbow. These players believe that they
can throw harder because of it as well, which will get them to the major
leagues and the big paycheck, so pitchers elect for surgery if at all possible.
However, the stereotype is very much false. Tommy John
surgery is a transplant, meaning that a doctor replaces the ligament from somewhere
else on the body. The doctor takes a tendon in the wrist, cuts it out, and
connects it in replace of the broken ligament. However, the new
ligament is no stronger than the old ligament. The inventor of Tommy
John surgery, Doctor Frank Jobe, spoke in favor of this notion, saying “The
surgery doesn’t make anyone better… It restores. That’s it." Doctors
have not perfected the surgery either. In 2014, 11 out of 31 surgeries
performed were for revisional purposes. Players underwent Tommy John
surgery for a second time because the first surgery failed. According to
Stephania Bell in an article on ESPN.com, since 1999, 32 pitchers have
undergone revisional Tommy John surgery and a third of those revisions happened
in the past year. Bell also tracked five starting pitchers and five relief
pitcher’s velocities before and after surgery. Seven out of 10 pitchers had
their velocity decrease post-surgery. The three pitchers that had their
velocity increase, increased by tenths of a mile per hour.
So why do pitchers elect
to receive Tommy John surgery? Because of the money that comes with making it
to Major League Baseball. The average annual salary for a Major League Baseball
player in 2014 was $3.82 million dollars. Pitcher Max Scherzer
inked a seven year, $210 million deal from the Washington Nationals last
offseason. Almost all of the top tier pitchers ink nine figure deals. With
pitching in such demand in Major League Baseball, organizations willingly spend
insane amounts of money on a pitcher. These teenagers want part of that.
Therefore, they feel the need to do anything they can in order to succeed as a
pitcher, even if that means needing Tommy John surgery. At young ages, pitchers
willingly do anything to net themselves a lucrative contract in the Major
Leagues. They will throw hundreds of pitches at top speeds all year round in
order to impress Major League scouts. These baseball organizations even
encourage it, shown when scouts pressured Brady Aiken to pitch against doctor’s
orders. Major League Baseball organizations use the money against these young pitchers.
They have created their own conundrum known as the epidemic of Tommy John
surgery. An inflation of Tommy John surgeries in baseball without any known
long-term consequences is a scary path for baseball to head down. What could
happen to these pitchers 10, 20, even 50 years in the future? Let us not wait
to find out by taking initiative now.
No comments:
Post a Comment