PEORIA, Ariz. — With a seemingly interminable spring training just days away from ending, the Mariners find themselves in the midst of a minor crisis.
Left-hander Drew Smyly, the team’s No. 4 starter in the rotation, has been scratched from his final Cactus League start on Friday with arm issues.
“He didn’t feel great coming out of his bullpen yesterday,” manager Scott Servais on Wednesday morning. “We need to get a feel for where he’s at.”
Servais wouldn’t go into specifics of what was ailing Smyly’s arm whether it was the shoulder or elbow.
“It’s just a little soggy,” he said.
The plan is for Smyly to meet with team orthopedist — Dr. Edward Khalfayan — on Wednesday. Smyly declined to speak about the issue, wanting to meet with Khalfayan first and getting a diagnosis.
“At this time of spring you are always concerned because we are getting close to opening day,” Servais said. “But I don’t want to rush to any judgments. We’ll wait and see what the doc says.”
The initial plan is to shut Smyly down from throwing for the next few days.
Smyly has had a history of shoulder issues. He suffered a tear in the labrum in May of 2015 and rehabbed the shoulder back to shape instead of undergoing surgery.
Arm fatigue isn’t uncommon for some pitchers during spring training. Smyly hasn’t had a typical spring, having pitched a game for the United States in the World Baseball Classic. He had a brilliant outing, touching 94 mph with his fastball and striking out eight batters in 4 2/3 innings. Prior to that outing, he went nine days without throwing in a game. He made two starts after returning to the Mariners camp. He threw four innings in a minor league game and then pitched four innings, giving up five runs and three against the Reds on Sunday.
The Mariners have some contingency plans if Smyly can’t make his first regular season start on April 6 against the Astros. Left-hander Ariel Miranda would seem like the most likely candidate. But right-hander Chris Heston or lefty Dillon Overton is also a possibility.
Shae Simmons suffers setback
The Mariners have shutdown Shae Simmons in his recovery from a forearm strain after continued issues with the flexor bundle.
“It’s weird,” he said. “Whenever I’m not throwing, it feels great. That’s the only issue.”
Simmons was removed a game on March 11 after experiencing forearm tightness. After taking a week off from throwing to receive treatment on the forearm, he had begun playing light catch out to 90 feet. But during that process he noticed that the forearm wasn’t responding well while throwing.
“When I’m throwing it’ll start to fatigue out on me,” he said. “When I get done, it might be a little uncomfortable. I don’t have any trouble sleeping and when I wake up the next day, my arm’s not sore.”
It was enough of a concern for Simmons to undergo another MRI and meet with team orthopedist — Dr. Edward Khalfayan, who decided have him shut down from throwing. The plan is for him to stop throwing and rest the forearm for the time being.
“Maybe a little more time off, but everything looks structurally sound,” Simmons said. “We don’t really know what it is exactly, but there’s no ligament issues or anything like that. The strain looks better on the MRI, so it’s cleared up. The strain would have been in the muscle part of it, so maybe just a little more rest and then continue throwing hopefully. We don’t really have a timeline on it. Probably a couple days. I’m not sure exactly when we’ll pick it back up, it just feels if I’m still feeling tender or what.”
Simmons has dealt with injury issues dating back to February of 2015 when he underwent Tommy John surgery to repair a torn ulnar collateral ligament.
“I’m trying to stay positive,” he said. “What else can you do? It’s out of my control. I’ve had a streak of unfortunate events throwing and it just happens that’s my job.”
With the time missed and the need to restart his throwing program from the beginning, it’s unlikely that Simmons would be ready to return until May at the earliest.
M’s welcome Cano, Cruz back to lineup
After having to write out a lineup without them for the past six days — a period of time that he hopes won’t happen during the regular season — Mariners manager Scott Servais was finally able to ink in the names of Robinson Cano and Nelson Cruz on his lineup card for Tuesday’s Cactus League game at Peoria Stadium.
Both players had been battling a cold/flu bug that had laid them low for about a week. It got to the point where Servais sent both of them home from the clubhouse for multiple days in a row for them to rest and recuperate. The two sluggers and key pieces to the Mariners’ potent middle of the order finally participated in a workout on Monday.
Both players were limited to three plate appearances in the game, but looked fine at the plate. With Jean Segura on third in the first inning, Cano lifted a deep fly ball to center off of Arizona ace Zack Greinke to score a run. He grounded out in his second at-bat and into a force out in his third time to the plate.
After grounding out in his first at-bat, Cruz mashed a run-scoring double off Greinke that short-hopped the wall in left-center in the third inning.
The plan is for Cano and Cruz to play the remainder of the week to help build game stamina and timing.
Servais will also start playing his opening day lineup in over the next few games before backing off on Saturday’s finale. That lineup will also include left-fielder Jarrod Dyson, who has been battling hamstring soreness and leg fatigue. Dyson has played just one game since leaving in the first inning of a game on March 17 with the leg fatigue. On Monday, he got 10 at-bats playing in multiple minor league games on the backfields of the Mariners’ complex. He followed that up on Tuesday with some running and agility drills to test the hamstring.
