The injuries to the pitching staff have been piling up for the Los Angeles Angels in recent days, which is beginning to test the team’s depth.
José Quijada and Austin Warren are both out for the season and set to undergo Tommy John surgery. The Angels also placed Aaron Loup on the 15-day injured list with a hamstring injury.
Now, José Suarez has become the latest Angels pitcher to deal with an injury. The southpaw started experiencing pain in his throwing shoulder but tried to continue pitching through it, via Sarah Valenzuela of the L.A. Times:
Suarez said after the game that his shoulder pain started in the second inning. He continued pitching, alerting Nevin to his injury after he had given up his second home run and seven earned runs total.
“I thought I could handle the pain and keep pitching,” Suarez said in Spanish, “but it’s a pain I actually couldn’t handle.”
Suarez is set to undergo additional testing to determine what the injury is:
For now, neither Suarez nor the Angels know the severity of his injury, but he is scheduled to have an MRI exam on Monday.
With shoulder injuries, it’s safe to assume Suarez will miss some time, and possibly the rest of the season depending on what the MRI finds.
The 25-year-old has struggled this season after providing hope of a breakout in 2022. Suarez has pitched to a 9.62 ERA across 24.1 innings with an 8.29 FIP, 2.14 WHIP, 17.1% strikeout rate, 12.2% walk rate and -0.5 WAR.
He provided some hope of getting back on track in his outing against the Milwaukee Brewers on April 30 when he went five innings and gave up no runs, but he followed that up by allowing seven earned in 2.2 innings against the Texas Rangers.
Angels manager Phil Nevin trusted Suarez to return to form this season, but with his last outing and the injury, that may be put on hold.
Zach Neto dealing with laceration on finger
On the position player side, the Angels have not dealt with many injuries.
Jared Walsh remains out due to insomnia and headaches but he has made continuous progress. Zach Neto also suffered a laceration on his right middle finger while trying to bunt, but he avoided any structural damage to the finger.
He should be able to return to the lineup soon, mostly depending on how quickly the cut heals.
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