DENVER \u2014 The concern around Los Angeles Dodgers closer Edwin D\u00edaz only grew Monday when the club placed him on the injured list with what it called \u201cloose bodies\u201d in his right elbow.<\/p>\n
D\u00edaz will undergo a right elbow procedure Wednesday, the Dodgers said, and is expected to return \u201cduring the second half of the season.\u201d<\/p>\n
D\u00edaz\u2019s diminished fastball velocity and inconsistent usage over the last 10 days culminated Sunday when the team\u2019s new high-priced closer failed to record an out in a non-save situation in a 9-6 loss to the Colorado Rockies. That prompted manager Dave Roberts to say he would have a further conversation with D\u00edaz, who signed a three-year, $69 million contract this winter.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know what it\u2019s supposed to look like, and when it doesn\u2019t look like that, it gets a little concerning, really,\u201d Roberts said Sunday.<\/p>\n
D\u00edaz has averaged 95.7 mph on his fastball this season, down from 97.2 mph a year ago. Still, the Dodgers said D\u00edaz wasn\u2019t dealing with anything arm-related. They have used D\u00edaz just once over the last nine days after the right-hander blew a save April 10 against the Texas Rangers and told Dodgers officials something didn\u2019t feel right in his right knee (the same one he injured during the 2023 World Baseball Classic). D\u00edaz underwent manual testing on the knee and stressed to the team that he wanted to pitch.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think, for us, it\u2019s just going on what the training staff and the player tells me,\u201d Roberts said Sunday. \u201cYou got to trust him and believe that they feel good. And a veteran player like him, no one should know his body better than he does. But obviously, today, it just didn\u2019t look sharp.\u201d<\/p>\n
The saga has lingered. Sunday, D\u00edaz averaged 95.4 mph on his fastball, an outing that included one fastball that registered at just 92.8 mph. D\u00edaz has thrown only six slower fastballs in his entire career. D\u00edaz no longer had a locker stall when media were allowed into the visiting clubhouse at Coors Field on Monday.<\/p>\n
The 32-year-old has allowed seven runs in his six innings since arriving in Los Angeles, with six of those runs coming in his last two eyebrow-raising outings.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers will have to figure out their closer role in the interim. The club used Alex Vesia to record the final outs of the team\u2019s two save opportunities since the weirdness started around D\u00edaz. Tanner Scott has enjoyed a bounce-back start to the season, a year after getting crushed in the first year of his four-year, $72 million free-agent deal. Blake Treinen hadn\u2019t allowed a run in his first eight appearances before surrendering three runs and failing to record an out Sunday.<\/p>\n
The team has benefitted from having D\u00edaz in the ninth inning, freeing up its bevy of high-leverage options to be deployed in ideal situations. Now, that advantage has been removed.<\/p>\n
Left-hander Jake Eder has taken D\u00edaz\u2019s spot on the active roster in the interim. The Dodgers acquired him from the Washington Nationals for cash April 1 and have used him primarily in multi-inning relief at Triple-A Oklahoma City. Their relief depth has taken a hit to start the season, with fellow 40-man roster options such as Ronan Kopp or Paul Gervase either struggling (Kopp has allowed 16 runs in 6 2\/3 innings) or injured (Gervase was placed on the injured list with a cyst in his non-pitching elbow).<\/p>\n
The Dodgers also recently acquired right-hander Chayce McDermott, who made his debut with the organization and allowed a pair of runs Saturday for Oklahoma City.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DENVER \u2014 The concern around Los Angeles Dodgers closer Edwin D\u00edaz only grew Monday when the club placed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":617532,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,487,462,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-617531","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-los-angeles-dodgers","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=617531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617531\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/617532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=617531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=617531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=617531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}