Blake Treinen hitting IL is worrisome for Dodgers after previous update

It’s April 22 and the Los Angeles Dodgers‘ already-thin pitching staff is getting … thinner. Really not great.

First, it was Andrew Heaney, who had tossed 10.1 scoreless innings in his first two starts, to hit the injured list with shoulder discomfort. Setup man Blake Treinen dealt with some shoulder soreness himself and missed the series against the Atlanta Braves this week after being on the shelf since last Thursday.

It wasn’t all that bad, though. Manager Dave Roberts told reporters that Treinen was doing well and was on track to get back to the mound on Friday for the series opener against the San Diego Padres.

In fact, Roberts said he didn’t expect Treinen to hit the injured list and believed he’d be pitching against LA’s division rivals.

But it seems something went wrong, because the Dodgers placed Treinen on the IL Friday morning and recalled lefty Garrett Cleavinger from Triple-A. What happened over the last couple days?

The Dodgers are thankfully humming along due to a total team effort, but Treinen’s health will be paramount to the bullpen’s success. He’s arguably the most valuable reliever they have because of his versatility and near-unhittable sinker.

Blake Treinen hitting the injured list is worrisome for the Dodgers

There’s no clarity yet on the exact issue, but earlier in the week Treinen spoke to the media and mentioned the abbreviated spring ramp up in addition to the Dodgers starting the season in cold weather cities (Denver and Minneapolis) likely contributed to his condition.

After just three innings of work on the year (one earned run on one homer, zero walks and five strikeouts), Treinen will spend time getting back to full strength. We’ll provide updates when more information about his status becomes available, likely this afternoon.

In the meantime, thankfully the rest of the bullpen has already been extremely impressive. All of Craig Kimbrel, Evan Phillips, Justin Bruihl, Brusdar Graterol, Daniel Hudson, David Price, Alex Vesia and Tyler Anderson have been as good (or better) than advertised, which should help the Dodgers get by at the moment without Treinen and Heaney.

There’s never a good time to lose one of your most valuable players, but Treinen’s preservation for the entirety of 2022 is what’s most important, and Andrew Friedman built this staff to have more depth beyond what the naked eye can detect, so while it might seem like the staff is thinning out, it’s actually just operating as it was designed to.

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