Pittsburgh just lost some pitching depth, announcing that right-hander Brandon Cumpton underwent season-ending Tommy John elbow surgery.
Cumpton debuted with the Pirates in 2013 and threw 70 innings for them last season, posting a 4.89 ERA and 46/18 K/BB ratio split between the rotation and the bullpen as a 25-year-old.
He was competing for a long reliever gig this spring while serving as rotation insurance and will likely be out until early 2016.
Every day brings a new player showing up to camp, facing the media and offering their two cents about the Astros, the sign-stealing scandal and Major League Baseball’s handling of it.
Today Justin Turner of the Dodgers gave more than his two cents. He gave a few bucks worth.
Speaking to the Dodgers media contingent, Turner reacted most strongly to Commissioner Rob Manfred’s comments yesterday, in which he talked about why he chose not to force the Astros to vacate their 2017 World Series title, calling the World Series trophy, “a piece of metal.” From the L.A. Times:
“I don’t know if the commissioner has ever won anything in his life. Maybe he hasn’t. But the reason every guy’s in this room, the reason every guy is working out all offseason, and showing up to camp early and putting in all the time and effort is specifically for that trophy, which, by the way, is called the commissioner’s trophy.
“So for him to devalue it the way he did yesterday just tells me how out of touch he is with the players in this game. At this point the only thing devaluing that trophy is that it says ‘commissioner’ on it.”
Turner is also upset that Astros players were not disciplined, and basically implied that, to the Astros, manager A.J. Hinch and GM Jeff Luhnow losing their jobs over this was worth it:
“Now anyone who goes forward and cheats to win a World Series, they can live with themselves knowing that, ‘Oh, it’s OK. … We’ll cheat in the World Series and bring the title back to L.A. Screw Dave Roberts and screw Andrew [Friedman]. It’s just those guys losing their jobs. I still get to be called a champion the rest of my life.’ So the precedent was set by him yesterday in this case.”
Turner thinks the Astros should give their rings back and give back the trophy. Though, really, I’m not sure what the league would do with it. To them it’s just a piece of metal, right?