Minor League Injury Update

 I get a lot of questions and emails about injuries to minor leaguers -- information that to my knowledge isn’t published anywhere. The Braves minor league people were nice enough to give me a rundown of the injuries to some of our top young prospects.

• Cole Rohrbough - Left elbow inflammation
• Moises Hernandez - Right shoulder
• Lee Hyde - Left elbow surgery
• Johnny Venters - Left elbow
• Eric Cordier - Right elbow surgery
• Tim Gustafson - Right elbow surgery
• Quentin Davis - Right shoulder

I didn’t get much more clarification that that and they don’t release expected return dates. The elbow surgeries are likely Tommy John surgery -- that’s three really good pitchers who went under the TJ knife. If the injury doesn’t say surgery, then I’m guessing it’s probably a week to week sort of thing. A couple of lesser known prospects are also on the DL to open the season, guys like Paul Bush, Jose Santiago, Tyler Wilson, and Joe Johnson.

Another question that I had wanted an answer to for some time was also answered by the Braves folks. The question was about the prospects that aren’t on any of the full-season rosters, where do they go and what do they do. I figured they were in some sort of extended spring training or instructional league, but I wasn’t 100 percent on it. According to the Braves, players not on full-season minor league rosters participate in an extended spring training program and actually start to play games today (I’m guessing it’s the same sort of informal games that go on in minor league spring training camp -- more instructional than for show). They play games for two months and then break during the draft when new draftees are inserted. They then begin a mini-camp program which is eventually broken into the Danville and GCL rosters.

This straightened some things out for me, and hopefully it will answer some questions you may have had.

Many thanks to Matt over at the Braves minor league offices for his help with this information.