Written by Greg Fertel
|
15 January 2007
As you may or may not know, Mr. James Brent Cox of Bay City, Texas was
not invited to Spring Training 2007. Since he's performed very, very well and there's no 40-man issues to worry about, I can only think of one other reason he isn't heading to Tampa in 3 weeks:
He's hurt. Bad.
Or at least bad enough that he won't take the mound until April or so. A player of JB's caliber and pedigree should absolutely be in Spring Training at this point in his development. Heck, he was with Phil Hughes and Tyler Clippard last September when the Yanks had them chillin' in the big league clubhouse, so it's not like they don't have plans for the kid.
So let's look at the facts: after logging 77 innings with Trenton in 2006, Cox tacked on another 7 with Team USA, putting him at 84 innings for the year, which is 21.2 IP shy of his career high of 105.2 in 2005, which he split between the Longhorns and the Tampa Yanks. He was set to pitch in the AzFL, but was pulled off the roster with an injury that was described as everything from elbow fatigue to tendonitis (which actually is just a symptom, not an ailment. It's like saying you have a runny nose instead of saying what's causing it to run) to a sprained ligament.
If it was something as serious as a torn ligament (requiring good old TJ surgery) or even a torn labrum/rotator cuff (the absolute worst injury a pitcher can sustain), we'd all have known by now...probably. It would have been on BA's website, or another such reputable site, completely unlike this one. So I think we can rule that one out.
Maybe his elbow is just fatigued and the Yanks are being extra careful as usual. Maybe it is a sprained ligament and he's going the rehab route instead of surgery. Maybe it's not his arm at all, maybe he jumped off the roof of his parent's house, missed the pool and broke an ankle. Point is, the Yanks are being hush-hush about it, so it's gotta be something relatively serious.
Otherwise, I just can't imagine the Yanks would have Cox pitching on the back fields with a bunch of 17-yr old Domincan kids (and Austin Jackson). There's something up here, and I'm dying to know what it is.
Complete Aside: Did anyone else think that was the fruitiest thing that could have possibly happened at that moment last night in 24 when that one kid offered to give
Kumar his good luck necklace? I thought I was watching Lifetime for a second...
