TAMPA — Joba Chamberlain expects to be back on a mound in July, according to Yankees general manager Brian Cashman.
The reliever, who suffered an ugly injury to his right ankle in a freak accident on a trampoline Thursday, is likely out for the season with an open dislocation — meaning the bone tore through ligaments and broke through the skin, but CT scan results yesterday revealed no microfractures.
“We’re happy about that,” Joe Girardi said, adding no further surgery is planned.
The 26-year-old is being held at the hospital until today for precaution against infection.
“He was saying he could be back on the mound in July, that’s what the doctors are telling him,” said Cashman, who visited Chamberlain at St. Joseph’s Hospital on Friday. “That’s the optimistic side.”
Cashman cautioned, however, there is still no guarantee Chamberlain will pitch again.
“As any orthopedic [surgeon] will tell you, you have to go through the whole spectrum,” he said.
That includes the possibility of Chamberlain’s career being over.
“That’s a concern,” manager Joe Girardi said before the Yankees’ 4-2, 10-inning win over the Tigers yesterday. “I have a lot of faith in the way Joba goes about his businessand rehabs. We have seen what his pain threshold is and his ability to come back. You look at the elbow and he was ahead of most people’s time frame. No one really knows how someone’s body is going to heal.”
Girardi said a July return to the mound could be possible.
“I don’t think that’s out of the question,” he said. “So far, so good. It’s not where we want him to be. We are staying positive about it. We are not going to rush him.”
Girardi said Chamberlain will be in a cast for six weeks and then begin his rehab.
Chamberlain suffered the injury at a children’s recreation facility with his five-year-old son Karter while jumping on a trampoline.
“I know he did it on the trampoline and he was bouncing,” Girardi said. “I am not always such a details guy. I don’t know what hop it was. It happened.”
Chamberlain underwent surgery Thursday and his chances of pitching in the majors this season remain small.
Doctors have said he will not be able to do any weight-bearing activity for anywhere from six weeks to three months, which also will impact his recovery from Tommy John surgery he had last year. The Yankees had hoped he could be in their bullpen by June.
“The way I work this stuff, my mindset is, until they’re close to knocking on the door, [I don’t think about it],” Cashman said. “Obviously, in Joba’s case, it’s still a question of when he comes back. I just hope we’re in a position where he can come back.”
Cashman said again he is not thinking about Chamberlain’s non-guaranteed, $1.675 million deal for this season.
“I haven’t looked at that at all,” the general manger said.
When asked if he was mad about the injury, as he has been in the past about other off-field incidents, Cashman said, “I’m sad about it. It’s just a tragic, freak accident.”
He compared it with riding a jet ski.
“You sign a waiver and you don’t think twice that there’s risk,” Cashman said. “He was being a father.”
Cashman has not decided whether he will tell the team to refrain from other potentially dangerous situations.
“It’s hard to say,” Cashman said. “It’s hard to tell a group of people not to be a father.”
—Additional reporting by George A. King III in Lakeland, Fla.