Pirates preventing Jameson Taillon from pitching in 2020

A pitcher who has already had all too much of his baseball career affected by injury and health, Jameson Taillon acknowledges that he’s allowed the fierce competitor inside of him to lobby to return to a major-league mound in 2020.

“Yeah, I’d be lying if I said that I hadn’t thought about it,” the Pittsburgh Pirates ace said during a conference call Monday, “but it gets shot down pretty quickly when I bring it up.”

The unique circumstances of the coronavirus-impacted season at least opened up a window in which Taillon theoretically could pitch in 2020. With the MLB season in limbo as a result of a suspension of play relating to covid-19 concerns, it’s possible – if not likely – that if this season is played at all that it will extend deeper into late autumn and perhaps even winter as part of the scramble to get in as many games as possible.

#Pirates will not adjust Jameson Taillon’s timeline for a return from Tommy John surgery in light of the currently suspended season. https://t.co/o7Uq6fNgHn

— Tribune-ReviewSports (@TribSports) March 26, 2020

With Taillon recovering from Tommy John surgery he underwent last August and that rehab pegged in the 12-month range, it’s much more feasible that the righthander could pitch in 2020 now than it was under conventional circumstances when the regular season ends in September.

The problem, Taillon said Monday, isn’t that his arm will not or cannot be ready to pitch by this coming fall. It’s that, if he did tax it by throwing major-league innings this fall that it will adversely impact his 2021.

“The big thing isn’t so much about the extension of this season for me; in that regard I probably could be ready,” Taillon said. “But I think the biggest thing is, coming off this surgery – and coming off (a second Tommy John), in particular –if the season gets pushed back into October or November or whenever it is, that would then give me a shortened offseason going in to next year. So I think the thinking here, longterm, is that we don’t want to risk shortening my offseason and cutting into my offseson rehab, therapy, throwing, all that.

“So, even though I’ve thought about (coming back in 2020), I get shut down pretty quickly every time I’ve brought it up.”

A former No. 2 overall draft pick, Taillon is enduring his second Tommy John recovery in addition to a season lost to a sports hernia and a separate bout with testicular cancer.

The Pirates’ union player representative, Taillon was coming off his best season: 14-10 with a 3.20 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, two complete games and a shutout in 2018. He has a 3.67 ERA over 82 starts with the Pirates since making his MLB debut in 2016.

He is under contractual control of the Pirates through the 2022 season.

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