Dodgers’ Yoshinobu Yamamoto Outlines Plan For Return

It has been almost two months since Yoshinobu Yamamoto last pitched for the Los Angeles Dodgers. He left his June 15 start with a strained rotator cuff.

The rookie starting pitcher will board the team charter this weekend to Milwaukee, where he is expected to face hitters for the first time since landing on the injured list.

“That,” Roberts said, “will be a big step.”

Yamamoto threw a bullpen session under the close supervision of club personnel and they will continue to monitor his progression closely.

“Overall with the rehab program, everything feels good,” the Dodgers right-hander said through his interpreter on Wednesday. “Every time I throw a ’pen, it feels better than last time, which means it’s all getting better.”

As Yamamoto feels better, his level of confidence increases. He feels like he will pitch again this season and before the playoffs begin. At this rate, a minor-league injury rehabilitation assignment should not be far off.

“My shoulder is feeling good,” he said. “I’m getting closer to the highest volume when I throw and I’m not really concerned with the injury itself.”

The right-hander is also confident that his stuff will return to where it was after 14 starts, when he was 6-2 with a 2.95 ERA. The data that the Dodgers have tracked during his bullpens says he is “getting closer to where they were and my feeling (for his pitches) is also getting better.”

On the day before his injury, Yamamoto threw 13 sliders. He completely abandoned the pitch in Japan and just thinks the correlation between the pitch and his shoulder is a coincidence. He believes there was more than one reason that contributed to the injury.

“It wasn’t one reason. Probably just too much stress and fatigue on my shoulder,” he said.

Yamamoto and the Dodgers agreed to a 12-year, $325 million contract, including a $50 million signing bonus, back in December. The Dodgers also had to pay his former team, the Orix Buffaloes, a $50.6 million posting fee.

A three-time Pacific League MVP and Sawamura Award winner (the Japanese equivalent of the Cy Young Award), Yamamoto was the most coveted free-agent pitcher on the market this winter and his contract included the most guaranteed money ever given to a pitcher.

Photo Credit: Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

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