Good thing they didn t get rid of him. Trade Reddick because they wanted to hold onto Kalish

I thought JD Drew retired

What is up with this medical staff? Unless he just got injured how can you wait until 2 weeks before training camp to have surgery?

Can someone please explain why it took so long to do the surgery?? He couldnt hit with it last year. This medical staff and the decissions they make flat out suck!!

Without more details on history of the right shoulder, and what this latest surgery is for, it’s hard to know what to make of this — except that it’s heartbreaker for Kalish.  It may widen Daniel Nava’s doorway to a role as a LH pinch hitter/ platoon partner for in LF, and it seems that it helped spur today’s signing of Ryan Sweeney to a AAA contract for OF depth.  Beyond that…
 
l. It is too soon to write Kalish off as mediocre.  He is just 24; when last healthy he showed nice on base skills, great speed and base running, and terrific outfield range with a good glove.  He had an OPS of .820 in split season at High A and (mostly) AA Portland in 2009, and an OPS of .884 the next year between Salem and AAA Pawtucket. 
 
2. It may be a reach even to call him injury prone at this point.  He got wracked diving for a catch in April of 2011.  A torn labrum in his (left) throwing shoulder was managed conservatively by rest and rehab that season.  He developed severe neck pain as a late complication.  A bulging disk in his cervical spine was repaired surgically in Sept 2011, ending the pain.  A second surgery was done in Nov 2011 to fully repair the torn labrum in the left shoulder — to make doubly sure, he said later, that ALL the April damage had been cleaned up.  No surprise, following such a dual surgery, the rehab has been complicated and prolonged, extending well into 2012, and limited playing time with recurring shut downs due to shoulder weakness that worsened and compromised his swing.  
 
3. Adding to the mystery pie are vague mentions of shoulder trouble while playing high school football, presumed to be long healed when he was playing great as a 21-22 year old.  He is also rusty, after nearly 2 years lost; he struggled with mechanics and confidence as well as shoulder woes when he played in 2012,  But at 24, he is young enough to recover and sort all this out.

4. He has only ONE minor league option left, one more year when he can spend sigificant time in the minors as a Sox prospect — to shed the rust, recapture and hone his former skills, and find his mojo again.  The sudden interest to carve his NON-throwing shoulder could be anything: a new injury from workouts, say, or something leftover from the April 2011 belly flop that usually resolves without surgery, or some exploration and tightening aimed to help stabilize both shoulders and the neck during his swing.  Details are lacking, the anatomy is all connected, so who can say?  Still, having been conservative first and incremental with the surgery so far, both Kalish and the team doctors might be of one mind to be more aggressive now to create the strongest, most stable swing — before he tries again to play a full year.  The one remaining option is a platform consistent with this approach.  In the extreme event that he misses the whole 2013 season, to rehab and strengthening or to further surgeries, I’m fairly sure his minor league option carries over to 2014.

Poor snakebit Ryan Kalish! He has so much potential and it’s beginning to look like he’s never going to be healthy long enough to realize it. He’s still just 24. But ugg. Other kids are coming up in the system and his window of opportunity is pretty much now. May you get well soon, dude, and come back strong.

But anyhow, I’m confused and frustrated. MLB does MRIs at the drop of a hat–or the tweak of a shoulder, in this case. Someone who’s been MRId for so many previous injuries surely would have something like this register, would he not? Unless he’s simply withheld the concern until he knew it was too serious to conceal–which would be foolish of him given his previous injury history and the importance of being OK by this particular spring training–this shoulder issue must have been evident before now. But if it was, surely they’d have done the surgery ASAP–i.e., October or November. Clearly I’m missing something basic and am clueless, but. . . I don’t get it. All these guys have to do in the winter is get in shape for the season. Surely whatever’s wrong in that shoulder would’ve been bugging him since day one?

This guy makes Ellsbury look like Cal Ripken Jr…..

Wish Ryan well. Hopefully this is his last so all can see his upside.

reddick is not accident prone, with a rifle arm, and 30plus homers ; not like kalish always hurt no power and  average arm at best . i dont know where the sox see an upside to kalish.

Why “sigh”? What did you expect? This is a totally shallow draft with no real first round, impact players. In a draft where the Pats don’t have many picks, and as Mayday said, Rhodes and Trufant were off the boards, who did you *want* them to take?

Would have been nice to give Andruzzi somebody to hand that jersey to. That said, as much crap as Bill (rightfully) gets for trading down every year, four picks for a late first rounder is by no means a poor decision. What’s done with them could well be a different story.