Walking the Plank: Taillon Injury News Changes Projecton of the Franchise

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Last week it was announced by Pirates Director of Sports Medicine, Todd Tomczyk, that Taillon began having pain in his elbow once he started to throw again and is going to be re-evaluated on Monday in New York by Dr. David Altchek. As soon as this news hit, every Pirate fan dreaded the worst, another Tommy John Surgery. Taillon has already accepted that he is probably out for this season, but if he does get surgery and is out for the 2020 season, it changes any hopes that this team had of being competitive in 2020. 

The Pirates are currently on a downhill spiral and there is not much optimism for the 2020 season as it is, but Taillon coming back next season could have given us fans a glimmer of hope that we truly needed. The off-season hope would have been around a rotation headlined by Taillon and Keller with Williams, Musgrove, and Agrazal or a free agent signing filling out the rotation behind them (This is suggesting the Pirates do not pick up Archer's option in 2020, which I do not think they should). That is a pretty solid rotation if everyone is pitching their best, but now we know that is not likely to happen. Take Taillon out of that rotation and the Pirates are lacking a true leader in the lineup and the outcome will be very similar to this season, a rotation that cannot sustain itself. With some young promising position players like Bryan Reynolds, Kevin Newman, Cole Tucker, Ke'Bryan Hayes, Will Craig, and Josh Bell, the lineup looks to be in decent shape in the future, but none of it will matter if Taillon goes down. 

This is sadly the reality that the Pirates are in that they have to rely so much on their draft talent panning out because we know the front office is not going to make any big off-season moves to fill a hole when it appears. The Pirates vision was for Taillon and Glasnow to be at the top of their rotation and lead this teams for years to come, and now we are seeing what happens with the Pirates when their vision fails to come together, failure on the field. 

As the 2nd overall pick in the 2010 MLB Draft, Taillon was looked at as a future Ace for this staff and expectations were very high for him going into this season.. and then the elbow pain crept in. Without Taillon in the rotation, the Pirates do not have a chance of competing in 2020 and should begin to rebuild for 2021 and beyond. I hate rebuilds and conceding a season, we all do, but this team has lacked a clear vision for a long time and it would be refreshing to know that this team is playing for 2021 and beyond. Last week, I wrote an article about how I think the Pirates should only sell a little at the trade deadline (Lyles- already gone, Liriano, and Cabrera), but now I would not be opposed to them being big time sellers at tomorrows trading deadline...

Hang in there Pirate fans, hopefully better days are ahead at PNC Park. 

Thanks for reading and Let's Go Bucs!

-Aaron, TGYK