Bobby Jenks has Surgery, Will Start Late

Published: 6^th Jan 12 1:56 pm

Matt Sullivan
Sully

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Howard Smith-US PRESSWIRE

When the Boston Red Sox picked up Bobby Jenks, they were hoping he could continue his 2010 return to form after a terrible 2009 season and provided the team with another arm for the late innings. Instead, Jenks has hardly pitched at all; he had two long trips to the DL and required surgery on his back in September. Various sources are now reporting that the righty needed a second surgical procedure and will miss the beginning of Spring Training.

This last news reduces the already slim chance that Jenks would be a positive contributor this season in Boston. Jenks as been erratic even in the best of times. In 2007, his best season with the Chicago White Sox, Jenks struck out 7.78 hitters per nine and walked just 1.80 while getting a huge number of groundball (53.3%), numbers that you would expect from a pitcher like Roy Halladay. He was then coming off a year where he had a K/9 rate of 10.33 and a walk rate of 4.00. Those are also very good numbers, but much more like Jon Lester than Roy Halladay. Since that time he has had wild fluctuations in the peripheral skills which we would expect to vary the least season to season. Only pitching 50 or 60 innings a year helps exaggerate these variations, but it can’t explain the overall lack of consistency.

Inconsistent as he might be, when healthy he has been fairly effective. His terrible 2009 season was largely due to home run issues. In 2010 when he had slightly better luck with the long ball, he was very good. The addition of a productive Bobby Jenks would be a major aide to the bullpen rebuilding. With Mark Melancon now slated for the eighth inning and Andrew Bailey closing, Jenks would be an asset against tough righties as well as a pitcher capable of coming in for the seventh or whenever one of the two top relievers is unavailable. As it appears now, this is a longshot.

The second surgery, coming less than two months before Spring Training starts, seemingly guarantees that Jenks will start late. With a long way to go to return to his productive days, the late start might mean he never gets caught up. Jenks has been on the heavier side most of his career and after an off-season and spring spent recovering the struggle to get into shape by the start of the season, or even by June will be significant. Should he re-injure his back or face other injury concerns during this process, he almost certainly will not factor into the 2012 season.

The team took a chance when they picked up Jenks and it has not paid off, we can hope for the best, but the return on this investment is never going to be much.