He hopes not, but Justin Verlander might be done for good.
The 43-year-old right-hander was scratched from his slated return Sunday night after suffering a hamstring injury in a bullpen session this week in his protracted recovery from a hip injury that's sidelined him since his first start of the season.
Speaking to reporters before the Tigers opened a 10-game homestand Friday night, Verlander acknowledged that this might be the injury that ends his Hall of Fame career.
"I've always said that I want to play until the wheels fall off," Verlander said, via WDIV. "And I don’t know, maybe they are falling off. I hope not."
The current Justin Verlander situation is really strange pic.twitter.com/R3j4xC0pf0
— 97.1 The Ticket: (@971theticketxyt) June 18, 2026
Verlander went on to say that "if I can't be healthy, and I continue to prove that I can't be healthy, (retirement) is something that I have to really evaluate." It's the first time in his career that he's experienced consecutive injuries like this, he said.
“Just really unfortunate, man. Just sucks,” Verlander said. “I don’t know what else to say ... My hip actually feels fairly good. All of a sudden, my hamstring was bugging me, and I had to cut my bullpen short.”
The Tigers expect Verlander to be sidelined for several weeks. While retirement might be a reality this offseason, he's not throwing in the towel just yet.
“I’m in the middle of a season,” he said. “There’s no giving up. This is halfway through a season that I committed to the Tigers for, and I intend on trying to give it my everything until the season’s over."
He said the "glass half full" perspective with his latest injury is that when the hamstring heals and he resumes throwing, he might realize "this was something that was holding me back ... and now I’m better than I was before."
Still, "it doesn’t take the sting away from being tantalizingly close to finally being back on the mound here at home and having it kind of pulled out from under me,” Verlander said.
He described his recovery from the original injury, which was supposed to be a short-term setback, as "an agonizingly long" process: "We were two-plus months later and that close to getting back out there, and then something else happens."
Verlander has a big decision to make this winter. It might already be made if he can't get back on the mound this season.
Until then, "it’s head down, work hard, get past this, try to get back out there for the Detroit Tigers and myself,” Verlander said. "And see what I can do."
