(670 The Score) There’s a layer of mystery that has accompanied Cubs right-hander Marcus Stroman’s right rib cartilage fracture, as the team hasn’t publicly pinpointed how the injury happened.
To no one’s surprise, that means 670 The Score host Dan Bernstein is skeptical.
“The Cubs say they don’t know, but I’m not sure they’re telling the truth,” Bernstein said.
Bernstein’s “spider sense is going off,” as he put it. Bernstein pointed to Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer’s comment that, “We didn’t know if was muscular, we didn’t know if it was skeletal, we didn’t know if it was indigestion, we didn’t know what it was.”
“It’s not your usual pitching injury,” Hoyer said. “It’s not an arm, it’s not a shoulder, it’s not an elbow.”
That set off a red flag in Bernstein’s mind.
“He sounds unhappy that his injury happened,” Bernstein said of Hoyer. “’Unusual injury for a pitcher’ and then later he added ‘not your usual pitching injury.’ The other thing that stood out to me was ‘we don’t know if it’s muscular, skeletal’ … pause … ‘or whether it’s indigestion’ … laugh, a nervous laugh. He didn’t have to throw that in there. You stop at muscular or skeletal when you find out it’s neither muscular nor skeletal.
“But to say twice ‘unusual injury for a pitcher’ and ‘not your usual pitching injury’ and then he was asked did this happen in one of the bullpens? He said, ‘We don’t know.’ There’s something missing here. It sounds to me like he evinced some doubt. My spider sense is going off here. I want to know what they think they know about how this injury happened.
“(A rib cartilage injury) is usually something incurred by doing something other than pitching. I would like to know what they think they might know about the cause. I’m not alleging … there’s some deep rabbit hole here. I just found it odd.”
There’s no timetable for Stroman’s return, raising the possibility that he could be completely done pitching for the Cubs. Stroman holds a $21-million player option for the 2024 season. He was open earlier in the summer about his desire to sign a contract extension with the Cubs, but the sides didn't make progress on that front. Stroman has a 3.85 ERA and 1.24 WHIP in 23 starts this season.
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