Ken Waldichuk to Make First Rehab Appearance After Surgery

While the Athletics haven't fared terribly well on a number of notable trades in recent seasons--mainly those of Matt Chapman, Matt Olson, and Sean Murphy--they've had some positive returns from the one they made with the New York Yankees in 2022. In that deal, they sent righty Frankie Montas and relief pitcher Lou Trivino to the Yankees in exchange for JP Sears, Luis Medina, Ken Waldichuk, and Cooper Bowman.

Three of those four players have received significant playing time with the A's since the deal, with Sears serving as the workhouse of the team's rotation the past two and a half years, never missing a start.

Waldichuk was the most highly touted prospect in the package, and he hasn't pitched on a big-league mound since September 29, 2023 in the team's final series of the season. That winter the team disclosed that in his final start of the year, he experienced "left medial elbow discomfort" and was later diagnosed with a flexor tendon strain and UCL ligament sprain.

Waldichuk opted for conservative treatment of this injury, leading to a Tenex procedure with Dr. Steve Yoon on Oct. 17 and a follow-up PRP injection to the flexor tendon on Oct. 24, 2023 and was left without a return date. On May 16, 2024, he underwent Tommy John surgery and has been out of action since.

Now, 13 months later, Waldichuk is set to make his first rehab start on Sunday evening with the Stockton Ports in Single-A. He will be built up like he's in Spring Training, and could be ready to return to the A's roster in July.

The expectation for Waldichuk in that first outing will be around 25 pitches. He threw a 25-pitch side on Thursday, which A's manager Mark Kotsay watched, and he said that the left-hander's stuff "looks good,"

He also mentioned that, "it's going to take time for the [velocity] to tick up, but the command down there today was what we really focused on, and filing the box up. I thought he had a really good side."

Athletics on SI also asked what his velo has been in those side sessions. "I can tell you what it was in the 'pen, and his last pitch was 90. I think that's been consistent with what it's been, 90-92." In his last season with the Athletics in 2023, he was averaging 93.3 miles per hour over the course of the season, so there is still a little bit of a climb to see from him yet.

In 2023, Waldichuk ended the year with a 4-9 record for the 50-win A's, holding a 5.36 ERA across 35 appearances (22 starts) spanning 141 innings of work. While the end results may not stand out, he did seem to flip a switch just after the midway point in the season, holding the San Francisco Giants to one unearned run over 4 2/3 innings, giving up just one hit, walking two, and striking out six.

From that start through the last time he stepped on the mound for the A's, Waldichuk went 2-3 in 12 games (nine starts) and held a 3.54 ERA over 61 innings. That ERA was good enough to rank him No. 25 in baseball over that span. Much like the recently surging Jacob Lopez, Waldichuk's extension is top tier when compared to other pitchers in the game, which helps his velo play up.

Regardless of what the outcomes are on Sunday night in Stockton, this will be a huge moment for Waldichuk in his road to recovery. Just getting back on the mound in a game situation has been nearly a two year process for the 27-year-old. The hope is that he'll be able to help contribute to the A's pitching staff in some way in the coming weeks--perhaps even picking up where he left off at the end of 2023.