Rangers ace continues to be plagued by nerve irritation in thumb

Rangers right-hander Max Scherzer has spent the season to this point on the injured list while rehabbing from offseason back surgery. While it appeared earlier this season that the 39-year-old hurler would be able to return to action ahead of schedule and perhaps as soon as the beginning of May, those plans were derailed by a bout of soreness in Scherzer’s right thumb that cropped up at the end of April.

Scherzer reportedly hasn’t thrown since then and it appears that the issue is more serious than initially believed. As noted Saturday afternoon by Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News, the Rangers now believe that Scherzer is dealing with nerve irritation in his thumb, rather than the previously diagnosed issue of ligament inflammation. Grant adds that Scherzer received a cortisone injection in his neck that provided “some immediate relief” of the discomfort, which allowed Scherzer to resume playing catch on Friday. While the club has previously indicated that Scherzer won’t resume his rehab in earnest until he’s completely pain-free, it seems that the cortisone injection has allowed him to return to some light activities. If he continues moving in the right direction, it’s possible he could begin ramping back up in the near future.

A return from Scherzer would surely provide a massive boost to the club’s rotation, which has already lost Nathan Eovaldi, Dane Dunning and Cody Bradford to injury during the season on top of Scherzer, Jacob deGrom, and Tyler Mahle, all of whom entered the season expected to miss at least the first half of 2024. While Jon Gray, Michael Lorenzen, Andrew Heaney and Jose Urena have done an admirable job in cobbling together solid production for the Rangers amid all the injuries, the return of any injured arm would be significant for the club.

That surely goes double for a pitcher with the resume of Scherzer, an eight-time All Star and three-time Cy Young award winner who has tallied more than 3,300 strikeouts in his career and has posted ERAs below 4.00 in each of the last twelve seasons. While Scherzer struggled somewhat early in the 2023 campaign, pitching to a relatively pedestrian 4.01 ERA and 4.70 FIP through 19 starts with the Mets, he appeared rejuvenated by a trade to the Rangers down the stretch as he dominated to the tune of a 3.20 ERA in 45 innings of work while striking out a whopping 29.9% of batters faced.

While the club’s update regarding Scherzer was surely encouraging for Rangers fans, the same cannot be said about the status of right-hander Carson Coleman, who according to Grant club GM Chris Young said is “unlikely” to pitch in 2024. The 26-year-old righty joined the Rangers this past offseason by way of the Rule 5 Draft, where the club selected him from the Yankees. Coleman underwent Tommy John surgery and entered the season expected to miss at least the first half of the 2024 campaign but now appears to be ticketed for a much longer absence.

Whether Coleman manages to pitch in the majors this year or not, it seems very unlikely that he’ll manage to return quick enough to spend 90 days on the Rangers’ active roster. In the likely event that he doesn’t hit that benchmark, Coleman’s Rule 5 status will roll over into the 2025 season, meaning he must be carried on the Rangers’ active roster until at least 90 days on the active roster have been accrued. If Coleman can make a healthy return to action next season, it’s possible he’ll be an impactful arm for the Rangers out of the bullpen. The relief prospect was nothing short of dominant for the Yankees in 2022, when he pitched to a sterling 2.13 ERA in 63 1/3 innings between the High-A and Double-A levels with an incredible 37.8% strikeout rate.