Cubs News: Lester has a 'little grenade floating near his ligament' |
Cubs veteran pitcher Jon Lester is one of the top pitchers in the majors despite having an issue with a bone chip in his pitching elbow.
Yahoo Sports baseball columnist Jeff Passan wrote a new book in April called, The Arm, that reported the existence of a bone chip in Lester's elbow. An MRI after the 2014 season stated that he had "a little grenade floated near his ligament, and at some point, it would warrant surgery." “It’s just a matter of hopefully it stays put, and we don’t have any worry about it,” Lester said via a conversation with the Chicago Sun-Times on Friday. "And then if it does become a concern, if I start having inflammation or missing starts because of it, then that’s when we’ll probably sit down and talk to somebody about getting it removed." “As of now, knock on wood, I haven’t had any concern with it.” “Luckily, my shoulder was pretty well intact, and my ligament looked good – I guess as good as a 31-year-old pitcher can look,” he said. "As far as team doctors were concerned, or any other doctor that we got an opinion from, there wasn’t too much of a concern over it." Lester acknowledges that surgery might cause his limited symptoms and condition worse, so he doesn't even want to risk it. "You start getting cut on and doing rehab,” he said, "and that’s when maybe they’re in there, taking that bone chip out, and it puts more stress on something else. You don’t know. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it type thing." The star lefty signed a six-year, $155 million contract with the Cubs after the 2014 season that included a signing bonus of $30 million and a full no-trade clause.
