Dodgers Should Not Elbow Aside Concerns

Just as they strongly insist that Kevin Brown’s accelerated return from elbow surgery wasn’t dictated by the highly-paid pitcher--”We reacted to how he was feeling and what he told us but he wasn’t the conductor of the orchestra,” General Manager Dan Evans was saying Sunday--it would be a surprise if the Dodgers were to concede they are walking a high wire with Brown and Andy Ashby.

The reality, however, is this:

With pitching critical to their success, with so much invested in Brown and Ashby, with largely suspect options if either had to be replaced for a long period, the Dodgers are operating without a net, the tightrope only as strong as the rebuilt flexor tendon in each of their elbows.

As the Dodgers nervously waited for a medical update on Brown Sunday after he was forced to leave Saturday night’s start when he felt pain and burning in that pivotal elbow after delivering a 93-mph fastball, catcher Paul Lo Duca came closest to conceding what is obvious.

“For us to win, we need Kevin Brown,” Lo Duca said. “He’s a leader on and off the field. I don’t know if I’d call it a tightrope, but it would be a blow if we lost either of those guys for any length of time. It’s really key for us that both of them stay healthy.”

Lo Duca admitted he couldn’t be sure of his own health as he watched Brown leave Saturday’s start.

“How did I feel?” he said. “I wanted to throw up.”

The update Sunday was reassuring, although not definitive.

Brown had no pain and no overnight swelling, suggesting that “very little serious [damage] occurred,” trainer Stan Johnston said after a clubhouse examination by Dr. Greg Schwab.

The suspicion remains, Johnston said, that Brown simply tore scar tissue, but more should be known today when he is examined by Dr. Frank Jobe after undergoing an MRI test.

Will he miss Thursday’s start against the Padres at Dodger Stadium?

Will he go on the 15-day disabled list, which would seem prudent?

Evans said the Dodgers won’t make a decision until he gets Jobe’s report but that he was “very encouraged” by Brown’s condition Sunday.

And Brown? Is he optimistic?

“I was optimistic [after Saturday night’s game] but some people didn’t believe me,” he said, typically taciturn. “Doom and gloom.”

He added that he doesn’t have a crystal ball but will be ready to pitch “at the earliest my arm will let me.”

Omar Daal would replace Brown if necessary. It isn’t clear who would replace Ashby or another starter if that became necessary and Brown was sidelined as well.

The Dodgers have no intention of removing Eric Gagne from the closer role, the triple-A rotation isn’t promising, and three other members of the 2001 rotation in L.A.--James Baldwin, Terry Adams and Chan Ho Park--work elsewhere.

The hope, of course, is that it won’t come to a worst-case scenario.

Ashby is scheduled to make his third start Tuesday in Coors Field, and if that environment isn’t enough to create an upset stomach, watching Brown leave Saturday night, his right arm hanging limply, did just that, Ashby said.

It was a painful reminder of his own rehabilitation, rekindling doubts he thought he had put behind him. Asked if it will be easy to forget what he saw, Ashby shook his head and said:

“You want to say you won’t do anything differently, but you’re going to think about it, especially having gone through the same procedure. In spring training you go through [the recovery] process. You get to a point where you think, ‘OK, you know what, I think I’m over it.’ The main thing is to try to block it out and not think about it. It’s not easy, but I’ve just got to do it.”

Because Ashby had surgery on June 15, 2001 and was back throwing almost three months ahead of Brown, who had surgery Sept. 27, he suspects that if he experienced some of the same scar tissue discomfort that Brown did (or is thought to have), he was able to work through it during the off-season rather than in a game situation.

That Brown started later and still caught Ashby in the season-opening rotation helped convince skeptics that the Dodgers had moved too fast with Brown and that the $15-million-a-year pitcher had dictated his timetable.

Evans continued to deny that Sunday, insisting the decisions were made in concert with Brown and the medical staff, and that “the same people who say we’ve been too quick with him forget that he made a 79-pitch gem” last Sunday, giving up four hits in seven shutout innings against Colorado.

Lo Duca agreed.

“I always thought he was ready,” the catcher said, “and there was no doubt about it the way he was throwing [Saturday night]. That was the hardest I’ve seen him throw in 18 months.

“Maybe that’s why he broke up the adhesions.”

Maybe, but Schwab, the doctor who examined him in San Diego, seemed to raise questions about the Dodger timetable when he said of Brown:

“He had his injury and he had his surgery. When you get to the point of recovery, it’s a blank page. Everybody’s different. Maybe this was a sign he hasn’t completed the healing process. He was definitely wise to stop when he did.”

At one point in spring training, pitching coach Jim Colborn and others speculated that Brown might not be ready for opening day and the opening week. Brown reacted with a degree of anger, and did, of course, start the opener--much to Barry Bonds’ delight.

“I don’t think any of us felt he was rushed,” Colborn said Sunday. “There are a lot of intelligent, professional people whose opinions went into the decision and who understand what the club has invested. I’m confident this is just a bump in the road. I certainly hope so. He deserves a full year of competition. I don’t remember one start, from spring training on last year, when he didn’t have pain. It started in his foot, went to his neck and settled in his elbow.

“He deserves some fun. Baseball is a game, not a tour of duty at Attica.”

Some might say that fun is an alien concept to Brown. It can definitely be said that a team whose hopes rest on pitching will experience an Attica-like lockdown if he is out long.