Pirates activate RHP Bryse Wilson to start against Arizona, place JT Brubaker on IL
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The Pittsburgh Pirates activated right-handed pitcher Bryse Wilson from the 10-day injured list in time to start Wednesday night against the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Wilson (0-2, 4.80 ERA), acquired at the trade deadline from the Atlanta Braves in exchange for closer Richard Rodriguez, went on the IL on Aug. 15 with right arm fatigue.
Wilson is expected to face Diamondbacks lefty Tyler Gilbert (1-1, 2.04), who tossed a no-hitter Aug. 14 against San Diego in his first major league start, but could be on a controlled pitch count.
“We’re just going to be thoughtful of how he looks and how the ball comes out of his hand,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said of Wilson. “It’s only really a 10-day blow. He did throw the side. But we will be very cautious of how the ball looks coming out of his hand. In saying that, it’s not like he’s at full go. We’re gonna monitor that very closely.”
To make room on the active roster, the Pirates placed right-hander JT Brubaker (5-13, 5.27) on the 10-day IL with a right thumb contusion just one day after he pitched five scoreless innings in a 4-2 win over Arizona.
Shelton said Brubaker jammed his thumb “pretty good” in his first at bat Monday night, when he grounded out to first base with the bases loaded in the second inning.
“We actually knew about it throughout the game,” Shelton said. “The effectiveness of his slider was why it was kind of inconsistent. I think you can see his slider looked really good early and inconsistent after that. He was having trouble gripping it.”
Brubaker, however, remained in the game to throw 86 pitches, including 54 for strikes. He struck out looking in his second at bat, which Shelton said was by design so that he could continue pitching through the pain.
“He gave the bunt for a hit attempt that we will not do again. He was not swinging at that because it was still stinging him pretty good,” Shelton said. “So we just wanted to give him enough time to heal up before the next start.”
Brubaker has pitched team highs of 121 1/3 innings in 23 starts this season, his second in the majors. He made 11 starts last year, going 1-3 with a 4.94 ERA, so the Pirates were monitoring his workload. A 10-day layoff simply could be a longer break in the team’s six-day rotation.
Pirates director of sports medicine Todd Tomczyk said Brubaker will be given a few days off from throwing to allow the inflammation to go down.
“I don’t think it hurts,” Shelton said. “We’ve talked about workload, volume management. I think the one thing we thought with this is it gives him a few extra days because we have the off-day, so he would have been bumped back a day. So I think it just bumps him back a couple more, which for the workload part of it, it’s fine.
“The bigger component for us is work in-between. We want him to be able to work on the breaking ball in-between and how he grips it. If two days from now he was throwing a side and couldn’t grip it, it was just be unfair, in terms of his development.”