GLENDALE, Ariz. — In a perfect world, it might have been Walker Buehler who signed a five-year, $136.5 million contract extension with the Dodgers this past winter, short-circuiting his potential free agency next offseason.
But in a perfect world, Buehler would not have had two elbow surgeries in 2022, including Tommy John surgery for the second time since he was drafted by the Dodgers in 2015.
“I don’t know,” Buehler said when asked if he ever lets himself think that Tyler Glasnow got the contract he could have gotten from the Dodgers if he’d stayed healthy. “I think there’s points in my career where I thought I was going to have a chance to change the market for starting pitching and what it looks like, just physically. I’m not the same as a lot of these guys who have gotten $300 million or whatnot. But I’ve had enough success that I was in that area.
“But now – look, I just want to be good and win. I’ve made money. My family is pretty comfortable. I think at some point those numbers are more ego than anything.”
Now, Buehler finds himself entering his ‘walk’ year with questions to answer. Is he the same pitcher who went 39-13 with a 2.82 ERA in his four healthy seasons (2018-2021)? What is the shelf life of a pitcher on his second Tommy John surgery? And who will invest in a 30-year-old (Buehler’s birthday is in July) with that history?
“I mean, when you initially get hurt … the timing of it stinks,” Buehler said. “But I also get a year to show that I am who I always have been.
“I think when I first came up, that’s the goal – get to free agency. But I don’t necessarily think that it means what you think it means when you’re 22, 24 years old. To me, I feel very fortunate that this is my seventh season. Not because that means I get to free agency but because it’s another year that I get to wear a uniform and play. Maybe the injury changes the perspective on that a little bit – especially with last year being the first time I was like, ‘No, I’m going to do this’ and it didn’t work. There’s a little more fragility in your mind than probably there used to be.”
Buehler set a goal for himself to return from his surgery and pitch for the Dodgers last September. He did pitch – two innings on a rehab assignment in Triple-A – but he was not recovering well after throwing and shut it down from there. This winter, the Dodgers and Buehler talked about an innings limit this season and how to make sure they have “October Walker” (as General Manager Brandon Gomes referred to Buehler at his best) at full strength for a playoff run.
So Buehler’s spring progression has been slowed with an eye toward starting his season late, most likely not until May. Though he might have been able to start the season on time, the extra time building up might be good for him.
“I think so. I think so,” Dodgers pitching coach Mark Prior said. “It all looks good, you have the surgery and it was like, ‘Yeah, you’ll be back in 12-13 months.’ Like, it just doesn’t play out that way. I mean, even a healthy player has things that pop up through the course of a season, just standard aches and pains and bruises and whatever.
“Plus, you obviously have a workload. You don’t want to just pull the reins completely off anybody that first year. … At the end of the day, we’re here to win championships. You want your best players available come October.”
If Buehler is the same pitcher he was before his second Tommy John, he will be one of the Dodgers’ best players come October. But he will have to prove it in a rotation rebuilt with Glasnow and Yoshinobu Yamamoto at the front, Bobby Miller potentially pitching like a newer version of Buehler and Clayton Kershaw and Dustin May possibly in the mix as well.
“There’s days when I feel I’m going to be just as good if not better. Then there’s days you realize you’ve had three elbow surgeries, right?” Buehler said. “I think that question involves a lot more than how I feel when I’m standing on the mound. I think if I can find a routine to get my elbow, shoulder and body in the same place I used to get it pretty consistently then I’ll be the same pitcher. That’s kind of my feeling.
“There’s some differences in terms of the way that I throw the ball that are probably better than they used to be. I think a lot of the things that I was hunting, the feelings that I was hunting in ’22 I think I’ve kind of found more similar things which then goes back to 2018, 2019. It’s this weird evolution. I’m trying to do the same things when my body is different and I’m older. You look at my delivery in 2018 versus 2021, they’re pretty drastically different and I thought I was doing the exact same thing. … Trying to find the happy medium between those two throws and be able to execute the way I want is a complicated thing.”
Prior doesn’t pretend to have the answer.
“Two Tommy Johns, so he’s got the double scar,” Prior said. “It’s hard. If I had a crystal ball, I think he’s going to be the same competitive guy. And I think he’s going to pitch a lot of big innings for us this year. Does he do it the same way that he did it before the injury? I don’t think anybody knows that answer. I think there’s gonna be things that are very similar to what he was. And I think there’s gonna be some adjustments, probably good things that he couldn’t do down the stretch because his elbow was barking and so I think maybe there’s some things that he’s going to be freed up to be able to do now.
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“But I mean, honestly, I feel like we’ve gone through a lot of Tommy Johns. You just don’t know until you know.”
There is a lot unknown about Buehler’s future because of those two Tommy John surgeries. He acknowledged the Dodgers have talked about contract extensions in the past. But not since his latest surgery. Where Buehler fits in the Dodgers’ future plans – and whether he enters the free-agent market next winter – is something that can only be written after everyone sees what Buehler’s comeback season looks like.
“My phone is always on,” he said with a smile. “But also I understand that I haven’t played in 22 months or whatever. I think in their situation I wouldn’t go and hand me a bunch of money until they know that I’m good. They don’t have to. I understand it.
“I obviously want to be here and play here and I love this team. But I can’t force anything. And also I’m not naive to the fact that I need to go play and pitch well. I don’t think free agency is super exciting if you’re not very good.”