Dodgers pitching injury woes continue as River Ryan's season ends with Tommy John surgery

The Dodgers have used 17 different starting pitchers this season, the most in baseball

By Mike Axisa Aug 13, 2024 at 12:52 pm ET• 2 min read

The Los Angeles Dodgers have lost another starting pitcher to injury. Rookie righty River Ryan exited Saturday night's start against the Pittsburgh Pirates (LAD 4, PIT 1) after 4 2/3 innings and 56 pitches with what was initially described as forearm tightness. On Tuesday, things turned for the worse as the club announced that Ryan would soon undergo Tommy John surgery to repair a torn UCL in this throwing elbow. Manager Dave Roberts had already confirmed that Ryan's 2024 season was over, and now it seems likely he'll miss most if not all of the 2025 season, as well.

Los Angeles placed Ryan on the injured list Sunday and called up righty Landon Knack to fill the roster spot.

Ryan said he began to feel discomfort in his forearm in the third inning saturday, but he was able to loosen it up with a massage gun between innings. It tightened back up on him in the fifth inning, and Roberts and the training staff removed Ryan from the game after they noticed him wincing. Ryan missed the first two months of this season with a sore shoulder.

Forearm tightness is a common symptom of elbow ligament trouble and often a precursor to Tommy John surgery, and indeed that turned out to be the case with Ryan. Ryan was in the rotation because the Dodgers have a full rotation on the injured list, plus several notable prospects on the injured list in the minors. The team's rotation depth chart currently looks like this: