Pic of the Week

The Miami Marlins left their caps on the pitcher's mound
after Monday's game, their first after the death of
ace Jose Fernandez.

Having a co-worker die is a sorrowful thing. I've been though it a few times myself; we all have or will.

It's never easy, even when you know it's coming. It's even rougher when it comes suddenly, as was the case with Jose Fernandez last weekend. And, probably, rougher still when it comes to one of great talent, as was the case with Fernandez.

It was a goosepimple moment last Monday when Dee Gordon, a left-handed hitter, stepped into the batters box right-handed in tribute to Fernandez for one pitch -- then took his stance in the proper batter's box and hit his first home run of the season.

Three losses

Sunday was a rough day for baseball, with three distinct losses felt in this corner of fandom.

The biggest loss, and the most surprising, was the death of Jose Fernandez, the brilliant young pitcher of the Miami Marlins, in a boating accident off Miami Beach.

I keep in my head a list of the great pitchers I've seen work in person. I'll never get to add Fernandez to that list. Obviously that's among the lesser aspects of this tragedy. He leaves behind, among other survivors, an as-yet-unborn daughter (he apparently announced his girlfriend's pregnancy just last week on social media),

Another loss was completely expected: Vin Scully called his final home game for the Los Angeles Dodgers. My experience with Scully's work is largely limited to his years of national work on baseball and football games, mostly in the 1970s and '80s. But I have long admired the transcription of his call of the ninth inning of Sandy Koufax's perfect game. Scully broadcast in complete sentences and paragraphs, and that ninth inning, obviously done without a script, reads like it had been crafted with multiple drafts.

The third loss matters mainly to Twins fans. Sunday marked the 100th loss of this far-below-expectations season for the Minnesota crew. The home portion of the Twins schedule is mercifully over, and the odds are quite strong that when the week and the season ends the record will be a new low for the Minnesota portion of the franchise's long if bedraggled history. (The Washington Senators twice lost at least 110 games in the early years of the American League.)

Does high quality equal damaged goods?

Jose Fernandez in 2013-14: 16-8, 2.25 in 224 innings.

The Miami Marlins put Jose Fernandez, their marvelous 21-year-old pitcher, on the disabled list Monday, and Tommy John surgery is expected.

It's difficult to find fault with how the Marlins handled the phenom. Fernandez made just 28 starts last season as a 20-year-old. Mike Redmond, the former Twins catcher who manages the Fish, never let the kid throw even 110 pitches in a game, and shut him down in mid September.

This year was more of the same. But Fernandez threw a career-high 114 pitches on May 4, then spluttered Friday with a noticeable loss of velocity. And now he is presumably headed for a surgical table and the time-consuming rehab that accompanies ligament replacement.

Earlier this year, noted orthopedic surgeon Dr. James Andrews granted an interview in which he remarked on the rapid increase in Tommy John surgeries among high school pitchers. He said the basic problem is that teenagers are throwing too hard for too long. An 18-year-old's arm isn't ready to handle the strain of a 95-mph fastball, he said, and also needs lengthy breaks from pitching. But many of the top prep pitchers now play baseball only, and never break out of a routine of regular mound work to, say, spend a winter playing basketball.

On Monday, on the heels of the Fernandez news, Baseball America's J.J. Cooper tweeted:

'10-'12 1st rd HS P: 15 pitchers. 5 already have had TJ, Fernandez pending. 2 now on DL with elbow/forearm issues, 1 major hip surgery.
— JJ Cooper (@jjcoop36) May 13, 2014

It's been asserted that every high-drafted prep pitcher has already sustained some arm damage before he signs. That's a daunting concept for a scouting director trying to get the most bang for his buck — that the bigger the arm, the more likely the damage.