Sources: Phillies’ Bryce Harper headed for thumb surgery, but plans to play again this season
Even though only 14 weeks remain in the season, Harper is said to be hopeful of returning, possibly even before the end of August.
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As hand specialists reviewed X-rays of the most scrutinized thumb in baseball and team officials huddled Monday to brainstorm how to replace an irreplaceable player, one question hovered over the Phillies.
How much time will Bryce Harper actually miss?
Harper is expected to need surgery on his fractured left thumb, multiple sources indicated, which would put his recovery time beyond the best-case scenario of four to six weeks. But even though only 14 weeks remain in the season, the reigning National League MVP is said to be hopeful of playing again this year, possibly even before the end of August.
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If that timetable does come to fruition — team officials have thus far said only that he will be out “indefinitely” — the Phillies would need to at least tread water without their best player for a minimum of eight weeks.
Doable? Maybe.
At 39-35, the Phillies are among eight NL teams in the mix for six playoff spots. The next six games are at home against two teams they are chasing: the Atlanta Braves (42-32) beginning Tuesday night and the St. Louis Cardinals (41-34) starting Friday night. Beyond that, they have tough series in St. Louis (July 8-11); in Toronto (July 12-13, likely with a shuffled roster to account for unvaccinated players who are barred from entering Canada); and against the Braves (July 25-27 at home, Aug. 2-3 in Atlanta) and Mets (Aug. 12-14 in New York, Aug. 19-21 at home).
The Phillies are on pace for 85 wins. They’ll probably need to do a bit better than that to capture the final wild-card spot. FanGraphs’ latest projection has them at 86 wins, one game out of the playoffs.
It’s going to be tough. It may even force president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski to expand his trade-deadline focus beyond pitching help, particularly in the bullpen, to adding another hitter.
But the Phillies have invested too much in the roster to do anything other than push forward without Harper. The notion that he may return this season, even for the final month, makes things less bleak than they seemed when he took a 97-mph fastball from Padres starter Blake Snell off the thumb Saturday night.
“We’ve had Harp down a couple of games before,” Kyle Schwarber told reporters after Sunday’s 8-5 victory in San Diego. “We had a little taste of it. Not saying that’s a good thing. Obviously we all want him in the lineup. But we’ve had him down before. We’ve all been in that spot where he’s not in the lineup, and we have to go out and win a baseball game.”
» READ MORE: Phillies brace for games without Bryce Harper by moving Nick Castellanos into vacant spot in batting order
The Phillies are waiting for Harper to see a specialist before putting a time frame on his return. It may be a positive sign that they didn’t transfer him to the 60-day injured list Monday to free a 40-man roster spot after claiming outfielder Óscar Mercado off waivers from the Cleveland Guardians. Instead, they recalled lefty reliever Damon Jones from triple A and put him on the 60-day injured list with a shoulder impingement.
Maybe it means they expect Harper to return before Aug. 25.
The length of Harper’s absence depends largely on the location and severity of the fracture, according to David Hay, an orthopedic hand and wrist surgeon at Cedars Sinai Kerlan-Jobe Institute in Los Angeles. Hay said a thumb fracture typically sidelines a player for six weeks on the low end or at least 12 weeks on the high end.
Given that it’s the last week of June, that difference could be all the difference for a franchise that hasn’t made the playoffs in 10 years and owners who are spending more money than ever to finally get there.
Hay, who hasn’t treated Harper and isn’t privy to the details of the fracture, outlined three potential scenarios:
If the fracture is nondisplaced, the bone could be set without surgery. Harper’s thumb would be immobilized for a few weeks, but Hay said it would be “pretty reasonable” for Harper to be “on the cusp of playing” within four to six weeks. Cincinnati Reds first baseman Joey Votto — like Harper, a left-handed hitter — missed 33 days last season with a nondisplaced left thumb fracture.
A minimally displaced fracture may also heal without surgery. But Hay said some athletes elect to have screws or pins inserted to hold the fracture in place and allow the rehab process to begin sooner. In that case, the timetable for returning to play is still roughly six weeks.
If the fracture isn’t clean, or if it’s in either of the two joints of the thumb, surgery would be necessary and the recovery would be longer and more complicated.
Phillies second baseman Jean Segura falls into the latter category. He fractured his right index finger while trying to bunt, underwent surgery on June 3, and will be sidelined until late August or September. Outfielder Mickey Moniak was luckier. When he got hit by a pitch on the eve of opening day and broke the fifth metacarpal on his right hand, he didn’t need surgery and was back in the lineup on May 30.
It’s unclear whether Harper will have screws inserted in his thumb or require a more complicated surgery. If it’s the former, his recovery time could wind up somewhere in between Moniak and Segura.
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“The general arc of this being six-ish weeks, with or without [minor] surgery, generally sort of makes sense,” Hay said by phone. “But there’s a lot of variability. If he has some less common fracture, more severe, displaced into the joint, then all bets are off.”
Only a sucker would bet on the Phillies to overcome losing Harper for the final 89 games. But if they could get him back with even 30 games to spare, well, they’ll certainly take their chances.
Thursday, June 30 at 12:30 p.m. @phillyinquirer on Instagram
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