The headline from today’s Tom Gage article on the Detroit News is Back from latest injury, Joel Zumaya throwing hard as ever.
This is something we’ve obviously seen time and time again with Zumaya and it’s starting to mirror the optimism that Lions fans have on their upcoming season only to be let down. In Zumaya’s defense though and the Lions too, most of his misfortunes were the result of bad luck and not necessarily mistakes off the field.
With Zumaya you hope and pray that the the latest injury is the final one for him and he can finally focus on helping the Tigers in the long run. Gage sums this up best saying that you can’t focus on the past with Zumaya and that you must take this latest step of his career one day at a time, with the awareness that the first day here couldn’t possibly have been better.
“It’s no big deal who you throw next to, except when you’re throwing next to Joel,” Rick Porcello
said. “I hate throwing next to him.“When you’re throwing your ‘pens, you don’t want it to look like your velocity is 30 miles an hour less than the guy next to you.
“You could literally hear his pitches rip through the air.”
Robbie Weinhardt knows the feeling.
“I’d rather be at the other end of the line from where he’s throwing,” Weinhardt said.
New Tigers catcher Victor Martinez also had praise for Zumaya after working with him during a bullpen session…
“It’s more fun being behind the plate for him,” Martinez said, “than being in the box. The ball was coming of his hand loud.”
It’s nothing new for Zumaya to open some eyes with how hard he throws, but Martinez’s jaw dropped at Zumaya’s first breaking ball.
“It was fun watching his reaction,” Zumaya said. “My secondary pitches were lights out.”
When looking at the following season and Zumaya there really isn’t anything other then him having a good first day that leads you to believe that this season will be better for him. The only other reason that comes to mind on why Zumaya will be healthy in 2011 is what other injuries can this guy deal with? He had the wrist injury in 2006, the finger tendon trouble, the shoulder problem and now the elbow.
Zumaya also knows that if he can’t stay healthy this season it may very well be his last in the MLB.
Source: Detroit News
