Sir Aaron

Patellar tendon is better than an ACL/MCL tear as far as heal time.

Patellar tendon tear is complicated because he will not even be able to walk for several weeks.  Rehab is long and painful.

If he tore his ACL instead, he'd have surgery next week, be walking by week's end, and return to athletics at 6 months (assuming he had patellar tendon graft). 

and once again the negativity on this board is astounding. 

I was thinking the same thing.  The Angels are perfectly capable of winning out the division this year. 

 

Weaver said Richards "kind of lost it" when he was in the trainers' room and heard talk of possible surgery to repair his patellar tendon.

Mike Trout, Richards' housemate and one of his closest friends on the team, said Richards "was in tears" in the trainers' room.

http://www.ocregister.com/angels/richards-632315-field-angels.html

 

Yes, I bet he did lose it.  Most people would.  This is a devastating injury.  It is painful, requires surgery, and the rehabilitation protocol can be very overwhelming.  I asked a well known Sports Medicine Doctor/OS and he said it was close as to which was worse, ACL or Patella tendon tear.  He went with ACL but said it was a close one.

Everyone is different -- I ruptured my patellar tendon at age 34 about 7 years after having needed knee surgery to repair a torn ACL, my tear was off the bone so they had to actually attach the tendon to the bone which made it a bit harder for them than had it just been a fibrous tear.  I actually said it looked like his patellar tendon when it happened because of my experience with the injury -- the pain was instant and much much worse than when I had torn the ligament, so much worse I thought I'd completely dislocated the knee and severed all three ligaments.  

 

Anyway, I was unable to do anything really for a good 3 months which was both frustrating and extremely boring, this led to a lot of Cheers re-runs and even more sandwiches eaten.  When it was all said and done I was doing normal daily activities (walking going up stairs etc etc), 4 maybe, 5 months after surgery and cleared to jog and so forth around 6 months in.  I didn't actually do any jogging because I had more Cheers to watch and more sandwiches to eat.  At about the 8th or 9th month mark I went to the batting cages and was freaking gassed within 15 minutes so I decided my rotund ass needed to get back into a shape other than round and I started legit working out.  I wore a sleeve basically every day for a good 6-8 months and put a strap on below the knee whenever I attempted anything that required burst or jumping but despite more initial pain and less activity than the ligament tear the recovery was a lot faster and with a lot fewer roadblocks, I never once had to back off after I started to try to work out or play sports.  Again, everyone is different, Richards is taller than I am, I'd assume that works against him but he's younger than I was and obviously in peak physical shape.  I guess the key will be what we are hearing 5-6 months in.  If he's already running then he would likely beat the 9 month time-table.  Again, everyone is different and I think I was aided in having had the surgery within ten days of the tear, as soon as the swelling went down and having been pretty active physically at the time of the injury.

 

The trick for him will be whether or not he is able to land his plant leg pain free.  His delivery is such that it likely won't be as big of an issue as if he were a true drop and drive (Tom Seaver) type of pitcher.  I was actually pretty elated to hear it was just the patellar tendon and nothing else had gone pop -- that would have greatly lengthened the recovery time and slowed down the rehab process.

 

I did a search for athletes coming back from patellar tendon tears yesterday and found  the following link to be pretty interesting.  It mostly relates to NFL players, but I think it's fair to say that's a far more strenuous sport than baseball. http://dynastyleaguefootball.com/2013/06/01/the-dynasty-doctor-6/

Keep in mind that he will receive the best physical therapy money can buy which will mean that he will get back a lot more quickly than the average person. 

Also patella tendon tear is going to be much more painful because the ACL stops hurting after the tear (no nerves to hurt).  Some people have virtually no pain when they tear their ACL.  I tore my ACL then got up and continued doing what I was doing before.

what are we looing at BEST SCENARIO??  Return July 1 next year?

Best scenario?  He could be back for opening day.  That would be about 7 months from now.  I think a realistic goal would be the 2nd half of the season.

So many variables that make it impossible to know...confidence in the leg, getting back into a rhythm like he was this year....hard to know....he may struggle to put it back together....or not.....

He's going to have surgery next week.  A lot of this depends on what the surgeon sees and what the prognosis is immediately after surgery.  After that, the tendon will need to heal which is something that can't be rushed.  The physical therapy will help him get confidence in the leg.  My guess is that assuming the surgery is successful, that he'll be cleared to start throwing lightly at about 6 months with full return somewhere around May.

Aaron, I did have that thought last night, about there maybe being wear and tear already on the knee, and it maybe took just enough of a tweak to expose it. 

Although the angle the knee was at when he fell was somewhat drastic. 

I watched the replay in slow motion several times.  It was his left knee and it doesn't look like it was at an awkward angle when the injury occurred.  Although to be fair, it isn't entirely clear from the replay when he had the injury.  An injury like this as well as ACL tear often cause the fall.  People are often under the misimpression that the fall caused the tear but it's the other way around.

Sometimes there are muscle imbalances which contribute to these types of injuries and that is often found and corrected during the physical therapy protocols.  So professional athletes (and sometimes regular folks too) sometimes come back better.  The only worrisome factor is that you aren't just talking about an injury but 4-6 months of not throwing a ball at all, much less pitching at a professional level.  But that's the nature of most injuries.

Born in Anaheim.  Fan all my life since my father took me to the games.  He preferred the Dodgers but I always preferred Anaheim.  I couldn't watch parts of the last two games of the world series because I was so nervous.

Does anyone think we still have a shot at a World Series?

Come on now.  They can do it, especially if everyone hits.

Of course. It's always the worst possible scenario with this team. And by 6-9 months they of course mean 9-12 months, then 6 months of rehabilitation.

LOL.  I share your facetious pessimism over what seems to be the most unusual injuries to Angel players.

Both 2015 and 2016, as Weaver/Wilson make some $32 million between them for each season.

 

Anyway to know 3-4 months from now how Richards' recovery is truly going?

If they could pencil him in by early/mid May, they might not need to sign a premium FA.

Yes.  The patellar tendon rupture is a pretty bad injury.  Fortunately, since he is a pro athlete, he'll probably be on the operating table this week.  That will help him get back faster.  The surgeon will be able to say how he felt the surgery went and any anticipated problems.  After that, they should know very accurately what his rehab looks like at the 4 month mark. At about 6 months, I'd expect to see him start at least light pitching.  The biggest factor, however, will probably be psychologically.  It's not easy to get back to using your leg properly again and fear of re-injury often limits an athlete's return from injury.  But assuming the outlook after surgery is positive, I would expect to see him pitching no later than 12 months. 

The way he got injured was such bs too.

 

Not even that big of a play, Aybar never even ended up throwing it to first.

 

So many other ways the whole thing could have gone down and he'd still be able to play.

 

Had a great season going, even guys on ESPN/QuickPitch were giving him props as the best pitcher this season.

Usually in this situation, there was some sort of patellar deficiency already.  Then the pressure exerted on it causes it to tear.  This is a pretty bad injury.  I can't say that it is worse than an ACL (which is a ligament and must be completely replaced), but it's pretty bad.  Very little blood supply there.