The Detroit Tigers announced that Victor Martinez sustained an ACL injury during a workout last week. An MRI at the Watson Clinic in Lakeland, Fla., revealed the torn ACL. He will be re-evaluated next week, however, the Tigers anticipate surgery will be necessary. That surgery will end Martinez's 2012 season before it even begins.
The Tigers have scheduled a teleconference to discuss this further at about 4 p.m. I'll dial in and provide updates to this post.
Obviously, this is really quite awful news.
(Near) live updates from the teleconference, pardon the typing mistakes!
John Lowe: Are you looking for a hitter?
GM Dave Dombrowski: We’re open to it by all means. Victor is a quality hitter, a key guy in our lineup. we do have some flexibility with positions players play with us. We’re ina s pot we could maneuver from within.
I’ve received numerous phonecalls from agents in the last hour llooking to place their players. we need to digest the situation, it all happened in the last day. We need to know what’s going on and we’ll go from there.
You have a guy like raburn who can play numerous positions, santiago can play second and short, andy dirks can play a lot of outfield spots, we’ve got outfielders who we feel can DH. you’ve got all sorts of possibilities.
How did he get hurt?
DD: He got hurt shuffling side to side movement, apparently his right foot slipped and when he did that he slipped in an awkward fashion and his left buckled on him, that's how he got hurt.
Trainer Kevin Rand: It happened last week as he was doing his agility drills, part of his conditioning program. he was doing a lateral move, his right foot slipped, all his weight came down on his left knee.
Similar players of a similar age have all recovered and done fairly well.
On Dr. Richard Stedman, who Martinez will see next week
Rand: We want our players looked at from the finest surgeons out there, finest doctors out there. Same surgeon who did surgery on clete thomas, he did an outstanding job.
On Jim Leyland's reaction:
DD: I know how I felt yesterday. Kevin called me in the morning, left me a message. I got the message later in the day we were waiting results. It didn't sound quite as optimistic. Any time that happens you're in a situation you feel like you get a sock in the gut kind of thing. Thats how Jim feels. I did talk to him today about that. Just like the rest of us. Yo've been in the game a long time, you need to be resilient. After you feel sorry for yourself for a day or so, you move on, start looking at all your alternatives. look at a club like st louis, lose adam weinright and go on to win the world series. we're a good club. players will step up, we'lll still have agood club.
Was victor at the lakeland base?
DD: He was working out on his own somewhere.
how's victor feeling and what extendt do you think he'll be around the club
DD: He's down, there's no question about that. I talked to him this morning. He's down in the dumps, loves to play the game, loves to be around it. You know it hurts him when he ges this type of news. He does everything he can to get himself in the lineup. How much he'll be around, I don't know that answer at this oint. The biggest thing is he'll be rehabbing. He won't be traveling with us at the beginning of the year.
Kevin Rand: We have to wait for the surgeon to operate on him, then we have a timeline.
What day did it occur?
Victor was working out in Orlando late last week.
Is it common for guys to come back 6 or 7 months from now?
DD: I think the possibility comes back he could come back later in the year, but I don’t think it’s something you count on. If it’s something it’s pleasant news. Sometimes it’s pleasant news, but I don’t think you can count on him coming back.
On loss of leadership:
DD: No question he’s a great teammate, great in the clubhouse, and well respected. you miss a player like him but I think … we have other people that can do a good job leading in that regard. the real leader in the clubhouse is our skipper. We’ll be fine in that regard.
short term or long term signing?
DD: Most likely i’d say it’s short term. It depends what position somebody plays and who they are. I would not 100% believe it won’t be anything beyond a year. We have a lot of information on every player in baseball. We didn’t spend a lot of time taling abotu DHs at that time but we have all that information
Can you totally rule out there was no leftover weakness of any kind from problem he had in august?
KR: He was evaluated at the end of the season. the diagnostics at that time show he knee was healed and he could go ahead with his offseason