After an impressive outing was cut short by an unfortunate injury, Toronto Blue Jays starter Ryu Hyun-jin was still happy with the way he pitched in just his second game back from elbow surgery.
The South Korean left-hander held the Cleveland Guardians without a hit over four innings, striking out two and walking one at Progressive Field in Cleveland on Monday (local time).
The last batter Ryu faced, however, knocked the pitcher out of the game. With two outs in the bottom of the fourth, Oscar Gonzalez hit a scorching comebacker that struck Ryu on the inside of the right knee.
Ryu, who fielded the ball and threw out Gonzalez before dropping to the ground in pain, was later diagnosed with a right knee contusion. He went for precautionary X-rays after the game.
The game was scoreless when Ryu was lifted, and the Blue Jays, leaning on six relievers, went on to win 3-1.
Ryu made his return from Tommy John elbow surgery last week against the Baltimore Orioles, starting for the first time in 14 months. In an up-and-down performance against a hot-hitting club, Ryu was charged with four runs on nine hits in five innings, while allowing plenty of hard contact.
It was a much different story against the Guardians, as Ryu showed much better command with his bread-and-butter changeup and induced soft groundouts and easy flyouts.
Against the Orioles, Ryu gave up five batted balls with an exit velocity of at least 100 mph. Four also had an exit velocity of 99 mph. But no batted ball by the Guardians left the bat at over 100 mph.
Ryu also got five whiffs out of nine swings on his changeup, compared with only one miss out of nine swings on the pitch by the Orioles last week. In other words, this was vintage Ryu, pre-Tommy John form.
"My command was much better tonight than my last outing, especially with my changeup," Ryu told Toronto media. "I was locating it right where I wanted. It seemed to work really well for me."
As for the knee injury, Ryu said the liner left a bruise, and he didn't hurt it running or making the play after the ball struck him.
In an indication that the injury wasn't serious, manager John Schneider cracked: "We joke about his big calves. He's got two calves on that right leg right now."
With Ryu's return, the Blue Jays have been running a six-man rotation as they try to survive the grueling stretch of 17 games in 17 days. The left-hander was pitching on five days' rest against Cleveland.
Source: Yonhap News Agency