Already shaky KC Royals pen suffers disastrous injury blow

When it comes to the bullpen, it seems as if the KC Royals just can’t have nice things. After a start that had the manager going on the radio and stating that he knows the pen will eventually be able to straighten things out, Matt Quatraro is dealing with having to replace the reliever that was easily the most dependable here in the early going.

On Friday afternoon, the Royals announced that they'd placed reliever Hunter Harvey on the 15-day IL. In his place, they are calling up an arm from Triple-A Omaha who has been around a while, but is still young enough that it’s possible he could eventually turn into a serviceable option.

The KC Royals are placing Harvey on the IL retroactive to April 8, answering questions in the process as to why he hasn’t appeared in a game for several days after being a guy the club leaned on heavily in the first week+ of the season.

Latest KC Royals injury to Hunter Harvey is a big blow to an already shaky bullpen

Kansas City reported that Harvey has a right Teres Major strain. This is a strain of a muscle that is in the back part of the shoulder. While a “strain” sounds like it might not be too bad, there is definitely cause for concern here. That particular muscle is an important one when it comes to the rotator cuff. Because of that, it seems extremely unlikely that Harvey will be returning to the Kansas City Royals after the minimum stay on the Injured List.

There might be some reason for hope since they’re backdating the injury, but that could also simply be a “best case scenario” bit of wishful thinking on the front office’s part.

Much has been made of the struggles of Kansas City’s pen at the beginning of the season, but it’s also seemed as though the relievers were starting to figure it out a bit. Now they’ll have to figure it out without Harvey, who had appeared in 6 games, pitched 5.1 shutout innings with 7 strikeouts, and had only allowed one baserunner.

His replacement, Steven Cruz, has 15 career major league appearances, including five last year with the KC Royals, where he didn’t allow a run. So far this season, he’s been a bit shaky himself. In three outings, he’s recorded a save but also posted a 6.00 ERA and an 0-1 record.