August 16, 2026 • 8 mins
Dr. Brandon Kohrs from OrthoCincy joined us to talk about another Hunter Greene Tommy John Surgery.
Learn more about OrthoCincy by going here.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
We talked with one of the experts from Orthosinsey about
injuries every single week Ortho Sincy Orthopedics and Sports Medicine.
The great thing about Ortho Sincy is they have specialists,
locations and services all over the Tri State. This includes
walk in orthopedic urgent care at five locations with extended
evening and weekend hours in Edgewood and Anderson. You can
(00:22):
learn more at Orthosinsey dot com. That's orthos ci Ncy
dot com. Today's conversation is going to focus on Hunter
Green Tommy John surgery obviously will miss the rest of
this year, gonna miss all of next year. When it
was announced that they were going to do surgery, it
was explained that they really didn't know what the injury
(00:42):
issue was and so they were sort of looking here,
So what were some of the scenarios that the doctors
were preparing for since they didn't know the exact nature
of the procedure until they actually went in.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
A lot of this is going to determine, as you
just said, on interoperative findings to see when you're in
there and it's gonna be you know, does the ligament
just look a little stretched out? Is it up approximal,
So is it up high? Is it distal to the tendon?
Is it mid substance? Uh? A lot of those factors
are going to be taken into play, you know, determining
(01:16):
the exact treatment option. And obviously, as uh, we've all
you know, we've both kind of found out just recently
he did have another Tommy John surgery, which is very unfortunate,
especially from a revision Tommy John's standpoint, Uh, definitely increases
the complexity of the length of recovery, the length of return. Uh.
But obviously it was this tear was obviously in a
place where they did not feel, you know, something which
(01:38):
has become more more common recently in the last couple
of years. As uh, we hear of an internal bracing,
which will be a more and more common terminology where
you just basically use almost like a really really really
strong little piece of rope that you tie into this
tendon and you can weave it in and out sometimes
and do that with PRP and stem cells and you
(01:59):
can facilitate some healing and a void of repair and
sounds like. Unfortunately that wasn't the case with the surgery.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So we're talking about a timeline that has him missing
the next twelve to eighteen months, so that's obviously all
of twenty twenty seven. It's interesting he came off the
injured list a few weeks ago, and you know, when
he went back on, he reported that he was, you know,
there was some discomfort right, and he thought it was
just you know, normal post surgery aches. How do you
(02:29):
differentiate between post surgery aches if those are normal at all,
and something more severe like this.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
It's difficult because he can't really distinguish that by pain alone.
And yeah, it's going to be where you hurt, how
you hurt, and you know, I would say, if you're
having similar type pain that you did during your recovery,
you know, and if it's if it's the same type
(02:56):
of discomfort, will you assume that's probably just from your
previous at arthroscopy surgery and you're removing bone chips and
bone spurs and that that'll continue to get better. And
so you know, there can be a lot of overlap
too with elbows, with where you hurt, and I mean
you're gonna have pain referred to certain areas and so yeah,
I mean that can be tough. If I was just
(03:17):
coming off of a surgery too. With a cleanout, I
would probably also assume that this discomfort I was having
was just post surgical, when it would get better with time,
I'd work my way through it and get back to throwing.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
This is not his first Tommy John surgery, and there's
a very, very very long list of pitchers and other
players who have had Tommy John surgery and a return.
Tj Antone, who's in the Reds bullpen, has had three
of them. He's having a good season, But how much
does the accumulation of these sorts of injuries and these
sorts of procedures, I guess jeopardize his ability to not
(03:53):
even just realize his potential, but when he comes back,
not end up back on the injured list again.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
I tell people, you know, it's like if somebody's building
a house, right, and you don't like the way the
stoppics look, they just they rip it off and they
put on an entirely new and they get new number
and new parts and new everything. Well, when you're dealing
with a human body and surgery, like, there are no
new parts, right. It's not new bone that you're going into.
(04:19):
It's not new tendons that you're addressing and new scar
tissue that you're going it's all the same tissue, it's
all the same bone, and so you know, your bone
tunnel placement can become more difficult the you know, the
amount of scar tissue that forms and replaces your native
tissue continues to progress. And so that's what that's why
(04:40):
I was explaining things, is that it's not you can
just go and get a new two by four out
of the out of the hardware store, like you got
to use the same one that you had and just
try to fix it and get it back to where
you want it. So yeah, that every time you go
back in that's that's complex. Actually, I wanted to bring
up PJ Antone because when I was, you know, doing
some research on this, that's a guy I thought of
(05:02):
and we'd actually talked about him a number of years ago,
and you know, I talked about like, ah, yeah, it's
gonna be tough, but he can name I can do it.
He can do it. But I mean, in the back
of my head, you're like, man, this is tough. There's
no way. And I let's just talk about that guy too.
That's amazing what he's done to come back from three
Tommy John surgeries. He's got to give a lot of
guys hope. And if I was a Hunter Gring, that's
(05:23):
a guy I'd be relying on two as far as uh,
you know, how he did it and what he did,
because that's that's been pretty remarkable to see. I mean
three is there was only a handful I could even
look up and coming back and that's pretty remarkable what
he's been able to do.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Yeah, and he's having a great season, which is just
makes his return all the more sweeter. You know, Hunter
Green has always been a guy who's thrown really, really hard.
So he is And I know you're not a pitching coach,
but is he gonna have to adjust how he pitches?
He's gonna have to dial back to velocity? Is does
he have no other choice but to dial back to
velocity when he finally does come back?
Speaker 2 (06:00):
You wonder like velocity and pitching velocity is directly related
to your risk of injury. Right if you're throwing a ball,
and these guys are throwing a baseball with enough rotational
force that it should literally rip your shoulder or rip
it should you should literally rip your arm off every
time you throw a ball like you throw that hard
(06:22):
and it's just it's all these muscular forces and the
ligaments and everything that hold things in place. But the
amount of like torque is is incredible, And you wonder
if it's more the the alternate pitches, the spin rates,
it's the the obsession of that aspect of throwing that
you might want to tweak. And I don't know if
(06:42):
just a straight you know, two seam forcing, straight forcing fastball,
Uh yeah, the velocity is a problem, but I think
it's probably just the more the rotational forces that you're
creating with these off speed pitches where you're throwing a
lot of those from a lot of high velocity. That
could be maybe something that you really want to consider
more than just straight throwing hard, because I mean, you
(07:04):
got to throw hard, right, You got to throw ninety
eight ninety times one hundred miles an hour to be
a successful pitcher in this league anymore. And I think
you get back to that. I think you get back
to throwing hard and just maybe uh, you know, change
your mechanics a little bit for those off speed pitches.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
What is the likely timeline and not just talking about
him returning, but like between now and his return. When
can you start throwing in all likelihood? What does what
does the timeline look like?
Speaker 2 (07:27):
Well? And it's tough too with me, you know, with
the revision nature of the surgery like that, you know,
slows things down. I mean you're probably not doing any
throwing at all for you know, the first couple of
months I would anticipate, then a couple of months after
that you're just working on range of motion, and you
(07:50):
know you're probably looking at man a number of months.
I mean you're you're probably I would say, you know,
maybe five maybe in this one, you do five six
months before you even do some white gentle stuff. I mean,
especially if you're looking at eighteen months for revision, it
(08:13):
could be a full year before you really start doing
any significant throwing even late.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
Sorry guy, doctor Brandon Courus from Ortho Sincy. I say
it every week because it's true. The great thing about
Ortho Sincy is they've got specialists and locations all over
the Tri State, which includes walking orthopedic urgent care weekdays
nine am to nine pm and on Saturdays nine am
to one pm at both Edgewood and Anderson. It's easy
because you don't need an appointment and it's definitely cheaper
(08:41):
than going to an er. Whenever you have an urgent
orthopedic injury, go to orthosincy dot com. That's ortho ci
ncy dot com. Tony Pike his final training camp report
of the week. Next
We talked with one of the experts from Orthosinsey about
injuries every single week Ortho Sincy Orthopedics and Sports Medicine.
The great thing about Ortho Sincy is they have specialists,
locations and services all over the Tri State. This includes
walk in orthopedic urgent care at five locations with extended
evening and weekend hours in Edgewood and Anderson. You can
(00:22):
learn more at Orthosinsey dot com. That's orthos ci Ncy
dot com. Today's conversation is going to focus on Hunter
Green Tommy John surgery obviously will miss the rest of
this year, gonna miss all of next year. When it
was announced that they were going to do surgery, it
was explained that they really didn't know what the injury
(00:42):
issue was and so they were sort of looking here,
So what were some of the scenarios that the doctors
were preparing for since they didn't know the exact nature
of the procedure until they actually went in.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
A lot of this is going to determine, as you
just said, on interoperative findings to see when you're in
there and it's gonna be you know, does the ligament
just look a little stretched out? Is it up approximal,
So is it up high? Is it distal to the tendon?
Is it mid substance? Uh? A lot of those factors
are going to be taken into play, you know, determining
(01:16):
the exact treatment option. And obviously, as uh, we've all
you know, we've both kind of found out just recently
he did have another Tommy John surgery, which is very unfortunate,
especially from a revision Tommy John's standpoint, Uh, definitely increases
the complexity of the length of recovery, the length of return. Uh.
But obviously it was this tear was obviously in a
place where they did not feel, you know, something which
(01:38):
has become more more common recently in the last couple
of years. As uh, we hear of an internal bracing,
which will be a more and more common terminology where
you just basically use almost like a really really really
strong little piece of rope that you tie into this
tendon and you can weave it in and out sometimes
and do that with PRP and stem cells and you
(01:59):
can facilitate some healing and a void of repair and
sounds like. Unfortunately that wasn't the case with the surgery.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So we're talking about a timeline that has him missing
the next twelve to eighteen months, so that's obviously all
of twenty twenty seven. It's interesting he came off the
injured list a few weeks ago, and you know, when
he went back on, he reported that he was, you know,
there was some discomfort right, and he thought it was
just you know, normal post surgery aches. How do you
(02:29):
differentiate between post surgery aches if those are normal at all,
and something more severe like this.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
It's difficult because he can't really distinguish that by pain alone.
And yeah, it's going to be where you hurt, how
you hurt, and you know, I would say, if you're
having similar type pain that you did during your recovery,
you know, and if it's if it's the same type
(02:56):
of discomfort, will you assume that's probably just from your
previous at arthroscopy surgery and you're removing bone chips and
bone spurs and that that'll continue to get better. And
so you know, there can be a lot of overlap
too with elbows, with where you hurt, and I mean
you're gonna have pain referred to certain areas and so yeah,
I mean that can be tough. If I was just
(03:17):
coming off of a surgery too. With a cleanout, I
would probably also assume that this discomfort I was having
was just post surgical, when it would get better with time,
I'd work my way through it and get back to throwing.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
This is not his first Tommy John surgery, and there's
a very, very very long list of pitchers and other
players who have had Tommy John surgery and a return.
Tj Antone, who's in the Reds bullpen, has had three
of them. He's having a good season, But how much
does the accumulation of these sorts of injuries and these
sorts of procedures, I guess jeopardize his ability to not
(03:53):
even just realize his potential, but when he comes back,
not end up back on the injured list again.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
I tell people, you know, it's like if somebody's building
a house, right, and you don't like the way the
stoppics look, they just they rip it off and they
put on an entirely new and they get new number
and new parts and new everything. Well, when you're dealing
with a human body and surgery, like, there are no
new parts, right. It's not new bone that you're going into.
(04:19):
It's not new tendons that you're addressing and new scar
tissue that you're going it's all the same tissue, it's
all the same bone, and so you know, your bone
tunnel placement can become more difficult the you know, the
amount of scar tissue that forms and replaces your native
tissue continues to progress. And so that's what that's why
(04:40):
I was explaining things, is that it's not you can
just go and get a new two by four out
of the out of the hardware store, like you got
to use the same one that you had and just
try to fix it and get it back to where
you want it. So yeah, that every time you go
back in that's that's complex. Actually, I wanted to bring
up PJ Antone because when I was, you know, doing
some research on this, that's a guy I thought of
(05:02):
and we'd actually talked about him a number of years ago,
and you know, I talked about like, ah, yeah, it's
gonna be tough, but he can name I can do it.
He can do it. But I mean, in the back
of my head, you're like, man, this is tough. There's
no way. And I let's just talk about that guy too.
That's amazing what he's done to come back from three
Tommy John surgeries. He's got to give a lot of
guys hope. And if I was a Hunter Gring, that's
(05:23):
a guy I'd be relying on two as far as uh,
you know, how he did it and what he did,
because that's that's been pretty remarkable to see. I mean
three is there was only a handful I could even
look up and coming back and that's pretty remarkable what
he's been able to do.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Yeah, and he's having a great season, which is just
makes his return all the more sweeter. You know, Hunter
Green has always been a guy who's thrown really, really hard.
So he is And I know you're not a pitching coach,
but is he gonna have to adjust how he pitches?
He's gonna have to dial back to velocity? Is does
he have no other choice but to dial back to
velocity when he finally does come back?
Speaker 2 (06:00):
You wonder like velocity and pitching velocity is directly related
to your risk of injury. Right if you're throwing a ball,
and these guys are throwing a baseball with enough rotational
force that it should literally rip your shoulder or rip
it should you should literally rip your arm off every
time you throw a ball like you throw that hard
(06:22):
and it's just it's all these muscular forces and the
ligaments and everything that hold things in place. But the
amount of like torque is is incredible, And you wonder
if it's more the the alternate pitches, the spin rates,
it's the the obsession of that aspect of throwing that
you might want to tweak. And I don't know if
(06:42):
just a straight you know, two seam forcing, straight forcing fastball,
Uh yeah, the velocity is a problem, but I think
it's probably just the more the rotational forces that you're
creating with these off speed pitches where you're throwing a
lot of those from a lot of high velocity. That
could be maybe something that you really want to consider
more than just straight throwing hard, because I mean, you
(07:04):
got to throw hard, right, You got to throw ninety
eight ninety times one hundred miles an hour to be
a successful pitcher in this league anymore. And I think
you get back to that. I think you get back
to throwing hard and just maybe uh, you know, change
your mechanics a little bit for those off speed pitches.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
What is the likely timeline and not just talking about
him returning, but like between now and his return. When
can you start throwing in all likelihood? What does what
does the timeline look like?
Speaker 2 (07:27):
Well? And it's tough too with me, you know, with
the revision nature of the surgery like that, you know,
slows things down. I mean you're probably not doing any
throwing at all for you know, the first couple of
months I would anticipate, then a couple of months after
that you're just working on range of motion, and you
(07:50):
know you're probably looking at man a number of months.
I mean you're you're probably I would say, you know,
maybe five maybe in this one, you do five six
months before you even do some white gentle stuff. I mean,
especially if you're looking at eighteen months for revision, it
(08:13):
could be a full year before you really start doing
any significant throwing even late.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
Sorry guy, doctor Brandon Courus from Ortho Sincy. I say
it every week because it's true. The great thing about
Ortho Sincy is they've got specialists and locations all over
the Tri State, which includes walking orthopedic urgent care weekdays
nine am to nine pm and on Saturdays nine am
to one pm at both Edgewood and Anderson. It's easy
because you don't need an appointment and it's definitely cheaper
(08:41):
than going to an er. Whenever you have an urgent
orthopedic injury, go to orthosincy dot com. That's ortho ci
ncy dot com. Tony Pike his final training camp report
of the week. Next
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