Borderline criminal: Yankees knew about hip injury last year

Tyler Kepner stuns us by reporting that the Yankees, specially Brian Cashman, knew about Alex Rodriguez's hip injury LAST YEAR.

Cashman said the Yankees discovered an irregularity in Rodriguez’s hip last May when he underwent a magnetic resonance imaging exam for a right quadriceps injury. By June or July, the hitting coach Kevin Long said he could notice subtle changes in Rodriguez’s hitting, notably in his right foot — the back one in his stance.

The foot was not pivoting fully, Long said, and as a result, Rodriguez could not completely turn his waist and clear his hips. This caused his bat to drag and prevented him from driving through the ball and generating maximum power.

“Speed-wise, to catch up to 95-, 96-mile-an-hour pitches, you’ve basically got to get your hips through,” Long said. “It affects bat speed, power, balance. From a technical standpoint, it affects quite a few things. But he’s so gifted and so talented that he made do with what he had.”
...

Cashman said Rodriguez had always had stiff hips, and there was no need to examine him after the season. The condition was so minor, Cashman said, that Rodriguez did not seek treatment from team trainers last season.

“That’s why I termed it as an incidental finding,” Cashman said. “If you took an M.R.I. right now of everybody in our clubhouse, you are going to find in many of them — 20 percent, 30 percent, 40 percent — the same finding. Just because they have it doesn’t mean it’s a problem. Just because you have it doesn’t mean you need surgery.

“So that’s why you put it in the file,” he said. “You treat the patient, not the symptom. You don’t treat the M.R.I. You treat the patient.”

That's some way to treat your $275 million investment, huh? I'm absolutely shocked and appalled by this news.

And now the team still wants him to play, even with the torn labrum in his hip. Every time he dives to his right at third, we'll cringe. Every time he slides into second, we'll cringe. Every time he tries to beat out an infield hit, we'll cringe. He needs surgery. Give it to him while he can rejoin the team in the middle of the season. If they keep waiting, he'll just injure it worse in June or July and he'll be gone until next February.