The Royals announced Sunday that right-hander Stephen Kolek is heading to the 15-day injured list with a flexor strain, another domino falling for a Kansas City pitching staff that's been getting hammered by the injury bug all season. The timing stings extra here because Kolek wasn't even hurt in a big-league game — he got hurt trying to get back to one.
MLB Trade Rumors flagged the move as it broke, with the Royals officially placing Kolek on the 15-day IL.
Kolek had been away from the club on the family medical emergency list after his daughter Faye was born seven weeks premature on June 25, spending weeks at the hospital with his wife Jessica and the baby instead of the mound. He was working his way back with Triple-A Omaha, lined up for four innings or 65 pitches to build toward a big-league return as soon as this week. Instead he lasted just 2 2/3 innings and 51 pitches before exiting Saturday's outing, and the flexor injury scrapped whatever return timeline the Royals had penciled in.
Before the emergency leave, Kolek had actually been a quietly solid piece of Kansas City's rotation depth, going 4-3 with a 4.50 ERA, 34 strikeouts and 12 walks across 10 starts and 54 innings. Losing him now, on top of everything else the Royals' pitching staff has dealt with this year, tightens the squeeze on a group already patching together starts down the stretch.
It's a brutal break on a human level too — a guy finally cleared to start working his way back to his teammates after a scary premature birth, only to get shut down again before he even got the chance. With the trade deadline bearing down, expect Kansas City to keep leaning on the waiver wire and depth arms while Kolek's flexor gets re-evaluated, and don't be shocked if this IL stint quietly stretches past the minimum 15 days given how these strains tend to go.