Promising MLB Careers That Injuries Totally Derailed

Here’s a fun fact: Pitching does incredible physical harm to pitchers. The unnatural motion takes a significant toll on the body, often doing lasting damage to the elbow, shoulder, back and/or knee.

So the starting pitcher position is baseball’s equivalent to the NFL running back. Because the men who do it may be capable of dominating the league in their first season or two.

But by then they’re highly prone to various likely injuries. And if physical ailments catch them, they sometimes disappear from the mound forever. Just ask the likes of Mark Prior, Dwight Gooden, Mark Fidrych and Sandy Koufax.

You’ll find all of them on our list of the greatest MLB careers derailed by injury.

Mickey Cochrane

The catcher won two American League MVP trophies  — one with the Philadelphia Athletics in 1928, then another six years later with the Detroit Tigers. After Rogers Hornsby and Jimmie Fox, he’s the third player ever to win two MVP awards.

While batting in 1937, he was hit in the head by a pitch, fracturing his skull. While he managed for parts of two seasons, he never played again.

Grady Sizemore

[dx_custom_adunit desktop_id=”RTK_K67O” mobile_id=”RTK_5yk0″]

The center fielder was a beast over his first four full seasons, hitting .281/.372/.496 with 464 runs scored, 107 homers, 325 RBI, and 115 steals.

But elbow troubles afflicted him in 2009, and he elected to have surgery on his arm, then had surgery on his abdomen to repair a hernia. The season after that, he underwent microfracture surgery on his left knee after just 33 games.

Then he played in just 280 games over five years, and hasn’t played since 2015.

Herb Score

As the 1955 American League Rookie of the Year, Score struck out 9.7 batters per nine innings, best in the majors, when the average pitcher struck out just 4.4 batters per nine innings. He was even more dominant the following season.

But in 1957 he took a liner off the face, then a year later started dealing with elbow trouble, and the lefty was never the same again.

J.R. Richard

Richard led the majors in strikeouts in 1978 and 1979, setting down 616 batters in that span and winning baseball’s ERA title in the latter season.

The 6’8″ righty was even better in the early going of the 1980 campaign before a stroke nearly took his life and ended his career.