Despite the Los Angeles Dodgers’ best efforts, Julio Urias threw a career-high 127.2 innings last season with Triple-A Oklahoma City and the Majors. His previous career high was 87.2 innings, in 2014 with High-A Rancho Cucamonga.
Urias once again will work on an innings limit. How the Dodgers intended to manage his workload remains unclear — at least publicly. Options discussed have been leaving Urias in extended Spring Training, sending him to OKC when the season begins, or capping Urias’ innings in starts with the Dodgers.
After his second relief appearance of the spring, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts indicated it’s unlikely Urias will be part of the Opening Day rotation, via Ken Gurnick of MLB.com:
“This next turn, we’ve got to get him to three innings and see where we’re at,” said manager Dave Roberts. “The guys are ramping up. I wouldn’t say the book is closed yet on Julio breaking with us [in two weeks], but if we’re going to do it, yeah, we have to ramp the innings up.”
In four games (two relief appearances), Urias has thrown a combined 5.2 innings. He failed to complete one inning out of the bullpen on Wednesday, needing 31 pitches to record two outs against the Seattle Mariners. Urias was removed after allowing two runs on two hits.
As it currently stands, Brandon McCarthy and Alex Wood appear likely to round out the Dodgers’ rotation behind Clayton Kershaw, Kenta Maeda and Rich Hill. In part as a result of survivin attrition.
Scott Kazmir is continuing to sort through mechanical issues as he recovers from a hip injury, the club is taking a deliberate approach with Hyun-Jin Ryu, and Brock Stewart was recently shut down due to right-shoulder tendinitis. Ross Stripling was recently identified as a potential long-reliever option.
