Dustin May battled back, now competing for rotation spot

LA plans to have a mostly 5-man rotation until May, with only three stretches of six game days in a row in the first 36 games on the schedule

Dustin May is back competing for a roster spot with the Dodgers, and his first appearance in Cactus League play will mark his first game action of any kind in nearly 22 months.

May last pitched on May 17, 2023, then later that July had flexor tendon repair in his right elbow, along with revision to his 2021 Tommy John surgery. He was slated to return at some point in the second half last season, but his 2024 season was upended by an esophageal tear in July.

May called it a “freak accident” and detailed the ordeal with Jack Harris of the Los Angeles Times:

Instead of completing the final stages of his elbow rehab, May embarked on a new six-month recovery in which he was barred from lifting any weights heavier than 10 pounds. Though he began light throwing activities in November, it wasn’t until around New Year’s that he was back to full strength.

“It just kind of gives me a different viewpoint on a lot of things in life,” May said Friday, still striking a tone of disbelief about all that happened eight months earlier. “Just seeing how something so non-baseball-related can just be like — it can be gone in a second. And the stuff it put my wife through, it definitely gave me [a feeling] of, ‘Wow, stuff can change like that.’ It was definitely very scary.”

May is battling for a spot in the Dodgers rotation, but also has over five years of service time and can’t be sent to the minors without his consent. So if he doesn’t start this season on the injured list, he’ll be on the active roster one way or another, whether starting or in relief.

Tony Gonsolin is in a similar situation, coming back from his September 2023 Tommy John surgery, only he’s further along in his rehab by actually appearing in minor league games last September in addition to simulated games during October. He’s 20 days shy of five years of service time and technically could be sent down to the minors, but Gonsolin was last optioned on August 19, 2020.

We’ve talked ad nauseam here about early off days in the Dodgers’ schedule makes a six-man rotation in the early portion of the season unlikely. In their first 36 games on the schedule — through May 6 — the Dodgers have a game on six days in a row only three times.

On Friday at Camelback Ranch, president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman told reporters that the six-man rotation won’t be used in earnest until May, which coincides roughly when Shohei Ohtani could return to the mound.

That means mostly a five-man rotation for the first month-plus of the season, with Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow, and Roki Sasaki already firmly in place. Manager Dave Roberts said Friday that May and Gonsolin would be considered as long relievers if they aren’t in the rotation to open the domestic portion of the regular season, which is still six weeks away.

From Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register:

“Absolutely,” Roberts said. “But I do think that right now, at this point, they’re both building up. They’re both viewing themselves, we’re viewing them, as starters. We’ll see how the rest of the spring plays out, which obviously is a long ways away. That’s really not impacted until Opening Day here, in the States, so we’ve got a lot of time.”