Grade 2 Groin Strain Sets Luis Severino Back a Month

Severino suffered the injury during a Tommy John rehab assignment at High-A Hudson Valley.

Danielle Parhizkaran/NorthJersey.com

The Yankees have some clarity on Luis Severino’s delayed timetable.

Aaron Boone announced Tuesday that the right-hander suffered a Grade 2 groin strain. Severino sustained the injury Saturday while he was pitching for High-A Hudson Valley as part of a Tommy John rehab assignment. He lasted 1.2 innings in what was his second rehab start before clutching his groin after his 34th and final pitch. Severino needed help coming off the field.

While the Yankees are certainly glad there are no issues with Severino’s elbow, the groin strain will postpone his big-league return by about a month. Boone had talked about having the 27-year-old flamethrower back by the end of June. Instead, some time around the trade deadline or early August is the new goal.

“We were hoping to get him back by the end of this month,” Boone said. “That’ll obviously be on hold, as he has to get that right over the next couple of weeks.”

Severino, who has not thrown a major league pitch since the 2019 postseason, is currently in New York, where he is doing treadmill activities. He will try to get some light throwing in this week in an effort to keep his arm active.

Despite the setback, Boone does not believe Severino sustained the groin injury due to something he did wrong or mechanical issues. Quite the contrary. The manager is rather pleased with how Severino has handled his grueling Tommy John recovery up to this point.

“I think it’s a little bit of just one of those things that can happen from time to time,” Boone said. “There’s nothing to my knowledge to this point that we’ve identified that mechanically he was out of whack.

“One of the good things about Sevy’s rehab process over the last year and a half is he really is in tremendous shape and has gotten his body as strong and as efficient as he’s probably ever been. So at this point it seems like it was a little bit of just a freak thing that can happen in the heat of competition.”

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