Orioles right-hander Chris Tillman was placed on the 10-day disabled list with a lower back strain Friday, opening up a spot in the team's starting rotation and leaving open the possibility that Tillman could find his form and one day reclaim it.
It became clear after Thursday's game, when Tillman recorded four outs and allowed six runs, that the Orioles were at a crossroads with him. He'd resisted a disabled list stint at times last season, and his $3 million contract this season isn't nearly as prohibitive as the money owed last season.
He even said after Thursday's start that he wasn't dealing with anything physical.
Going on the disabled list might be what kept him in an Orioles uniform, though. When manager Buck Showalter spoke to the media for the game, he indicated that a decision was imminent on Tillman's future. He spoke as if a goodbye was looming between the Orioles and the pitcher that left fielder Trey Mancini said was a face of their renaissance this decade.
"When you have the type of background that we all have with Chris, you pull for all your players, but at some point, whether it's a coach, a manager, a pitcher, a position player, this is ... we know what the job description is," Showalter said. "Nobody knows that better than Chris. It's very frustrating to watch what he's going through on a lot of fronts."
That frustration has stemmed really since Tillman pushed through shoulder pain for the 2016 stretch run, returning to pitch in September and make the team's wild-card game start against the Toronto Blue Jays.
He debuted a month late in 2017 as shoulder soreness shut him down in the spring, but never found the form that allowed the Orioles to rely on him for so long. He's made 31 appearances (26 starts) since, and has an 8.42 ERA in that span.
Showalter on Friday also shot down the idea of Tillman pitching out of the bullpen in the short-term.
"A lot of it is more than just physical, I've found," Showalter said when asked whether he'd seen a fall like this before in his career. "A lot of it is. That's why you see guys leave a place and do real well. That doesn't mean they don't like that place or aren't happy there or didn't like their teammates or coach or manager or trainer. It's just the emotional and mental side of this as much as the physical part of it. I've had players in the past, sometimes, where I've said it's not going to happen here, but it may. In fairness to him, let it happen somewhere else.
"At some point, we're always going to say 'What's best for us,' and be selfish with it. 'Sorry, I know you'd like to go start somewhere else, but we like you here as a reliever. But there will come a time when he'll be able to do that. But I've found with most things like this ... there's other things going on other than just physical sometimes."
