Tony Cingrani Reluctantly Goes On Disabled List

Tony Cingrani is a fierce competitor and a straight shooter.

When Bryan Price removed him from the game after four innings, Cingrani was not in full agreement.  He was even less inclined to go on the disabled list with tendinitis in his left shoulder.

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“I’m fine right now. Just a little tendinitis. I could keep throwing but it’s their call," Cingrani said. “Obviously, with pitching, you deal with a lot of arm injuries – not injuries, but things. I don’t know what they’re called – different things.”

Cingrani made a couple starts with an aching back last season.  The Reds wanted to impress upon the young lefthander the importance of reporting pain.  It is just not in Cingrani's nature to back off

“I don’t know why they do a lot of things. I don’t agree with it, but if that’s what they want to do, because they don’t want me to injury myself, so I understand. I think I could throw just fine, but they’re exercising caution”

The media had its suspicions last night when a postgame meeting went longer than usual and Price met with them in a hallway rather than his office which was inhabited by Walt Jocketty and others from the front office along with trainer Paul Lessard.

Cingrani had back spasms last season and stubbornly pitched through them.  He was asked on Wednesday after he left the game against the Cubs early about his back.

"It is fine," Cingrani said at the time. “You guys can see what’s going on.”

Given a choice, would he still be out there?

“I would’ve kept going the last game.”

Price suspected that Cingrani had discomfort.

“As we kind of investigated, my concern toward the end of his outing yesterday was his velocity was kind of dropping down. He hasn’t been real acute with his command, either," Price said. "His delivery’s kind of wavered a little bit. Upon further investigation, we realized that he was having a little bit of discomfort in his left shoulder – mild left shoulder tendinitis. It doesn’t seem like it’s going to be a big issue, but with multiple days off coming up, we can really avoid him until about the middle of the month. That’s what we plan to do. We put him on the DL. We just want to get his shoulder strong, get any of the soreness out of there, and he should be ready to go by the middle of the month.”

The Reds have three off days in the next 15.  Four starters could cover the 12 games during Cingrani's absence.