Joe Musgrove hopes he’s finally on the way back from the reconstructive elbow surgery he underwent nearly 21 months ago.
The right-hander recently met with Times of San Diego in the Padres clubhouse at Petco Park to explain for the first time how extensive his surgery had been. It went well beyond traditional Tommy John ligament replacement.
“I had a flexor, I had bone spurs, I had a microfracture, I had Tommy John. So, they did a lot of work in there,” Musgrove said. “It changed the structure of the elbow itself. The way I used to move and throw created new pain where it didn’t before. So, it was a lot of trauma, and a lot of stuff was done outside of just fixing the ligament and getting out of there.”
This all helps explain the starts and stops Musgrove’s been experiencing since his recovery journey began on the mound this past spring. He had the surgery on Oct. 11, 2024. The usual recovery from Tommy John surgery is 12 to 18 months. But Musgrove obviously didn’t have the usual surgery to a ligament which is the size of a thread and has the texture of a rubber band.
There was a lot of other damage in there.
“I mean, we’ve tried everything under the sun,” Musgrove said. “But it’s not the usual type of injury I’m familiar with that just responds well to rest and rehab. I’ve been very lost. We’ve done nine weeks of rest and no throwing. I’ve done injections, cortisone shots, stem cells. We’ve tapped into every resource we have and talked to a lot of people who have been through it before, and we’ve tried some new theories that are pretty new to the PT [phjysical therapy] world.
“For the better part of it I wasn’t getting any better. Every day I’d come in feeling the same. It was frustrating because I was putting a lot of hours in, following different routines and special diets. I just wasn’t getting any results from it. All I could do at that point was just trust the process and continue to look for different avenues.”
Eventually the clouds cleared. Musgrove began to at least soft toss from 90 feet without pain. The next step is getting back on a mound for the first time since early March.
Joe Musgrove throwing before today’s game against the Dodgers. pic.twitter.com/PdcEnycOw4
— 97.3 The Fan (@973TheFanSD) June 27, 2026“I feel good about where I am at now and I’m just grateful to have some days of pain-free time,” he said.
Musgrove made his first start of spring training on March 4 in an exhibition game against Team Great Britain, which was preparing for the World Baseball Classic.
He worked into the third inning, threw 60 pitches and reached 95 miles per hour. A few days later during a routine bullpen session he felt some pain and the Padres shut him down. It’s been four months since then and there’s no timeline yet for Musgrove’s return to game action. The next step is back to the mound for bullpen sessions.
“This is my second or third time trying to get ramped up,” Musgrove said. ““I know throughout my rehab, it was a lot of, I don’t want to say lying to myself, but I was telling myself I felt a lot better than I did.
“This time it feels noticeably different. Once we get through the phase of buildup and throwing, I don’t know how many bullpens they’re going to want to see or how many I’m going to need before some [minor league] rehab games. That’s up to me. But I see getting back on the mound relatively soon. And I expect to be pitching again this season. I really do.”
I expect to be pitching again this season. I really do
Joe MusgroveThat’s good news for the veteran starter, if not necessarily for the Padres, who are in an immediate starting pitching crisis as they open a four-game series Thursday night against the first-place Dodgers at Dodger Stadium. The Padres are now 12 games behind the Dodgers in the National League West and two games out of the third and final NL Wild Card spot.
This, after the Cubs swept a three-game series at Wrigley Field outscoring them 35-12, including 23-3 on Wednesday, the worst loss in San Diego’s 56-year history. In that one, Walker Buehler, previously one of their most reliable starters, was racked for nine runs on seven hits and three homers during the first four innings.
The starting rotation’s ERA is 26th in the majors at 4.75 and it has won just five times in 27 games since June 1. Couple that with a league worst .224 batting average and .672 OPS, and the Padres are looking at a season on the brink.
There’s no pitching help coming. Along with Musgrove, Nick Pivetta, Matt Waldron, German Marquez and recently signed Lucas Giolito are all in different phases of recovery.
It’s tough for Musgrove to watch, but right now there’s nothing he can do about it. He can only slowly follow his own progression.
“That’s the nature of the business when you’re a pitcher, especially with the way pitching is going, one guy after another is going down,” Musgrove said about the spate of injuries in the big leagues. “With the addition of sweepers now and splitters, these grips are somewhat different to the arm.
”So, I don’t know that you can ever prevent it or stop it. You can do everything right and something still happens to you. It’s one of those things.”
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