The Orange County Register speaks to experts including Joshua S. Dines, MD, sports medicine surgeon at HSS about Los Angeles Angels superstar Shohei Ohtani’s recent UCL tear. 

“If it was just a repair, the typical timeline would be six or eight months for a pitcher, and that would be during the 2024 season,” said Dr. Dines. “The fact that they’re saying the 2025 season is sort of a 16- or 18-month recovery, and that speaks more to a full Tommy John reconstruction using a graft from somewhere to make a new ligament, even if you’re repairing whatever native ligament he had.”

One particular phrase in the statement suggested that Ohtani didn’t have a mere repair, though.

“When you say that you’ve reinforced it with viable tissue, almost everybody would agree that that is not just suture or an internal brace,” Dr. Dines said. “That would be tissue, meaning a graft from somewhere else.”

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