Justin Hollander met with the media today to provide an update on Colt Emerson, the Mariners’ young shortstop. Shortly after Emerson, who was hitting .190 at the time, was re-assigned to Triple-A, it was announced he’d instead go on the IL with a wrist injury that had been nagging at him in Tacoma but dated back to spring training. Emerson will have surgery on that wrist, performed by Dr. Donald Sheridan, an orthopedic hand and wrist surgeon, this Wednesday, ending his 2026 season.
The surgery will
move a tendon in Emerson’s wrist which has slipped out of place back to where it belongs, an injury known as a subluxation in the wrist. Warning: Gory Medical Details ahead. Skip to the next paragraph if this makes you squeamish. Most commonly in a wrist subluxation, the extensor carpi ulnaris (ECU) tendon, which runs along the outside of the pinky side of the hand, slips out of alignment – the “groove” on the bone it’s located in. The most common symptom is a “popping” or “clicking” sound during movement, and in acute cases, swelling and inflammation. Since the ECU tendon is fundamental in actions like gripping and twisting, a severe injury clearly poses a problem for a professional baseball player.
It’s a fairly common injury, and one that is often managed without surgery – J.P. Crawford has been dealing with a similar injury – depending on where the tendon is and what it’s resting on. The soreness first popped up this spring in Arizona, and Emerson saw Dr. Sheridan at that time, whose diagnosis was that Emerson could elect to have surgery, but that he didn’t have to have the surgery if he didn’t want to. With a wide-open road to playing time with the incumbent shortstop Crawford dealing with a shoulder injury, and feeling like he could manage the occasional soreness, Emerson elected to continue to play.
“Different guys have different pain thresholds,” said Hollander. “My belief is that Colt Emerson has a really high one, and he played to the point until he felt like it has crossed the threshold of being smart for him to continue.” Hollander also says there are “no concerns” with Emerson being ready for next year.
It’s hard to remember given how badly he slumped down the stretch, but Emerson got off to a strong start initially, hitting for average and power in May and June, with seven homers and five doubles. However, as his time in the big leagues wore on, pitchers found they could get Emerson to expand up out of the strikezone and chase the high fastball; by the time he was sent down in August he was striking out over 40% of the time.
It could be argued that a sore wrist was causing Emerson to be late on the fastball. His bat speed on Statcast is listed at 72 mph, which is about average, whereas his prospect numbers had him more around 75, classified as “fast” by Statcast. However, the sore wrist was likely a minor contributing factor in the biggest issue facing Emerson: his swing decisions. Never a free swinger in the minors, in the big leagues Emerson chased more than he ever had as a prospect, swinging 60% of the time in the Shadow zone (compared to MLB average 54%) and 34% of the time in the Chase zone (compared to MLB average 26%). He showed swing and miss vulnerabilities on all pitches, not just fastballs, whiffing 38% of the time on curveballs and 40% of the time on sliders.
As tough as Emerson’s season was offensively, he also scuffled at times defensively, which could be related to the deteriorating pain in his wrist, especially as the ECU tendon plays such a role in gripping and twisting. Emerson was assessed eight errors at shortstop, six of them throwing errors.
The good news about all of this is there’s nowhere to go but up for Seattle’s young infielder, inked to an eight-year contract extension this year. Hopefully he’ll follow in the footsteps of another young infielder for Seattle, Cole Young, who struggled in his debut but applied himself with specific energy this off-season and has been reaping the rewards of the off-season work he put in on both sides of the ball all season long. In a season that’s not been very lucky for Emerson nor the Mariners, he’s fortunate to have a role model to follow right in his own clubhouse.
One final note: As mentioned above, this is a similar injury to the one J.P. Crawford has been dealing with this season. Crawford, who has been rehabbing with Triple-A Tacoma, is with the team today and will probably be activated tomorrow depending on clearing pregame activities without incident, although Hollander called it “likely” he’d be activated.
