Josh Beckett Fears Numbness In Pitching Hand May End Career
BOSTON (CBS) - Numbness in his pitching hand has Josh Beckett worried he may never pitch again.
The 33-year-old Beckett, who was shipped out of Boston to Los Angeles in last August's blockbuster trade, has been dealing with the numbness for over a month now. He underwent a 90-minute MRI on the hand, and the results will be reviewed early next week by a nerve specialist in Dallas.
Until that meeting, Beckett isn't sure if he'll ever take the mound again.
"Any time something like that happens to your arm or you start losing feeling and stuff … you think about it for sure," Beckett told the LA Times on Thursday night. "I don't really want to think like that right now. I want to think about figuring out a way to deal with this."
Already on the disabled list since May 15 with a groin injury, Beckett said the numbness worsened as he tried to work his way back.
"I've never dealt with anything like this for this amount of time. We'll just have to see what happens there," said Beckett.
Beckett was 0-5 with a 5.91 ERA for the Dodgers this season. He is a career 132-100 with an ERA of 3.94 over his 14-year career, with two World Series championships to his name.
Beckett helped lead the Red Sox to a championship in 2007, going 5-0 with a 1.20 ERA in the playoffs, but will be remembered for the way his time in Boston ended. After the team's 2011 September collapse and the "chicken and beer" talk that followed, Beckett put up a lackluster season and was sent to the Dodgers along with first baseman Adrian Gonzalez and outfielder Carl Crawford in a blockbuster trade that cleared the books for Boston.
He is currently signed through the 2014 season.
In his seven years in Boston, Beckett went 89-58 with a 4.17 ERA.
