Holland Optimistic About June Return To Rangers
ARLINGTON (105.3 THE FAN) -- While rumors continue to swirl about the true cause of Derek Holland's recent knee injury, the left-hander is focused on one thing -- returning to the Rangers rotation.
Though General Manager Jon Daniels wouldn't commit to a timeline for Holland's return, the Rangers are looking at a midseason return for planning purposes, according to Daniels.
Holland has a slightly more optimistic outlook for the 2014 season.
"Me personally -- this is just my opinion -- I don't feel like I'm going to be back anywhere later than the All-Star break," said Holland with Ben & Skin on 105.3 The Fan on Monday. "I think I'll be before that. I'm going to go on a limb and my goal is to hopefully — and you know I want to make sure I'm fully recovered, there's no rush for this -- my goal is to be back by June or sooner."
While Holland admits that this is his first surgery and doesn't really know what to expect, he is very clear on one aspect of the surgery.
"Nothing is torn," said Holland, "it's just a bunch of cartilage that has been pretty much grazed off, I guess is what you can say. That's all they did was basically repair that. That's why the healing takes so long is you got to get the cartilage to build back up, but nothing is torn."
According to Holland, the injury occurred last Tuesday morning at home while "clowning off" with his dog, a boxer named "Wrigley".
"As I was going up the stairs to get away from him trying to hide, he decided to be pretty sneaky and caught up to me and clipped me as I was up the stairs. I fell down a little bit of them. It could have been really bad, I could have fell all the way down and probably crack my head open. I caught myself. My knee had buckled really bad. I didn't think it was really that bad until I got up I was pretty sore and noticed that me knee had swollen up pretty bad."
Many have speculated that the injury occurred at a recreational hockey league that Holland participated in on Monday night. But Holland calls the league a "non-contact hockey league", saying he completed Monday's game without any issues.
"It kind of makes me laugh a little bit because it's like somebody is trying to find an excuse for me," said Holland. "I'm telling what it is. It's just not good enough, so [people] want to find something else."
As for the dog?
"He's had his little intervention. He's calmed down. He sits in his corner at night because we have to put him in time out for a little bit of punishment for every night just because of what he did. But yeah he's very good; he took it well."
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