Neck discomfort Mariners starter Kendall Graveman has dealt with caused by benign bone tumor
Given the setbacks he’s endured in his baseball career the past few years, it was tough for Mariners starter Kendall Graveman to discuss what has hindered him, and kept him away from the mound this season with Seattle.
Graveman underwent Tommy John surgery in 2018, and endured a long recovery process for the following year before making a brief return in the Cubs’ minor league system late last summer.
When he signed with the Mariners as a free agent in the offseason, and impressed in both spring training and summer camp, it appeared the injuries that held him back for so long were, at long last, behind him.
But, he was sidelined again earlier this month, and placed on the 10-day injured list with neck spasms, two starts into the comeback he’d been waiting so log for.
Monday, following a start in an intrasquad game at the Mariners’ alternate training site at Cheney Stadium in Tacoma, Graveman opened up more about how distressing this road back has actually been, and continues to be.
The neck discomfort Graveman has been dealing with while pitching for about two years now has been caused by a benign bone tumor in his cervical spine, he said.
“This is just me being honest and open,” he said. “I’m not here to hide anything. That’s what we’re dealing with. That’s what we’re faced with. Just continue to hope that there is relief in the future, and continue to pitch and pitch through it.
“They say it can’t get any worse. It doesn’t grow. It doesn’t spread. Right now medically that’s what I’m dealing with.”
Graveman said the tumor, which is in the C6 vertebrae section of his spine, near the base of the neck, was found last July when he was with Chicago’s organization, but discomfort in the area started in October 2018. He has since been trying to manage it with treatments and nonsteroidal anti-inflammatories.
Following his most recent start against the A’s on Aug. 2, Graveman said his neck “flared up” during his first start against the Astros, and continued to bother him against Oakland.
He has spent much of the past two weeks consulting with doctors about how to proceed, but surgical options to remove the tumor were outlined to him as challenging and risky. There is a possible procedure, he said, which he could look at down the road, but for now he plans to try to compete and work through it.
“Right now, because of where it is, every doctor has said no because it’s so close to the spinal cord,” Graveman said. “You’re dealing with 5 millimeters of space right there of where it is, between the spinal cord and the vertebral artery, and the vertebral artery sends oxygen to your brain, and the spinal cord is obviously all of your nerves, so that’s modern medicine. That’s what we’re presented with.
“It’s a sticky situation, but I believe that I will be healed and I believe that at the end of the day I’ll be better because of this.”
Graveman sees it is a blessing that the tumor is benign, but the reality of trying to manage the discomfort he feels when pitching, and learning there is no easy solution for removal, has still been difficult to accept.
When asked if this, on top of everything else he’s been through has tested his resolve, he paused, fighting back tears, and lowered his head.
“It has,” he said. “At the end of the day, I have faith that this happened to me for a reason to help me become a better person. Man, it’s tough. I just have to be joyful through it, joyful through the storm, that’s what I’m called to do. Obviously it hurts. It hurts me emotionally that just when you saw some good things on the horizon and I was throwing the ball well, that this is something that I deal with.
“I’ll be tough at the end of the day, and when this is resolved, I promise good things will come from it. I don’t know what they’ll be. I don’t even know if they’ll be in baseball. But, the person that it’s grown me into off the field is something special.
“It’s hard to put into words, but with my faith and believing that there is work going on inside of me, I’ll continue to be a great teammate, show up every day and do what I can to be as joyful as I can. At the end of the day that produces endurance to run this race that is life, and impact people that are around me.”
Graveman said it’s difficult to explain the discomfort he feels when pitching — it doesn’t feel like muscle pain or nerve pain, he said. He has been able to pitch through it, and has been told by doctors pitching won’t cause further damage.
In the past two years, he said he has been able somewhat manage it with medicine and treatment, but, “It’s there,” he said. “It’s every day.”
After two weeks away from the mound seeking answers, Graveman threw 54 pitches in Monday’s intrasquad start. He gave up five runs, including three solo homers in 3 2/3, but while he felt his location was shaky after missing time, but his stuff and velocity were there, and he felt “as good as possible” considering.
With a return to the Mariners rotation in mind the final two months of this season, he continues to treat the discomfort as much as he can.
“This whole thing has been trial and error,” he said. “We’ve tried pretty much every soft tissue work there is, and everything we can do, and it’s just embedded into my bone, so there’s really no treatment. That’s why this is a unique situation.
“I’m down here rehabbing and trying to get back because I missed some time, but nothing has changed. Nothing structurally has changed.”
Graveman plans to continue plugging along and moving forward, knowing there isn’t much he can do from a maintenance perspective.
“When you’re out competing you’re using every ounce of energy you have,” he said. “As a competitor, you’re doing that. And then with discomfort you just continue to pitch through it and be as good as you can.
“At the end of the day that’s where I’ve got to be and hopefully guys can look at me and see that, ‘Hey, it’s not an ideal situation, but he carries himself at the ball field the way he’s supposed to,’ and I think that’s the biggest impact I can be to everyone I’m around.”
As far as a timetable for his return to Seattle, Graveman said he will take it day by day, and is looking at another start in Tacoma likely at the end of the week if he remains on the Mariners’ six-day schedule. He plans to add about 15-20 pitches his next time out.
Mariners manager Scott Servais said in his pregame video call with reporters Monday he is excited to have Graveman back when he does make his return to Seattle.
“Certainly understand he’s trying to kind of grind through it,” Servais said. “It says a lot about the person he is and how much he loves pitching to go through what he’s going through right now. I know he’s looked at a ton of different options on how to kind of put this behind him, but obviously it’s in a very sensitive area, and it’s really his call.
“Fortunately I don’t think it’s going to get a lot worse, it’s just something whether he can deal with it or not. We certainly miss him around our club, and his ability to get people out is really huge for us, but again, want to be patient with that one, see how it came out, how he’s feeling tomorrow and then we’ll take it from there.”
This story was originally published August 17, 2020 at 6:17 PM.
