Angels & # 39; Ohtani will undergo a patella surgery, misses the rest of the year

ANAHEIM, Calif. (AP) – Shohei Ohtani ends his second season of Major League early in order to make sure he is ready to resume his career in both directions by 2020.

The Los Angeles Angels' slugger and pitcher will miss the rest of the season for surgery on the left knee, the team said on Thursday. Los Angeles (67-80) was eliminated from the playoff fight with 15 games to play.

Ohtani will be operated on Friday on his bipartite kneecap, or a two-part kneecap that did not fuse at birth. The disease is rare, congenital and generally safe.

But Ohtani began to experience occasional patella pain in February when he returned early after Tommy John's operation. According to general manager Billy Eppler, the discomfort has increased when he started to launch in the mid-80s recently in his rehab work.

"It started to cause a bit of apprehension to Shohei as he was increasing the intensity of his mound progression," Eppler said. "It annoyed him a bit, so we made the decision not to let him continue the progression of the mound and to make sure that this bipartisan situation is resolved now."

Ohtani will put his throwing program on hold during his recovery from surgery, but he should have completed the Tommy John re-entry phase by December, said Eppler. The Angels will wait later to develop a plan for Ohtani at the spring training in February, while he hopes to become a two-way player again.

Ohtani beat .286 with 18 homers and 62 RBIs in 106 games this season as a designated Angels hitter. The AL 2018 rookie was a constant presence in the midst of training the Angels while he was simultaneously going through a year of elbow rehabilitation.

Ohtani had never reported bipartite patella pain to the Angels or his Japanese teams before this season, Eppler said.

Ohtani and the angels thought to wait for the operation until his complete progression after the operation of the elbow surgery was over. But Ohtani decided Wednesday morning to have the end-of-season operation, and the slugger gave up the mark later in the day, in his last game of the year.

"We felt that it was better to do it now, because it caused some reluctance or some apprehension, whatever the word you want to use, in the progression of his mound, and we wanted to increase the 39 "intensity," said Eppler. "If we pushed harder and it compromised something in its delivery, it could lead to unforeseen problems."

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