A year that will live in infamy for so many, 2020, has turned darker for a top Tigers pitching prospect.
Alex Faedo now must endure the year-plus recovery that follows Tommy John ligament reconstruction. A first-round draft pick by the Tigers in 2017, Faedo, 25, will have surgery this month on his right (throwing) elbow and is certain to miss all of the 2021 season.
Faedo already had dealt with a personal bout of COVID-19, the scourge that has ravaged a world-at-large, as well as a pandemic that canceled the 2020 minor-league baseball season. His 2020 dress-rehearsal, which likely was to involve work at Triple-A Toledo, was set to build endurance and polish his repertoire for a long-expected debut at Comerica Park.