{"id":749243,"date":"2026-07-11T22:03:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T22:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/749243\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T22:03:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T22:03:15","slug":"orioles-ryan-helsley-avoids-elbow-surgery-keegan-akin-has-surgeon-appointment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/749243\/","title":{"rendered":"Orioles: Ryan Helsley avoids elbow surgery; Keegan Akin has surgeon appointment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Orioles closer Ryan Helsley appears to have avoided the worst-case scenario regarding his right elbow. Helsley has inflammation around his ulnar collateral ligament, but manager Craig Albernaz said he doesn\u2019t have a tear of the ligament and will go through rehab rather than surgery.<\/p>\n

Left-hander Keegan Akin, meanwhile, has a UCL injury that requires an appointment with Dr. Keith Meister on Tuesday. When asked if Akin would have surgery Tuesday, Albernaz said the club will know more after that appointment.<\/p>\n

This is the second time Helsley has been on the injured list this year with an inflammation-related issue in his elbow. The first time<\/a>, he missed almost two months from April to June.<\/p>\n

He wound up heading back to the injured list July 3<\/a>. He pitched in only five games before his season was paused again.<\/p>\n

Albernaz said Helsley, who holds a 4.11 ERA with eight saves, will remain with the team as he rehabs his elbow.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe wants to be out there pitching with us and he understands, when he\u2019s not out there, it\u2019s a whole different look in the bullpen,\u201d Albernaz said. \u201cIt\u2019s just one of those things where he has to get ahead of [it]. You don\u2019t want something really drastic to happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Helsley\u2019s previous elbow inflammation is anything to go by, he may not return until late August. That is a considerable absence for a team hoping to make a charge up the standings. Without Helsley to close games, Baltimore has relied on right-handers Andrew Kittredge and Tyler Wells in big moments.<\/p>\n

Akin\u2019s injury appears to be trending toward a more serious intervention. Akin, who has a 5.68 ERA, is awaiting Meister\u2019s analysis before continuing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Orioles closer Ryan Helsley appears to have avoided the worst-case scenario regarding his right elbow. Helsley has inflammation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":687863,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2374],"tags":[143,39604,47,2538,5,1404,4,12212,23849,125],"class_list":["post-749243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-baltimore-orioles","tag-baltimore","tag-baltimore-city","tag-baltimore-orioles","tag-baltimoreorioles","tag-baseball","tag-camden-yards","tag-mlb","tag-os","tag-opacy","tag-orioles"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116903608582991954","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/749243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=749243"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/749243\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/687863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=749243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=749243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=749243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}