Leiter hits IL with ankle impingement; Rangers recall righty Corniell

ARLINGTON -- Rangers right-hander Jack Leiter is going to the 15-day IL.

Leiter is bothered by a “posterior ankle impingement” in his right ankle, president of baseball operations Chris Young said before Texas’ game against San Diego on Sunday afternoon. It’s something that’s been there “for a little bit of time,” Young said, while adding that the injury was aggravated when Leiter slipped recently on the on-deck circle.

“He's done his best to pitch through it,” Young said. “We've tried different ways to try to calm it down and alleviate it. After his last start, we did another image to see what's going on. It showed that it has gotten worse and the recommendation from the doctors is to give this a break. It's altering his mechanics.”

There is also concern about the kinetic chain, the series of movements that transfers energy from a pitcher's legs through his body and into the baseball. An ankle injury can disrupt that process and affect the rest of his mechanics and cause stress on his arm or shoulder.

Leiter’s performance has suffered in recent starts. He has failed to complete five innings in two of his last three outings and has allowed five or more runs in three straight starts against Cleveland, Boston and Minnesota. Before that stretch, he was coming off a start in which he struck out 10 over 5 2/3 scoreless innings against Kansas City on May 31.

In three June starts, Leiter is 0-3 with 9.88 ERA and only nine strikeouts in 13 2/3 innings.

Leiter is 3-7 overall with a 5.29 ERA in 15 starts this season.

“We cannot put him in harm's way,” Young said. “He's too important to our future. So our hope is that we can shut him down right now, get this looked at, understand what the prognosis is, and then hopefully get him back.”

In Leiter’s place on the roster will be Jose Corniell, a right-handed pitcher recalled from Triple-A Round Rock. Corniell, who turns 23 on Monday, has gone 0-2 with a 6.08 ERA, 10 walks and 19 strikeouts in seven games (six starts) for Round Rock this year. He is ranked as the Rangers' No. 4 prospect by MLB Pipeline.

In two starts in June, the right-hander has allowed just two runs (one earned) over nine innings with no walks and seven strikeouts. He covered a season-high-tying five innings in his most recent appearance June 12 against El Paso.

The Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, native made his Major League debut with Texas on the final day of the regular season last year. Corniell dealt with back and triceps soreness this spring.

Corniell is a candidate to fill Leiter’s next scheduled start on Tuesday in Miami, Young said.

“I’m guessing it's going to be an opener for his start day and then we'll see what happens, who gets the bulk there,” manager Skip Schumaker said. “There's a number of different options that have been brought up on the table.”

Young said Leiter had been dealing with the injury for a while.

“He was trying to do whatever he could to make his start,” said Schumaker. “Jack is a really tough kid and the fact that he was trying to make every start dealing with his push-off leg not being really good might have started to impact other things.

“As much as I want him out there, I think we have to make sure that he's OK. He's part of the future of our team and our franchise and I think he's going to be pitching here a long time.”

Seager update
Corey Seager, on the seven-day IL with a concussion, took infield pregame on Sunday. His return date is still unknown.

“We've got to make sure he's 100%,” Young said. “There are multiple tests he has to pass as spelled out by a very specific concussion protocol, and with that we've got to just make sure that he's back to normal before we get him back out on the field. But my understanding [is that] today was a good day and we're making progress.”

Seager sustained the injury in a collision at home plate with Royals catcher Carter Jensen on June 11.