Matt LaPorta Undergoes Surgery: Is His Indians Career Over?

News broke on Friday that Cleveland Indians first baseman Matt LaPorta had undergone arthroscopic surgery on his left hip on Wednesday. It’s the second time he’s needed such an operation, with his first coming almost exactly three years earlier. Recovery and rehab are expected to take three or four months.

Eric P. Mull-US PRESSWIRE

Assuming LaPorta does not experience any setbacks he should be ready to play by mid-February,meaning he’d be healthy in time for the start of spring training. But given the situation LaPorta is in, one has to wonder if this surgery will signal the end of his tenure with the Tribe.

LaPorta has been something of a disappointment since coming to the Indians as the centerpiece of the CC Sabathia trade in 2008. After showing some impressive raw power as a rookie in 2009 (.188 ISO), he lost some of his pop in 2010. His plate discipline abandoned him in 2011 and he lost his starting job at the end of the season. And his struggles were only exacerbated in 2012, as he hit just .241/.267/.328 in 22 games across two cups of coffee with the big-league team.

That LaPorta barely got a chance to prove himself in the majors despite tearing the cover off the ball in Triple-A doesn’t speak well for his future opportunities in Cleveland—some of that was because of Manny Acta, but if giving him the chance to redeem himself was a priority for the front office they would have kept LaPorta on the active roster longer and probably wouldn’t have traded for Lars Anderson.

LaPorta’s time in Cleveland already looked like it might be coming to a close. He’s out of options so he can’t just be reassigned to Triple-A Columbus if he doesn’t break camp with the Indians in March, and he’ll be arbitration-eligible for the first time this winter so he’ll earn more than the $400,000 MLB minimum wage if he’s tendered a contract. A guaranteed 25-man roster spot and the potential for a seven-figure salary might be more than the Tribe would be willing to commit to him.

Given his struggles at the plate and the front office’s apparent lack of faith in him, 70 percent of respondents in our survey this month said they expect LaPorta to be suiting up for one of the other 29 teams next year. Now it seems even more unlikely. On top of all the preexisting uncertainty surrounding him, LaPorta will be coming off a serious procedure (four months sounds a lot more ominous than a trip to the 15-day DL) that he’d already had once before. A player who already might not be good enough to make the team will have devoted the offseason to recovering from an injury—not exactly a confidence-inspiring story.

I know I’m in the minority on this, but I still believe LaPorta has a chance to be a useful MLB player and perhaps even a middle-of-the-order hitter. But this news makes the already-risky proposition of tendering LaPorta a contract even dicier. His only chance of sticking around in Cleveland was to make the team more confident in him, so after this surgery it’s hard to imagine the Indians will keep him around for 2013.