I am not a doctor and neither is Yu Darvish. I wouldn’t pretend to be one and I doubt Darvish would either meaning we can’t take his recent comments as fact or the absolute answer to the Tommy John epidemic sweeping the Major Leagues.

However, at the All-Star break there were 35 pitchers on the Disabled List because of Tommy John surgery which means that whatever teams are trying right now isn’t working. So maybe we should give Darvish’s thoughts some credence.

The Rangers ace opened up to the Japanese media at the All-Star and shared his thoughts on why so many pitchers have been getting hurt.

Sam Onoda of NHK Television shared the transcript with T.R. Sullivan, the Rangers beat writer for MLB.com, and here are some of the more interesting aspects of the conversation:

Q.What is your take on the increase in TJ surgery?

I think there are a lot reasons that are being said and I don’t know the exact reason either but I think it could be the way that we train. The way that we train nowadays is so that we can increase the velocity of our pitches. This is how I tell my training coach, lower body, back, lower back if we concentrate on that area we are able to throw the ball faster, but we are not able to protect the arm and elbow. Since we are throwing the ball faster there is more tension on the ligament, we need to protect that, so (the training) it’s not good. So I think that is the main reason. But people are saying throwing the splitter is not good but I don’t think that puts stress on the elbow. I think the change up has more to do with it as it catches the ring finger. The forkball is different and I think that definitely puts strain on the elbow, the grip of a split finger is shallow and doesn’t differ much than the two seamer.

Q.So you should work on the whole body?

If you’re not going to do it it’s best you don’t do anything. The Japanese aren’t getting injured, in 10 years I only know three or four people that had TJ. There are very few in Japan, over here there is about 10 guys that do TJ in a year, I think that’s due to the way they train. It difficult to train the lower body, you need to balance the training well, and also it’s the number of days between each start I think that’s number one.

Q. Four days rest?

It’s way too short, that’s why they have pitch count limitations but pitch count doesn’t have much to do with it. You could throw 120 pitches 140 pitches and have six days rest and the inflammation on the ligament will all be healed so I think that’ it.

Q.So do you need to adopt to the environment, Strasburg was young but had TJ?

It’s not about adjusting period, I think pitching on 4 days rest is fine, there are a lot more banned substances compared to 10,20 years ago, I’m not saying they were using substances  but now a days you can’t even take cold medicine I think that may be a reason too. I don’t think that Matsuzaka,Tanaka, Wada, Fujikawa had damage to their ligaments in Japan, when they came over here they had medical checks so I don’t think they had any issues, so it developed after they came here. So why? I think it’s the time between starts and heavier ball those kind of things.

Q.Do you think a six man rotation will help?

I think that’s the way to go. But if you do that the salary of each player will go down, but if you wanted to protect the player they should add one more spot to the roster. 5 days, 6 days between each start, if you have a minimum of five days I think it would be a lot more easier.

Q.But four days rest is a norm here so don’t you think it’s hard to change?

There are this many TJs, the top brass should talk about why it is so.

Q.Especially young ones?

It’s such a waste (of talent) The top brass of organizations should protect them, I think by doing so it would profitable so they should talk about it.

Teams have certainly tried plenty of things to prevent injuries to pitchers such as limiting innings and installing pitch counts, but extra rest has not really been considered.

Yes, teams have skipped a guy once through the rotation or pushed him back a day, but no team – as least not that I can recall – has ever continuously given a guy extra rest throughout the bulk of a Major League season.

Although the six-man rotation may work to keep pitchers healthy and may have some merit, there is no way teams will implement it anytime soon.

The name of the game is winning and adding a sixth starter means less starts for a teams ace.

It is hard enough for teams to put together five quality starters to trot out to the mound each day and adding a sixth would likely have a big impact of a lot of teams.

Since adding a sixth man to the rotation seems to be out of the question, maybe it is worth looking at Darvish’s thoughts on the way pitchers train.

Training is one thing that can be tweaked fairly easily – pitchers and teams can simply institute a new offseason program – and it may have a positive impact.

Is there one concrete solution that will prevent any pitcher from needing Tommy John Surgery ever again? No. Of course not.

However, if the surgeries can be limited it is undoubtedly good for the sport and at this point all options are worth considering.