An MRI on Blake Snell’s left shoulder showed no structural damage, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts told reporters on Friday night at Dodger Stadium.

This comes after Snell’s bullpen session Wednesday at Wrigley Field was scrapped when he felt discomfort in his left shoulder.

The left-hander was placed on the injured list on April 9 with shoulder inflammation. There is no timetable yet for his return.

From Beth Harris of Associated Press:

The results of Thursday’s MRI were a cause for optimism, Roberts said.

“At some point I think he’ll get an injection to calm it down, and then we’ll figure out when we pick up the throwing program,” Roberts said. “But I think for us, we feel given the findings of the MRI that we dodged a bullet.”

Links

Prior to Friday’s start, Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s best pitch caught the eye of David Adler at MLB.com: “Yamamoto’s splitter is the most valuable splitter in the Majors so far. It’s proven all but impossible to do damage against.”

Mario Delgado Genzor at Baseball Prospectus dove into the myriad problems Bobby Miller has dealt with in the last year-plus, including his approach to right-handed batters:

In essence, Miller has been tossing his fastball against righties the way you would if you were trying to throw a slider off of it, but without a slider to actually pair alongside the heater(s) and relying too heavily on his curve instead. This throws off the tunneling game—I think hitters have been able to identify, isolate, and damage both the fastball and curve as a result, and it’s a big part of why he’s had so many issues with righties, as well as a consistently unremarkable strikeout rate.

Not only were the bonus pools for the MLB Draft unveiled this week, but also the bonus pools for the 2026 international signing period as well. Ben Badler at Baseball America has the latter, including the Dodgers at $6,679,200.

Also at Baseball America, Josh Norris wrote about Sean Linan, who has 40 strikeouts against only four walks in his first four games for Low-A Rancho Cucamonga this season. Norris had this quote from Dodgers director of pitching Rob Hill about Linan’s changeup:

“It’s kind of like a Devin Williams-style (changeup), like a screwball, almost, the way he releases it. So it’s just a super unique offering, and, because of how high the spin is, it’s almost impossible to tell that it’s anything other than a fastball. And that’s why I assume people swing at it so much.”