Jackson Holliday's injury is already causing Orioles fans to panic

2024 was supposed to be a banner year for Baltimore Orioles top prospect Jackson Holliday. He was considered one of the best prospects in all of baseball coming into the season and after a strong showing in spring training, he impressed the team enough to earn an early-season promotion to MLB. Everything was trending up for him and Orioles fans were thrilled.

Unfortunately, Holliday's season has taken a couple of unfortunate turns since then. After failing to do much at all in the big leagues at the plate, Holliday got sent back to Triple-A to develop more as a hitter. That certainly was not a death knell for his career, as many young guys just need more seasoning before they are ready to face big league pitching.

However, the news that Holliday is hitting the injured list with elbow inflammation is significantly more concerning and has some Orioles fans wondering if there is something more serious going on with the organization's former No. 1 overall pick.

Orioles News: Jackson Holliday placed on the injured list with the dreaded elbow inflammation

The good news here is that the team does seem to think that Holliday's injury is minor and that he doesn't have any ligament damage. Orioles GM Mike Elias indicated that the initial tests on Holliday's arm just showed inflammation and that right now they are just going to give him some rest and let it heal on its own.

However, as the Orioles have found out this year, especially with their pitching staff, anytime an elbow is giving a player problems is cause for concern. While severe elbow injuries aren't overly common amongst position players, they do happen with Bryce Harper being a somewhat recent example here. While it appears unlikely, Holliday isn't in the clear when it comes to avoiding a potentially lengthy downtime if there is something more than just a sore elbow in play here.

Luckily, the initial tests have gone well, and even in the worst-case scenario, position players can generally bounce back from elbow injuries more readily than pitchers as there isn't constant stress on their arms. However, a big part of Holliday's value is that he is a very capable defender, and one hopes that his arm is safe and sound after he takes a couple weeks off so that he can stay that way.

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