Dodger Bullpen Even Thinner

The Dodgers lost setup man Yhency Brazoban for this season and perhaps next season Friday, after an examination revealed he had torn a ligament in his pitching elbow.

Brazoban will undergo reconstructive elbow surgery -- better known as Tommy John surgery -- on Tuesday.

The Dodgers played host to Barry Bonds and the San Francisco Giants late Friday, so late that the game was delayed 1 hour 57 minutes by rain. The score was 1-1 after eight innings when this edition went to press. Randy Winn homered for the Giants, and Jeff Kent homered for the Dodgers

If Brazoban’s situation wasn’t bad enough, Brad Penny, perhaps the Dodgers’ top starter, left Friday’s game after six innings because of a bruise on his pitching arm.

In the third inning, Steve Finley’s drive nailed Penny above the right elbow. Penny scrambled to retrieve the ball, threw out Finley and remained in the game.

The bruise apparently got worse as the evening went on, and Penny left after making 78 pitches. The Dodgers listed his condition as day to day.

With closer Eric Gagne preceding Brazoban into the operating room this month, the Dodger bullpen now consists of Danys Baez, Lance Carter and four guys with a total of zero major league victories and zero major league saves.

That is a bullpen fit for a rebuilding year. This is not a rebuilding year for the Dodgers.

“It’s not going to be an easy hole to patch,” General Manager Ned Colletti said. “You’re always looking to improve the club, but can we go find two or three veteran relief pitchers to pitch the seventh and eighth inning? I don’t know that I can make a couple phone calls and find the answer to that question.”

The Dodgers hope Gagne can return by June 1, and hard-throwing prospect Jonathan Broxton has eight strikeouts in four innings at triple-A Las Vegas. Manager Grady Little said the Dodgers have no plans “at this moment” to add another reliever.

So, for now, they’ll stick with Franquelis Osoria, Tim Hamulack, Hong-Chih Kuo and Takashi Saito, none of whom pitched in the majors before last June.

“Any time you lose a player you’re counting on, it’s a setback,” Little said. “To what degree, only time will tell.”

Brazoban, 25, said he felt elbow pain on a pitch to Pittsburgh’s Jeromy Burnitz on Wednesday. He said he knew immediately that “something was wrong,” but he made two more pitches to complete the inning. The diagnosis came two days later.

“That was the worst news,” he said through an interpreter, “but I have to accept it and go through with it. It’s difficult to accept, because I’ve never had surgery before.”

Brazoban, who earned 21 saves in Gagne’s absence last season, said he had long recovered from the arm soreness that sidelined him in spring training. Little said he was clocked at 96 mph Tuesday.

Trainer Stan Johnston said Brazoban tore the ligament so severely that he pulled off a piece of the bone attached to the ligament, a rarity that Johnston said would not cause complications for the surgery or rehabilitation.

The typical rehabilitation takes 12 to 18 months.

The injury affords the anonymous cast of setup men the chance to emerge as legitimate major leaguers. Two years ago, Brazoban parlayed a similar opportunity into a role as a trusted member of the Dodger bullpen.

In July 2004, then-General Manager Paul DePodesta included setup man Guillermo Mota in the controversial six-player trade that sent catcher Paul Lo Duca to the Florida Marlins and brought pitcher Brad Penny and first baseman Hee-Seop Choi to Los Angeles.

At that point, Brazoban was half the answer to this trivia question: Name the prospects the Dodgers acquired from the New York Yankees along with Jeff Weaver, in the trade that rid the Dodgers of Kevin Brown. (Brandon Weeden was the other.)

But Brazoban, promoted from the minor leagues the day after the trade, quickly emerged as a reliable setup man for Gagne. Amid the pressure of the Dodgers’ drive to the National League West championship, Brazoban posted a 2.48 earned-run average in 31 appearances. He set Dodger rookie records last season for appearances, with 74, and saves.