Pavano's history of injuries and his present of reliability

Our Tuesday print edition didn't have enough room for all of the McClatchy News Service piece on Carl Pavano. So here's the rest of the piece by John Shipley of the Pioneer Press:

Pavano has missed time because of injuries dating to his days as a minor league prospect in the Boston organization, when he was diagnosed with tendinitis in his elbow and shoulder. In 2000, his first full major league season (with Montreal), he had the first of three elbow surgeries. But it wasn’t until he signed a four-year, $40 million deal with the New York Yankees after the 2004 season that his injury problems overwhelmed his career.
In four seasons, he made only 14 starts for the Yankees because of a variety of ailments that included broken ribs suffered in a car accident and a concussion caused by a line drive to the head. He had rotator cuff problems and had two elbow surgeries, the second one a Tommy John procedure.
After four years as a New York media punch line, Pavano was eager to prove he could again pitch the way he did in 2003-04, when he was a combined 30-21 with a 3.61 ERA in two seasons with Florida, helping the Marlins win the World Series in 2003.
And it wasn’t just a matter of reputation, he said.
“It wasn’t just a question mark for New York and the organization, it was a question mark for me — because it was a reality and it was a fact,” he said. “I got injured a lot, which kept me off the field, which kept me from doing my job, which was making starts every five days and filling up innings.
“That kind of defines a starting pitcher, the ability to make your starts and fill out innings.”
Since signing a one-year, $1.5 million deal with Cleveland before the 2009 season, Pavano has been one of the major league’s most reliable starters, pitching 613 1/3 innings and making 94 starts. He enters tonight’s game with 193.0 innings pitched in 2011, within one good outing of reaching one of his season goals of 200 innings.
“You’ve got to understand, when your starters are going deep into games, and your bullpen’s rested, it’s a domino effect,” manager Ron Gardenhire said. “The starter’s out there, and there’s less maneuvering going on because he has got the ball and he’s going deep into the game.
“As our starters kind of scuffled, that’s when our bullpen started getting beat up, too. It was a domino.”
Only three times this season has Pavano failed to get out of the fifth inning, and only once since the end of April, though that hasn’t always spelled victory. All pitchers rely on defense, Gardenhire pointed out, but few rely on it more than Pavano, a groundball pitcher who throws strikes.
Pavano acknowledges that has, at times, frustrated him, but no more so than his own failings. A 13-year starter with a remarkable memory for past at-bats, he confessed to not entirely understanding why he has often been ineffective this season.
Hence the damaged property in the dugout. Gardenhire said he doesn’t mind a player showing emotion — “it shows he cares” — but the outbursts earned Pavano a lecture from his fiancee, Alissa. Still, Pavano said, they did the trick.
“There’s obviously more mature ways to respond to it,” he said, “but the way I did it felt really good at the time.”