McKinney recovering from hip surgery

Arkansas starting pitcher Keaton McKinney delivers against Miami in the first inning of an NCAA College World Series baseball tournament elimination game at TD Ameritrade Park in Omaha, Neb., Monday, June 15, 2015. (AP Photo/Mike Theiler)

— Keaton McKinney is recovering from surgery to repair a tear in his hip that bothered him at the end of Arkansas’ season.

The rising sophomore pitcher tweeted July 15 that the surgery was a success and Arkansas coach Dave Van Horn echoed that assessment Monday.

“The surgery went well,” Van Horn said. “It’s what was bothering him pretty much the second half of the season. He had an issue with some pain in his hip and come to find out, he had a little bit of a tear in there that they had to go in and repair.”

After ending the regular season with seven shutout innings against Georgia to lower his ERA to 2.83, McKinney gave up seven earned runs in 10 2/3 innings for an ERA of 5.91 over his final four starts.

While the injury was well publicized, its severity was unknown until after the College World Series.

McKinney had been set to play for the Falmouth Commodores in the Cape Cod Baseball League in Massachusetts, but he never made the trip north.

“We never sent him to go play summer ball,” Van Horn said. “He was done. He was done in Omaha. He was going to have to have (his hip) fixed.”

Van Horn said McKinney will miss all of fall practice and could miss the start of the season.

“He may be ready when the season starts, but that’s pretty iffy,” Van Horn said.

Despite his struggles down the stretch, McKinney finished the year with a 6-2 record and 3.21 ERA and was named to the SEC All-Freshman Team. He was also named a Freshman All-American by Louisville Slugger.

By the end of the 2015 season, a couple of other Arkansas pitchers were battling injuries, too.

Rising junior Dominic Taccolini, another weekend starter for the Razorbacks, did not pitch in the postseason because of tendonitis. He is recovering from offseason surgery, as well.

“He can’t do a whole lot right now,” Van Horn said. “He probably won’t throw at all this fall. Hopefully he’ll be ready to roll come springtime.”

Unlike McKinney and Taccolini, rising junior James Teague did not need surgery to fix the injury that caused him to miss the College World Series. He had a stress reaction in his throwing elbow.

“His was just more rest than anything,” Van Horn said. “Last I heard, he was ahead of schedule and he’ll probably be able to throw for us some this fall.”