UPDATE: Junichi Tazawa visits with Dr. James Andrews

UPDATE: Tazawa tells Scott Lauber of the Boston Herald that there appears to be ligament damage in his elbow. He’s not sure about surgery, according to Lauber, but it “will be part of the discussion.” Doesn’t sound too promising.

Monday, 7:14 pm: Uh-oh. The Red Sox announced on Monday that Junichi Tazawa was in Birmingham, Ala. to have his right elbow examined by famed orthopedic surgeon Dr. James Andrews. As Red Sox pitching coach John Farrell told Rob Bradford of WEEI.com, the elbow bothered Tazawa during the second half of the 2009 season:

“He’s been dealing with some discomfort, some tightness, in the second half of last year,” Farrell explained. “He went through a normal offseason, didn’t have any issues, came into spring training, went through every outlined throwing session that we had and there were varying degrees of tightness or discomfort at different points this spring. And then in games his velocity was not quite where it was in the past and his breaking stuff was not as sharp. And even in his last bullpen he felt there was a little bit of tightness. I wouldn’t say it was further, or getting worse, but precautionary we wanted to send him to see Andrews and get that evaluation.”

Tazawa, 23, was 2-3 with a 7.46 ERA, 2.05 WHIP and 13/9 K/BB ratio in 25 1/3 innings with the Red Sox last season. We aren’t going to look too much into those numbers, though, as the young right-hander was 9-5 with a 2.55 ERA and 1.04 WHIP in 20 starts between Double-A Portland and Triple-A Pawtucket last season, showing plenty of promise and elite command. Hopefully this is just a mere bump in the road for him.