Yankees place Masahiro Tanaka on the disabled list with an inflamed right elbow

The Yankees have officially placed Masahiro Tanaka on the 15-day disabled list with inflammation in his right elbow. He had reportedly complained of irritation in his arm after last night's start against the Indians where he was hit hard and surrendered five runs. No one had any indication that something was wrong, but obviously the Yankee ace hid his discomfort well.

On the house keeping side of things, the move will set the active roster back to 25 after Zoilo Almonte was called up to replace an ailing Brett Gardner. With Tanaka on the DL to finish out the first half, the Yankees will still need to name a starter for Sunday's game. That will likely end up being either Chase Whitley or maybe even David Huff. Either way, the All-Star Break can't come soon enough.

Either way, as longtime commenter Long Time Listener discussed in the lineup thread, this might not be apocalypse for the Yankees:

if everything's fine they'd need a fifth start on the 23rd and Tanaka wouldn't be eligible to come off the DL until the 24th, so they'd have to work the rotation a little, but they can DL him today and lose only one start that they weren't going to lose anyway.

Now if it's more serious than that, Yankees fans might have to get used to the idea of the team not making a big run in 2014 as their entire rotation has been decimated by injuries. We still have some time before we have to deal with that idea as the Yankees team doctor has yet to see the MRI.