Hunter Greene's second Tommy John surgery wipes out two seasons and clouds the Reds' future
The 27-year-old Cincinnati ace underwent a full UCL reconstruction Wednesday, and his 12-to-18-month recovery means he almost certainly won't pitch again until 2028.
In brief
Hunter Greene's second Tommy John surgery wipes out two seasons and clouds the Reds' future
The news everyone in Cincinnati had been dreading arrived Thursday morning. MLB.com confirmed that Hunter Greene underwent a full Tommy John surgery Wednesday to repair the damaged ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow. Manager Terry Francona told reporters that surgeons went with the full reconstruction rather than the less invasive internal brace procedure that had been on the table. The recovery clock: 12 to 18 months. Greene, who turned 27 last week, almost certainly won't throw in a major-league game again until some point in 2028.
This is the second time he has been through it. Greene had his first Tommy John procedure in 2019 while still pitching in the minor leagues, before he had thrown a single big-league pitch. He made his MLB debut in April 2022 and has spent time on the injured list in every season since. The elbow has simply never left him alone.
The 2026 season had already been a write-off before Wednesday's surgery table. Yahoo Sports reported that Greene missed the first three months of the year recovering from arthroscopic surgery in March to remove bone chips and loose bodies from the same elbow. He returned in July and made five starts. They were rough: Bleacher Report noted he allowed at least four earned runs in three of those five outings, finishing with a 6.83 ERA across 27 and two-thirds innings. He told the training staff something still felt wrong. An MRI confirmed it. Greene then flew to Los Angeles to consult with orthopedic surgeon Dr. Neal ElAttrache, according to Yahoo Sports, before the team announced surgery was unavoidable.
The timing stings because of what the two seasons just before this wreckage looked like. From 2024 through 2025, Greene posted a 2.76 ERA over 45 starts, racking up 301 strikeouts in 258 innings. He made the National League All-Star team in 2024 and finished eighth in Cy Young voting. For a stretch, he looked like one of the five or six best starters in the National League. The Reds signed him to a six-year, $53 million extension in 2023, a deal that runs through 2028 with a club option for 2029. That contract, once a bargain, now reads as a painful ledger of innings that may never happen.
For Cincinnati, the organizational math is brutal. As Yahoo Sports pointed out, the richest free-agent deals in Reds franchise history are a pair of four-year, $64 million contracts. This is not a franchise that absorbs roster setbacks by writing a check for a replacement. Cincinnati enters the weekend at 57-62, sitting 5.5 games back of the final NL Wild Card spot. The playoff chase was already a long shot. Without Greene, Chase Burns carries the rotation alone, and the path to October gets narrower by the day.
The broader baseball conversation around second Tommy John surgeries is not encouraging. Yahoo Sports flagged the split outcomes for pitchers who go through the procedure twice: Jacob deGrom came back and dominated; Walker Buehler has not been the same pitcher. Greene's path likely lands somewhere in that range, and nobody can say where until he's actually healthy and throwing again, probably two full years from now.
The Washington Post reported Thursday that Reds president of baseball operations Nick Krall acknowledged the surgery could not be confirmed as a full Tommy John until the doctors were already inside the elbow. 'Both said when you go in there, you're going to find out what it is and then go from there,' Krall told reporters, according to MLB.com. That uncertainty lasted until Wednesday afternoon on the operating table. The answer, unfortunately for Greene and Cincinnati, was the harder one.
Greene was drafted second overall by the Reds in 2017 out of Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, California. Since his MLB debut in 2022, he has spent time on the injured list every single season. A right-hander who touches triple digits with a slider that buckles hitters, he has never had the chance to give Cincinnati a full, uninterrupted year. The next chance, at the earliest, is April 2028.
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CAN I KICK IT? screens New Jack City at the Sylvan Theater, Washington Monument, on Aug. 22. (Courtesy SHAOLIN JAZZ)
The live-cinema series CAN I KICK IT? returns to the National Mall this month with what its producers are calling the "Gangsters on the Mall" chapter of their free outdoor summer run. On Saturday, August 22, the SHAOLIN JAZZ production brings the 1991 crime classic New Jack City to the Sylvan Theater at the Washington Monument for a night of film, music, and community under the DC summer sky.
What sets the event apart is the sound. As the film plays, DJ 2-Tone Jones builds an original score in real time, reimagining one of the most iconic crime movies of the ’90s through hip-hop, soul, funk, and more. It is less a movie screening than a live performance built around the film.
The details:
Film: New Jack City (1991), with a live soundtrack by DJ 2-Tone Jones
When: Saturday, August 22 — seating opens at 7:30 p.m. (bring lawn chairs and blankets); film begins at 8:30 p.m.
Where: Sylvan Theater at the Washington Monument, Independence Ave SW & 15th St NW
A parking note from the organizers: expect road closures and restricted parking east of 14th Street NW due to a separate race event in the District. Roads west of 14th Street NW will be accessible and available for parking.
New Jack City is the second of three screenings in this year’s free CAN I KICK IT? outdoor series, which opened with Black Panther at Skyland Town Center and concludes with Scarface at the Lincoln Memorial on September 5. Produced by the Washington, DC-based multimedia arts company SHAOLIN JAZZ, the series has presented more than 150 live cinematic experiences at venues across the country, from Lincoln Center to SXSW.
"I wanted to be able to tell good stories with substance and remove the ‘ego’ out of the art," said Andrew Huang during a recent interview. Now, he’s building his career at the intersection of discipline, creativity and innovation.
Andrew Huang, founder of New Place Studios. (Courtesy photo)
As a Chinese American, Huang was reared with a deep respect for hard work, consistency and excellence. He describes his childhood as "not so affluent" and later attended college to hone his passion for videography. "In college I tried to do something I loved, which was video, but along the way I knew that I had to find a job. And so I thought, ‘what was the low hanging fruit to get to that stable 9 to 5 job?,’" he stated.
Later in life, Huang found himself working for corporations where his creativity was often limited, eventually leading to burnout. "I worked in a corporation for a long time and there were a lot of missing pieces. I wanted to fill in gaps missing in corporate video production," said Huang.
He later described how his upbringing and a mindset of "survival" led him toward a corporate career. However, his desire for balance and authentic storytelling ultimately pushed him to take the entrepreneurial leap.
"I founded a new place where you can create video and film with ‘substance and style,’" said Huang. His desire for work-life balance and passion for storytelling naturally evolved into a small business based in Virginia. With the launch of New Place Studios, the entrepreneur quickly found himself reconnecting with the values that would become the foundation of everything he creates behind the camera.
Huang said being a business owner has allowed him to first embrace himself. While others may see video as simply capturing moments, he sees it as a way to preserve stories that inspire, connect and leave a lasting imprint.
By combining cinematic visuals with cutting-edge production techniques and a keen understanding of branding, Huang helps organizations and individuals communicate their vision with purpose. He said understanding a client’s "why" serves as the compass for delivering the services they need.
One benefit of working with a small business, he said, is that clients get to see the production process unfold through a micro lens while working with the same faces throughout the entire project. "The work feels personal," said Huang.
Huang does not regret leaving behind the flash-over-substance mentality and corporate hustle culture. That does not mean the Asian American entrepreneur has been without challenges in the industry. "It’s relatively hard to find other Asian American creatives or people who would want to work with me in the DMV," said Huang.
He identifies the industry culture in which everyone is trying to blend in, creatives may fear displaying their Asian identity and some feel pressure to adopt an American corporate persona. He also points to what he describes as a level of gatekeeping within the industry. According to the U.S. Small Business Administration’s 2024 statistics, Asian American and Pacific Islander entrepreneurs own more than 3 million businesses and employ 5.2 million people in the United States.
After tapping into organizations such as SCORE, which offers free small business mentorship, New Place Studios has become a trusted creative partner throughout the DMV (Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia). The company produces a range of creative services, including commercials, corporate branding, documentaries, film, 2D animation, motion graphics and photography.
For Huang, entrepreneurship has become more than a departure from corporate life. It has given him the freedom to create with intention, build meaningful connections and tell stories that go beyond the surface.
The 2026 CAN I KICK IT? outdoor series. Poster courtesy of SHAOLIN JAZZ.
For three Saturdays this summer, some of Washington’s most familiar public spaces will do something they rarely do after dark: fill up with blankets, lawn chairs, and the sound of a movie being scored live, in real time. CAN I KICK IT?, the traveling “live cinema” series produced by the DC-based multimedia arts company SHAOLIN JAZZ, is bringing a free outdoor run to the city — pairing three era-defining films with an original soundtrack performed on the spot by DJ 2-Tone Jones.
The premise is what sets it apart from a normal screening in the park. Rather than simply pressing play, 2-Tone Jones builds a score as the film unfolds, pulling from hip-hop, soul, funk, jazz, rock, electronic music, and sounds from around the world. The result, the organizers say, is less a movie night than a one-time performance — the same film you know, wired to a soundtrack you have never heard and will not hear again. Guest DJs warm up the crowd starting at 7:30 PM before each 8:30 PM screening.
The 2026 outdoor schedule
All three events are free and open to the public.
Saturday, August 8 — Black Panther at Skyland Town Center. A pop-up marketplace and community activities kick off the evening; guest DJs at 7:30 PM, film at 8:30 PM. Marvel’s superhero epic gets a one-night-only live score in Southeast DC.
Saturday, August 22 — New Jack City at the Sylvan Theater, Washington Monument. Seating begins at 7:30 PM; the film starts at 8:30 PM. The 1991 crime drama plays out at the foot of one of the country’s most recognizable landmarks.
Saturday, September 5 — Scarface at the Lincoln Memorial. Seating at 7:30 PM; film at 8:30 PM. The series closes with Brian De Palma’s crime saga against the backdrop of the Memorial, scored live from start to finish.
First up: Black Panther at Skyland Town Center on August 8. Poster courtesy of SHAOLIN JAZZ.
A DC company with a national footprint
SHAOLIN JAZZ describes itself as a Washington-based arts company working at the intersection of music, film, art, and culture, and CAN I KICK IT? is its signature production. According to the organizers, the series has staged more than 150 live cinematic experiences around the country — at performing arts centers, museums, festivals, and cultural institutions including Lincoln Center in New York, SXSW, the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, Republic Square in Austin, the Tacoma Armory, and The Cary Theater.
“CAN I KICK IT? has always been about creating a shared experience,” said Gerald Watson, co-founder of SHAOLIN JAZZ. “When you combine iconic films with live music in public spaces, something special happens. People aren’t just watching a movie — they’re experiencing it together. That’s what makes these nights so memorable.”
Cinema as a community event
The DC run lands as cities across the country look for new ways to activate public space through arts and culture — and this series is a straightforward pitch for how to do it: take a landmark everyone already knows, add a film everyone has an opinion about, and let a live soundtrack turn the evening into something neighbors experience shoulder to shoulder. Families, film buffs, and music fans are all invited, and admission won’t cost a thing.
The CAN I KICK IT? outdoor series runs August 8, August 22, and September 5. All events are free; check SHAOLIN JAZZ (shaolinjazz.com) for the latest details and any weather updates before heading out.
