Doctor Who Treated Bartolo Colon with Stem Cells in 2010 Thought He’d Never Pitch Again

April 28, 2015

(New York Daily News) – When Dr. Joseph Purita traveled to the Dominican Republic in 2010 to examine Bartolo Colon, the Boca Raton, Fla.-based orthopedist said he told the pitcher “there are no guarantees here,” referring to the stem cell procedure Purita planned to perform on Colon’s right rotator cuff and ailing elbow. “I’m going to be honest with you, when I got down to the Dominican, I said (to Colon and his doctors), ‘You better realize, we’ll make this guy feel better, but he’s never going to play baseball again, probably.’ At his age then (37), he was throwing 75 mph,” Purita told the Daily News Thursday, a short time after Colon improved his record to 4-0 on the season following the Mets’ 6-3 victory against Atlanta.