He took a page right out of The Twins pitchers' guide to handling elbow injuries. Drag your feet, get second and third opinions and waste time trying to rehab something that clearly needs surgery.
I get that nobody wants to go under the knife, especially with where Verlander is at in his career. But realistically, how many successfully rehabbed Elbows are there in pitchers? It has to be 1 successful rehab to 50 unsuccessful ones that end up needing surgery anyways.