Surviving 15 days without your .175-hitting outfielder
The Chicago Sun-Times' Gordon Wittenmyer probably never imagined he'd begin a story this way:
Forget the hot-tub injuries and twisted testicles and beat-downs at the Circle K.
If he were a feature writer for the porn section, sure. But he's not. Wittenmyer continued:
What happened Tuesday night at Wrigley Field was the Cubby occurrence of all Cubby occurrences since Lou Piniella became manager.
It's true. As with so many other bizarre occurrences in recent Cubs' history, Alfonso Soriano's calf injury somehow seemed both freakishly unlikely and galactically inevitable. Naturally it happened that way. (Even though he says it didn't). Soriano couldn't just strain himself via the usual methods.
He's not an easy person for fantasy owners to replace, either. Soriano has been a 30/30 player in four separate seasons, including two of the last three. Last year when he injured his quad, we suggested that his absence was much more troubling for his imaginary employers than for his real-life employers.
This year's leg injury sounds less severe. The Sun-Times offers this update on Soriano today:
He wore a protective walking boot Wednesday that he's expected to use until sometime this weekend, after which he'll start rehab exercises. The team anticipates a full recovery within the two weeks.
And there's further confirmation on the Cubs' website:
"We feel confident Soriano won't be out past the 15," (Jim) Hendry said. "At the same time, we don't want to rush this and take a chance of him re-injuring it."
Here's a clip of Soriano discussing the injury. There's really no obvious reason for the fantasy community to panic. (Well, except for the fact that Soriano apparently won't give up his pre-catch hop. An earlier commenter called it a "timing mechanism." Hmm).
If you're looking for an outfielder who can do a reasonable impression of Soriano over the next two weeks, add the 36.3 percent-owned Lastings Milledge (.310 AVG, 1 HR, 1 SB). If he's not available, consider the 1.4 percent-owned Milton Bradley (.362 AVG and batting cleanup).
This is apparently not the disastrous injury we'd all feared. Still a classic Cubby occurrence, though.
