A surprise to no one, Washington Nationals first baseman Nick Johnson is now out for the remainder of the 2008 season. Johnson was initially out on the disabled list with a torn ligament in his wrist but only expected to miss 4 to 6 weeks. The injury was very similar to what Boston Red Sox’ David Ortiz is currently disabled with. Unfortunately for Nick, the injury has not healed and surgery was needed. The team is pretty confident thou that he’ll be ready for the 2009 season.

The most surprising thing to me with this is injury is the response to it by one of the Nationals beat writers, Chico Harlan. He called this “stunning news”, guess he really hasn’t followed Nick Johnson and his career to closely. Although, only a line after saying that he did say this injury fit in with the rest of his bad luck. Notably, he mentioned the femur injury suffered in 2006 and how he missed the entire 2007 season when the team expected him back for spring training.

“You’ve got to feel bad for Nick and his family. He’s had a tough career of injuries,” Washington general manager Jim Bowden said. “You can’t explain it. Some players just get hit by the injury bug. And his injuries, a lot of them were just freak accidents, unfortunately.”

I’ve got to admit I feel pretty bad for this guy, I’ve been a fan of his ever since he was a star prospect in the New York Yankees minor league system. He was the guy I thought could replace the aging Tino Martinez but between injuries and a certain guy named Jason Giambi it just wasn’t going to happen for him. Even after leaving the Bombers he could never shake the injury bug, in the past 7 seasons he’s only played in 614 games of a possible 1050, not a good number. Evenso, he’s always been a very productive player and outstanding defensively. Because of this you know the Nats will give him another chance in 2009 if he shows up healthy, which they fully expect.

“There’s not one thing you can pick on him when he’s healthy,” Nationals manager Manny Acta said. “Even when his batting average isn’t there, he’s getting on base four out of 10 times. … Defensively, he was brilliant this year, and his clubhouse presence— he’s a quiet guy, but he leads by example.”

If you’re in the DC area at all this summer, you need to check out the new Nationals stadium. Even if you don’t care about the team check out the ballpark its a beautiful site.

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