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This will probably set Julio back quite a bit. Kendry missed so much time with his broken leg. Terrible news.
Mariners Minor League News for August 20
Bad fates befall Morban and Elias ... Choi moves up ... etc.
Lots of news ... and unfortunately much of it bad.
Edit to add: some good news. Shannon Drayer reports that Mike Zunino is close to taking batting practice after the broken bone in his hand, and could be out on a rehab assignment soon.
She also reports, as others have, that Eric Wedge will return to the clubhouse on Friday, although it's not clear whether he'll manage the games right away.
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First, the Morbanwagon will be in the garage for a long time.
Julio Morban (Talk40 #15) broke a bone in his lower leg on a slide into second base in the first inning of Jackson's second game Monday.
The Jackson media crew reported that it reminded them of when Carlos Triunfel (26intheMix) broke his ankle on slide in Montgomery in 2009. Triunfel ended up missing pretty much the entire season.
Luckily for Morban, the injury comes near the end of the season, so he'll have the whole winter to recover.
Morban's season ends after hitting .295/.362/.468 with 20 doubles, 5 triples, 7 HR. [We can quibble about his stats, but this is not the right time.]
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And another promising season ends, but not due to an on-field injury.
Roenis Elias (26intheMix), who had climbed well up the pecking order of starting prospects, had an emergency appendectomy Monday and is not expected to return.
The Cuban defector started 22 games for Jackson and put up excellent numbers:
3.18 ERA | 1.25 WHIP | 7.8 H/9 | 3.5 BB/9 | 8.4 K/9
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And Jackson's roster was depleted further when our man Ji-Man Choi (Talk40 #19) got the call to Tacoma.
Choi replaces Rich Poythress (26intheMix) (left knee) who went on the disabled list. Utility guy Scott Savastano (torso strain) also is disabled, and Stefen Romero (Talk40 #11) is day-to-day with a knee injury, so Choi will get a good taste of AAA right away.
His promotion was no doubt accelerated by the injury situation, but Choi was doing just fine in AA, with a .268/.377/.487 line and 32 walks vs.just 28 strikeouts in his 61 games there.
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There will probably be dominos to fall as a result of all this, so we'll try to keep you posted.
And Bat571 usually is ahead of the curve in the Shout Box if I miss something.