Strasburg likely needs Tommy John surgery

Well, this isn’t good. But it’s not entirely surprising since the kid throws 100 mph. According to Washington Nationals GM Mike Rizzo, their ace Stephen Strasburg likely needs Tommy John surgery. Strasburg has a “significant” tear in his UCL.

He’ll probably need 12 to 18 months of recovery time and won’t return until late in 2011. Considering how valuable the 22-year old is to the organization, this is a crushing blow. He might not really be himself until the start of the 2012 season.

“We’re going to take this news and we’re going to persevere,” Rizzo said. “We’re going to move and we’re going to get our rotation intact. And when Stephen Strasburg returns, along with Jordan Zimmermann and the rest of our good young rotation, we’ll be prepared to take on the 2011 season and beyond.”

Strasburg is going to get a second opinion before a final decision is made on surgery, but it doesn’t look good.

“We’re not going to drag this out,” Rizzo said. “If the second opinion is surgery, we’ll certainly have surgery, as soon as maybe the next day.”

The Nationals actually think that the injury occurred on Strasburg’s final pitch against the Phillies and wasn’t the result of wear and tear.

“I asked the question myself [to doctors],” Rizzo said. “They think it was an acute injury from a particular pitch. You can’t rule out that there was something there, but our doctors looking at the type of tear that Stephen has, it probably was from a one-pitch incident that tore the ligament.”