The Sun-Times reports this morning that Aramis Ramirez is likely headed to the DL today with a hand injury.
↵It’s seemed obvious to most observers that Ramirez, who is hitting .168/.232/.285 — Aaron Miles territory — has been playing hurt most of the year. In that link, the Sun-Times’ Gordon Wittenmyer agrees:
↵↵↵The Cubs might have been better off, in fact, to make the move a little over two weeks ago when the issue first was revealed. He missed four games then because of the hand problem and hitting woes, but the club decided to allow him to continue to try to fight through the soreness and his slump.
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It almost seems as if the Cubs won’t put a veteran star on the DL unless his injury occurs on television in front of enough people (as Derrek Lee’s wrist injury in 2006 and Alfonso Soriano’s pulled hamstring in 2008 did) so the team can’t deny something’s wrong. Soriano played hurt for four months last year, having the worst year of his career, before the team finally admitted something was wrong with his knee and shut him down in early September.
↵That doesn’t help the player or the team. Let Ramirez heal; the Cubs’ offense is impotent without him producing. Chad Tracy, who will replace him on the roster, is no superstar, but could hardly be worse than Aramis has been this year.