Sprowl said:
My impression is that Sizemore has one good gallop in him per game, and that once he's used it up, he'll be limping around the field and the basepaths for the remainder of the day. His performance tends to confirm radsoxfan's supposition that his microfracture-repaired knee isn't looking like a long-term investment.
Minor correction.... it's his microfracture-repaired knees, plural. Not to mention repaired should probably be in quotes, since it often doesn't fix things very well.
I'm still holding out hope Sizemore can be useful this year, but I always thought the idea he might be a 6 game-a-week CF was wildly optimistic. Combining his injury history and his lack of any success in the majors for 5 years, it just didn't seem realistic.
Hopefully Grady can get used to LF, avoid playing more than 2 days in a row and day games after night games. Maybe if he settles into a 3-4 game a week platoon with Gomes, he can recapture at least some of his prior glory on a small scale. If Nava really turns into a pumpkin, Grady should get a chance to do that.
I'd look at it like the Knicks deal with Amare Stoudamire, who is at least still marginally useful as a bench player (though way overpaid). Manage his minutes, avoid back-to-backs, hope for the best. Let's just hope Grady doesn't go the way of Brandon Roy (Sorry for the NBA references, I know that's out of style in these parts).
FWIW, not all arthritic knees and microfracture surgeries are the same, so we can't be sure his situation is at all like those NBA guys. It's probably not. There is a very wide range of severity. Just using them as examples of possible outcomes.
