Based on Thursday night's brawl in San Diego, Zack Greinke will miss two months for surgery to place a rod in his fractured collarbone.
Compare that with the rumored length of Carlos Quentin's suspension, which could be anywhere from 5-10 games. (UPDATE: he got eight games, which he's currently appealing, of course.)
No matter how you slice it, a nobody like Quentin for a nothing team like the San Diego Padres has greatly altered the season for the Dodgers. And if the length of suspension for him is accurate, then that doesn't nearly do justice to the pain this causes the Dodgers going forward.
For those of you who somehow didn't hear, Greinke beaned Quentin in Thursday night's game... in the sixth inning... with the score 2-1... on a full count. Quentin then charged the mound, and Greinke lowered his left side to take the blow, causing the fracture. Obviously Quentin thought the pitch was intentional. You know, because so many pitchers are looking to put men on base to lose such a huge lead. That's what any successful starting pitcher is looking to do. Makes perfect sense to me.
But seriously, the thing that pisses me off the most about this is that a guy can get injured, Major League Baseball will hand out a suspension to the other guy who charged the mound in a foolish act, and the injured player's team will suffer the longest. There's no justice to it whatsoever. And of course, that's the way it'll be.
I think somebody needs to tell Quentin that he's not nearly a relevant enough player anymore to be charging the mound like that in the first place. He's not with the White Sox anymore, where he at least was a legit power threat, despite never appearing in more than 131 games in his career. He plays for the forgotten Padres now, where he appeared in only 86 games last season thanks to more injuries. I mean really, how many people even knew he was playing for the Padres right now? Maybe a handful of people in San Diego, and that's it.
At the end of the day, it doesn't matter what anyone on the Padres does. They were eliminated from postseason contention on Opening Day. They can do whatever they want, whenever they want - it makes no difference. The bottom line is that they can start brawls every game for all they care - it's not like they have the worry of losing guys to hurt their postseason chances. Those chances are never there anyway.
They only have two guys other teams would really want: Chase Headley and Luke Gregerson. There's a few other guys teams would MAYBE want, but that's it. Like I just said, when your team consists of mostly bad and average players, they can go after anybody they want. Suspensions mean nothing.
Now the Dodgers have to hope the rest of the rotation holds things together while Greinke is shelved. Even with the recent trade of Aaron Harang, they still have Ted Lilly and Chris Capuano to turn to. So it's not like there's no options. But with all due respect to them, they're not Greinke. And with the way the offense has struggled to score runs, this injury sucks even worse. All thanks to a CLOWN like Quentin.
I guess Padres' fans can thank Quentin for affecting the Dodgers' playoff chances. They stand no chance in hell of getting there themselves, so why not ruin it for others instead?
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