Patrick Reddington: Strasburg's latest injury not the worst-case scenario

Considering what the worst-case scenarios could have been, the diagnosis of a strained flexor mass for Stephen Strasburg was relatively "good" bad news.

It's still a significant blow for the Washington Nationals and their 28-year-old starter, of course.

"It's very good to know," Dusty Baker told reporters after the official announcement of the results of the MRI on Strasburg's elbow.

"I met with our trainer Paul Lessard and we discussed it extensively and everybody was pretty satisfied with where we are at this point. It's very good to know.

"Exactly the timetable for that we don't know, but it's good to hear that it wasn't what everybody was speculating what it was."

"I know everyone was concerned about did he re-injure that Tommy John ligament," Lessard explained when he too met with reporters, "and the answer is no. The ligament is good. The rest of the elbow looks basically the same as the last MRI that we did, however, he does have a new injury, a little strain in his flexor mass. So he strained his flexor mass while he was pitching last night."

Lessard didn't have any thoughts on a timetable for a potential return for Strasburg either.

"I'm thinking, let's take care of the swelling and the pain-free range of motion and then we'll start a strengthening program," Lessard said.

"So, I'm just worried about the next four or five days right now."

Baker has to think big picture though, and he was asked on Thursday about his options with Strasburg out of the rotation again.

Joe Ross returning would be ideal, but as the Nats' skipper explained, they can't rush him back because of what has happened to Strasburg.

"We can't rush him or else we have two of them down," Baker said. "We still have to treat him as if Stephen is here. I tell you who does come into play, big time, are guys like [A.J.] Cole, [Lucas] Giolito, [Reynaldo] Lopez and probably even more importantly, Gio Gonzalez."

Gonzalez is the veteran of that group, and he put together a solid stretch of outings before this week's disappointing start. Baker's other options are thus far unproven.

Cole, Giolito and Lopez are, Baker said, going to be pitching deeper into a season than they have before in their careers.

"They're going to be pushed anyway," he explained, "because none of them have pitched in September and none of them have pitched in October.

"The ones that have pitched in September and October -- you look historically, you look at the Giants pitching staff, the [Barry] Zitos, [Matt] Cain, [Tim] Lincecum: when do you push and when do you sacrifice for today? That's a delicate thing.

"Everybody wants to win, but nobody wants to push. Hopefully you can do both. You don't think [Madison] Bumgarner was pushed in the World Series? He was pushed, everybody was risking his arm too at that time, so we're treading on territory that not many people have the opportunity to go to."

Will Strasburg actually be able to return and contribute? Will the Nationals push the 2009 No. 1 overall pick after he's thrown so little in the last month-plus and is going to be off again for at least the next few weeks?

No one is ruling out the possibility of Strasburg's return, but it seems like a long shot at this point.

He returned from his second stint on the disabled list of the season and got through just 2 1/3 innings before once again injuring his right elbow.

Lessard said that the two issues are, in fact, different injuries. The flexor mass strain was an acute injury according to the Nationals trainer.

"It's actually different," he explained.

"He just had some posterior elbow -- some swelling in the back there and that's why we were working on it before, got that out of there and now it's more the flexor mass. Normally they come around very well with treatment and strengthening programs. It's not a season-ending injury, but we still need to take time to make sure he's nice and strong because of his past."

If he doesn't make it back in time to join Max Scherzer and Tanner Roark atop the Nats rotation, who fills in that third spot going forward in a potential postseason rotation?

"We haven't decided who that person is necessarily," Baker said. "We have the personnel that we have. You can't count on somebody else coming in here. And so we have to do the best for the situation and what we have and then make a determination on who is to take his place now and possibly later. Or is it a better option to not have Stephen or do we not count Stephen out? Those are our options."

Patrick Reddington blogs about the Nationals for Federal Baseball and appears here as part of MASNsports.com's season-long initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our pages. Follow him on Twitter: @federalbaseball. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers.