Washington Nationals place Stephen Strasburg on 10-Day IL with carpal tunnel neuritis

Asked after he’d lifted Stephen Strasburg just 16 pitches into the 32-year-old right-hander’s second outing 2020 campaign, the start of which was delayed by a nerve impingement in his right wrist, what the next move was with the 2019 World Series MVP, Washington Nationals’ skipper Davey Martinez said last night that he wasn’t sure, but they had to get the starter right before sending him out to the mound again.

“I talked to him after he came out and I appreciated him trying to gut it out, but I don’t want this to become a bigger issue if something else goes wrong, so he’s going to get reevaluated here tomorrow and we’ll know more tomorrow. But he’s a big part of our future, and I don’t see him getting hurt any more right now until we figure out what’s really going on.”

Strasburg missed time at the start of the season, and felt the tingling and numbness in his thumb late in his 2020 debut last Sunday, so the manager and his staff were watching closely last night and they didn’t like what they saw as Strasburg shook out his wrist and grimaced after several pitches.

“I’m not going to run him out there like that,” Martinez said after the game.

“He was upset. He wanted to be out there. But I’m not going to see him go through that. I mean, he’s one of our best and to see him try to gut it out like that, I appreciate it, we all did, but man, we’ve got to take care of him. So at this point right now, like I said, we’ll reevaluate him and we’ll go from there.”

This afternoon, the Nationals placed Strasburg on the 10-day Injured List with what a press release on the move said is carpal tunnel neuritis of the right hand. The club recalled right-handed reliever Ryne Harper from the Alternate Training Site in Fredericksburg, VA to take Strasburg’s spot on the roster.