J.P. Crawford stood in front of his locker with a soft cast on his left hand and a sad look on his face.
A few lockers away, Jerad Eickhoff struck a more optimistic tone.
As Eickhoff gets ready to ramp up his recovery from a condition that has caused numbness in the fingers on his right hand, Crawford was officially placed on the disabled list Wednesday morning with a broken bone in his left hand. He suffered the break when he was hit by a pitch in Tuesday night’s game. The Phillies recalled corner infielder Mitch Walding from Triple A to take Crawford’s roster spot.
Manager Gabe Kapler said Crawford would be down four to six weeks.
“Plain and simple, it sucks,” Crawford said.
The fracture is on the top of Crawford's hand, on the bone that extends from the middle knuckle. He said it would not require surgery.
Crawford, 23, is hitting just .194 with a .312 on-base percentage this season. He missed five weeks with a forearm strain earlier this season and returned to the lineup in early June. He had been getting reps at third base and was due for more. With Crawford out, and missing more development time, Maikel Franco, who had lost time at third, will get regular playing time again.
Eickhoff, who was projected to be a mainstay in the Phillies’ rotation, has not pitched all season, first because of a lat strain and lately because of numbness in the fingers on his pitching hand. A series of tests ruled out a serious problem. He was treated with an anti-inflammatory injection in his wrist and passed a test when he threw a problem-free, 20-pitch bullpen session on Tuesday.
“It was good, 20 pitches, all fastballs,” Eickhoff said. “It felt good. No numbness. The shot seems to be working.”
Eickhoff felt the numbness mostly when he torqued his curveball. He did not throw that pitch in Tuesday's bullpen session. He said he would mix in that pitch during his next bullpen session, Saturday in Washington.
“That’s a big test,” he said. “I am cautiously optimistic that I won’t feel anything.”
Eickhoff believes he will need a couple of more bullpens before he moves to competitive work in minor-league rehab games. He is confident he will pitch for the Phillies again this season.
“One step at a time,” he said. “We checked one box yesterday. We’ll check another one Saturday.”
In other health matters, Nick Williams, who suffered a broken nose Monday night, passed concussion protocol and was in the lineup for Wednesday afternoon’s game.