
Both the Eagles and Phillies were hit hard by injuries over the weekend. Desean Jackson gave 8,328 Eagles fans (and thousands more on the internet within minutes) a scare when he landed awkwardly after attempting to catch a pass and ended up taking a free cart ride. Speculation went everywhere from ACL to ankle and ultimately ended up being a back injury. The Eagles beat reporters are suggesting that Desean should be fine in a few days.
On Sunday, Mike Bell and Asante Samuel both left practice on a cart with pulled hamstrings. There was concern for Bell who was running down the field after catching a pass in the flat and went down like he had been shot. Asante should be fine as it sounds like he’s just milking it to avoid practice. When asked by reporters how he felt after practice he said, “I’m not a mad scientist, I might be out there tomorrow.”
Other Eagles injury notes: Stewart Bradley (hamstring), Jordan Norwood (hanstring), A.Q. Shipley (ankle) and Max Jean-Gilles (dehydration) all missed time over the weekend but none of the injuries are expected to be serious.
For the Phillies, Raul Ibanez sat out Sunday’s game with a sore wrist after being the hero the night before. Ryan Howard exited Sunday’s game with a sprained ankle that he suffered while “sliding” into second base. The Beast got hit on the elbow by John Lannan during his at bat. Then on a Ben Francisco bloop single to right he made the turn at second but Nationals’ right fielder Mike Morse threw behind him and Howard injured himself going back to second. Howard went into a half slide back into second base and came up lame when his ankle twisted as it hit the base. The Phillies are calling it a sprain as x-rays were negative.
As bad as it looked for Howard, Charlie Manuel was quite optimistic post game saying that Howard is not expected to go on the DL and will hopefully just miss a couple games in Florida but could be back by the series finale Thursday. Charlie added, “He’s pretty big and strong. He ain’t dead by a long shot.”
At least Howard has that going for him.
Let’s hope this injury roundup doesn’t become a weekly feature.