Ryan Howard's injury the latest freak Phillies injury
The Phillies have announced that Ryan Howard's season is over because of a broken toe that he suffered when he dropped the long lead pipe he swings in the on-deck circle on his foot during Thursday night's game.
While it's a bad way to end the season, it's not as bad as the way Howard's 2011 ended.
And, the good news for Howard is that it could have been a heck of a lot worse.
By breaking his toe in the on-deck circle, Ryan joins a long list of other Phillies that have hurt themselves in less than dignified ways:
Darren Daulton missed the last month of the 1988 season because he broke his hand when he punched a wall in the team's video room after he struck out in the 9th inning of a game against Los Angeles. Adding insult to injury, Daulton was hit with an undisclosed fine by the team.
A year after famously breaking his face open making a dramatic catch in 2006, Aaron Rowand had to sit out a game after he 'tweaked' a muscle in his left shoulder while playing tag with some kids in his neighborhood.
In 2001, Adam Eaton missed a start because of a self-inflicted stab wound he suffered while trying to open a sealed DVD. The knife he was using slipped and jabbed the righty in the stomach. In his defense, those packages are hard as hell to open, but that's no excuse for forgetting the cardinal rule of knives: always cut away from yourself.
While in the employ of the Padres in 1991, current Phillies radio announcer Larry Andersen strained a muscle in his chest while climbing out of a Jacuzzi. The ever-colorful Andersen dubbed the injury a "Jacuzzi-tusion." He went on to say that he'd "probably get little plastic inflatable sides in the mail so [he] can get out easier."
Terry Mulholland, then with the Minnesota Twins, suffered a scratched cornea in his right eye in 2005 when he was jabbed by a feather sticking out of a pillow in a hotel room.
Then-Phillies' closer Ryan Madson hit the DL because he broke his toe by kicking a metal chair after blowing a save against the Giants in 2010.
In 1994, Jeff Juden (who played a total of 19 games for the Phillies in his eight-year major league career) had to miss a spring training start when a newly-inked tattoo developed an infection.
Dave Hollins, back with the Phillies for the second time in 2002, was bitten by a spider in April. The spider bites somehow caused complications with his diabetes and forced him to miss nearly the entire season: Hollins was on the disabled list until the middle of September. He retired as a player the following year but is still a scout for the Phillies.
In the most bad-ass injury on this list, Michael Jack Schmidt broke his right ring finger during a fight with Pirates pitcher Bruse Kison in 1977. For those too young to remember, the Phillies and Pirates really hated each other in the 70s and Schmidt/Kison was one of many memorable brawls between the intrastate rivals.
The most shameful of all injuries on this list belongs to Lenny Dykstra. In May of 1991, Nails wrapped his car around a tree in Radnor Township on the way home from John Kruk's bachelor party. Dykstra had been speeding, was not wearing a seatbelt, and was incredibly drunk: he blew a .179 on a Breathalyzer which was nearly twice the legal limit. Lenny suffered three broken ribs, a broken clavicle, a broken cheekbone, and a punctured lung. Darren Daulton, who was riding shotgun, suffered a broken cheekbone and a bruised heart. Dykstra would miss two months due to his injuries, Daulton would miss one. Don't drink and drive, kids.
(Dis)honorable Mention: The Nationals' Mark DeRosa, already on the DL with an oblique strain, re-aggravated his injury when Bryce Harper high-fived him in the dugout after he famously stole home against Cole Hamels and the Phillies on May 6th of this year.