DENVER – There was a sigh of relief for the Nationals’ beleaguered bullpen on Monday when the results of lefty PJ Poulin’s MRI came back.
The tests showed there was no damage to his UCL, and the injury was contained to the left flexor strain that was originally diagnosed on Sunday. The expected timeline for this injury is two to six weeks.
“Obviously, your mind goes some places,” Poulin said pregame on Monday. “But now that we’ve got the MRI and we know exactly what it is, I guess it definitely puts my mind at ease that it could have been worse.”
Poulin said he began feeling discomfort in his elbow area during the Boston series earlier this month. It was the first time he had experienced these symptoms, and he tried to battle through the pain. But it lingered.
“I got some anti-inflammatories in me that I think helped at the time to help get me through a couple weeks,” Poulin said. “After we tried to kind of wean off that, that’s when it kind of came back again.”
Poulin will be reevaluated when the team returns to Washington, D.C., later this week to help determine when he can resume baseball activity.
“Friday in Sacramento playing catch, he mentioned that it was bothering him again,” said manager Blake Butera. “Knowing that we just had four days off, he hasn’t pitched in a while [since July 11] and it was still bothering him and this had come up previously, we wanted to get some imaging done. We figured it was at least a 15-day stint on the shelf.”
Poulin is 3-0 with a 2.70 ERA in 35 games this season, including three saves and 11 starts as an opener. To fill the left-handed vacancy in the bullpen, the Nationals re-signed Matt Krook to a Major League contract on Sunday.