Every fantasy baseball season, there always seems to be a running theme you can highlight when you look back at how the year played out. We’ve got seasons that include the Year of the Rookie, the Year of the Starting Pitcher, the Year of the Shortstops and then we’ve got this year – the Year of the Injury. Yep. The 2017 season is easily going down as one of the most brutal seasons for injuries. It’s been relentless, whether you look at spring training, early in the regular season and now, the post-All Star break. How brutal after the break? Well how about losing both Clayton Kershaw and Stephen Strasburg?

Aces down!!! Repeat! Aces Down!!!

Are you kidding me?

Let’s see…we lost Madison Bumgarner for an extended period of time because of a dirt bike accident. Noah Syndergaard’s lat injury has kept him out since April 30. David Price was unable to start the season on-time. Kyle Hendricks hasn’t thrown a competitive pitch since June 4 due to a hand injury, Dallas Keuchel’s neck injury had him take two DL stints, one of which is still going, and Aaron Sanchez has blisters of Rich Hill-like proportions. Ridiculous? Yeah, I’d say so.

According to reports, Strasburg was removed from Sunday’s game for precautionary reasons, but what do you think of when you hear “forearm stiffness?” I’m not going to sit here and pretend to be a doctor, and no, I did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but I’ve been around baseball, both real and fantasy, long enough to know the variety of symptoms which eventually lead to bigger issues. Nationals manager Dusty Baker said he didn’t think it was anything serious, but come on…when was the last time any one of you trusted anything Dusty said about a starting pitcher? With Monday being an off-day, the team will have Strasburg see a specialist to determine the extent of the problem.

As for Kershaw…ugh! We’ve endured the back issues with him before and we actually lost him for all of July and August last year for this exact same problem. Obviously the wear and tear from six-straight seasons of 200-plus innings has taken a toll on him and while the first half was, once again, extremely productive for fantasy owners, the prospect of losing your ace for a month or two right now is brutal. I won’t say it’s an impossibility, but let’s face it, there’s very little chance you can stream in enough starters to match his strikeouts and ratios for that long of a period of time.

The biggest problem with Kershaw’s injury is that we should have seen it coming. When he was giving up so many home runs through the first half of the season, there had to be some speculation that he wasn’t feeling 100-percent. Yes, he was effective, but when you’re suddenly giving up twice as many bombs as you’ve ever allowed before, something isn’t right. When Keuchel was suffering from a pinched nerve in his neck early in the season, I opined that the Astros were going about it the wrong way with simple rest. There needed to be something more. A pinched nerve in the neck is a strong indicator of a cervical issue and the cause was likely a bulging or herniated disc in his neck, so without proper treatment, the issue would recur. And what happened? He went right back to the DL and still isn’t back yet.

For Kershaw, the Dodgers are going to now have to take it extremely slow with him, especially if they hope to make a successful playoff run. While some people may not believe in it, many teams employ a chiropractor to assist in cases like this and perhaps that’s something the team will look into. Just taking two weeks off isn’t going to fix the problem. Maybe it masks some of the symptoms and he is good for one or two starts, but it is far from a permanent solution. If you’re a Kershaw owner, you have every right to be concerned. If I owned him, I would certainly be looking to trade for value right now before word gets out as to just how much time they expect him to miss. Let someone else in your league think you’re panicking. I certainly don’t and would prefer you did something to benefit your fantasy team rather than wait it out. You never know if the Dodgers are going to just decide to shut him down until late September so he can get ready for the playoffs. Is that a risk you’re willing to take?

The loss of an ace is a brutal thing in fantasy. The investment you need to make to acquire them is always substantial and should you lose one, the impact is a lot greater than if you lose a position player. Yes, even the loss of Mike Trout this year has had less of an impact on fantasy teams than a two-month loss of Kershaw or even a month of losing Strasburg. They may only pitch once every five days, but when that’s the case for all of them, the loss of an ace who is there to boost your strikeouts while stabilize your ratios, is going to impact you that much more. Start working those trade phones. Focus on that waiver wire. You’re not completely sunk yet, but it’s going to take some serious work to get back on track.