Good night, Mr. Hamilton:

Out of the lineup for a second consecutive day, OF Josh Hamilton summed up his situation for the final week of the season this way:

“I’m playing when I’m able to play,” he said of his injured back Monday afternoon. “It hasn’t stopped hurting. The three injections I got helped, and for a while, it didn’t get worse, but once I got out there and ran, it started up again. [Sunday] I couldn’t go. Today, I feel a little better. I can probably pinch hit, but if I got on base, they’d have to run for me.”

So, that's just about that from Hamilton in 2009, a season which will go down in the annals of baseball history as extremely disappointing relative to what he ended up doing in 2008. Is this the beginning of Hamilton being a 500 PA-type player, the sort who will (hopefully) be really productive in his time on the field but might only be good for 130 games per season? I hope not, but it's probably safe to say that the projection systems are going to spit out some very disappointing 2010 forecasts for Hamilton in terms of both playing time and performance.