Josh Hamilton Out 6-8 Weeks - Shoulder Surgery

The Angels just announced that outfielder Josh Hamilton will miss at least six to eight weeks due to scheduled shoulder surgery. In pre-spring workouts, pain flared up and arthritis was discovered in the AC joint of his shoulder. He will have surgery tomorrow to shave down some of the bone in order to ease the pain caused by intense rapid movement, e.g, swinging a baseball bat.

The estimated recovery period throws out any chance of seeing Josh in Spring Training and makes the recent acquisition of Matt Joyce a much smarter move by GM Jerry Dipoto. While Joyce comes with his own set of problems - can't hit lefties and can't field reliably - they pale in comparison of the high maintenance former all star.

The club had hired Jerry Narron as their AAA coach specifically with the added bonus of working with Josh as an accountability partner in Spring Training. That plan just went out the window. Based on the rosiest estimates Hamilton would be ready for Spring Training on April Fool's Day - five days before the start of the regular season.

Spring Training suddenly gets interesting with finding a lefty-mashing right-side bat of a platoon partner for Joyce.

OBVIOUS ANALYSIS: Worst case scenario for Josh - retirement - is the best case scenario for the Halos.