Bad Ph***in' News, Phils!

Phillies' Utley to have hip surgery
By Todd Zolecki

Inquirer Staff Writer

Chase Utley tried fiercely to conceal the severity of his right-hip injury throughout the Phillies' championship season.
It was not an issue, he maintained. Just normal bumps and bruises.

But the hip bothered him much more than he let on.

Utley, the Phillies' all-star second baseman, will undergo surgery next week in New York that will keep him from baseball activities for three months. A full recovery is expected to take four to six months.

The surgery is described as "an arthroscopic evaluation" that could treat "any labral [cartilage] or bony injury." In other words, it remains to be seen what exactly needs to be done.

Phillies officials sounded optimistic yesterday that Utley will be available to play most of the 2009 season, which begins April 5 against the Atlanta Braves at Citizens Bank Park. They also were optimistic that Utley will be the same Utley, the one who famously plays with reckless abandon, when he returns.

"I don't look to change the way he plays," said Scott Sheridan, the Phillies' head athletic trainer. "That's certainly not the goal of surgery. The goal here is to promote his health for the long term.