Anthony Alford injured in on-field collision

Anthony Alford's annus horribilis took another turn for the worse Friday night in Dunedin.

After a breakout 2015 in which he dominated low-A and high-A while ascending to the status of the consensus top prospect in the farm system, Alford's 2016 got off on a bad note when he was injured sliding into home in Dunedin's first game requiring a month long stint on the DL. Then he struggled to a .203/.273/.254 trple slash line entering tonight's game against St. Lucie

With the game tied 2-2 in the top of 12th inning and the bases loaded with 1 out, Tomas Nido hit a shallow fly ball to centre field. Alford came in to get the ball, and Richard Urena came out from shortstop in pursuit, and they collided. Urena made the catch, but Alford stayed down and did not get up.

After about 5 minutes, a cart was brought out, and then according to the St. Lucie broadcast EMTs were brought out with a stretcher to first strap him into before removing him from the field to a waiting ambulance. At this point, the severity of the injury is unknown, having occurred within the past hour at the time this was posted. Hopefully, it was mostly precautionary and out of an abundance of caution, but it certainly seemed quite serious.

Adding insult to injury, the infield fly rule was in effect, and so with the collision the go ahead and eventual winning run scored on the play, Ken Huckaby waiting for 15 minutes until Alford was off the field to launch a tirade that got him ejected. Obviously, that is purely trivial in light of the injury to Alford, and let's all hope for a full and quick recovery whatever the severity of tonight's injury.