Texas Rangers' 3B Hank Blalock is scheduled to have shoulder surgery next week, a move that could keep him on the sidelines for up to three months.

Blalock has been a solid offensive threat for the Rangers for several years now, and was recently mentioned in several trade rumors. Presumably, this news will halt speculations about what uniform Hank will be wearing by the season's end.

I saw a headline earlier today that suggested that the Astros' Morgan Ensberg was off the block as well, but for a very different reason: nobody wants him. (Apologies, but I cannot find this link now!) Ensberg, a career Astro who put up great numbers in 2003, 2004 and 2005 has slumped of late, and has been benched in favor of the streaking Mike Lamb. (That's Lamb, not that other streaker.)

So, just in this past week we've seen the pool of available third basemen shrink considerably. Troy Glaus' heel injury will likely plague him all season long, but he's still the best option for a team looking to add offense and average defense at the hot corner. Edwin Encarnacion is another possibility, but only for a team that's in a position to take a risk: he's been miserable at the plate and on the bag in 2007.

This post was added on Friday, May 18th, 2007 at 5:07 pm and is filed under Trade Rumors . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.