If you're tired of the Stephen Strasburg innings saga, I empathize. It's a weird story that's being pounded into the ground. On the other hand, though, it's a unique story. A team is willing to harm their postseason chances to protect a franchise arm. That's amazing and different -- it deserves to be run into the ground. Beats the latest story about which members of the Red Sox are chronic non-flushers, and how that hurts team morale.

From the intrepid William Ladson, we have some indication about how much time Strasburg will miss because of a team-imposed innings limit:

#Nats RHP Stephen Starsburg is expected to miss two to three regular season starts. #MLB

— William Ladson (@washingnats) August 12, 2012

Those would be September starts, ostensibly. And once Strasburg is shut down, he's down for good. There's no rebooting him in the event of an NLCS or World Series berth by the Nationals.

I'm wondering if the Nationals had to do it all over again, they would have had Strasburg start the season late rather than end it early. Probably. Well ... shoot.