Avalanche’s Injuries Issues Continue:Tomas Fleischmann Out For Season

Added on Jan 21, 2011 by J Merrill in

NHL

The Colorado Avalanche announced to the media on Thursday that left wing Tomas Fleischmann has been diagnosed with pulmonary emboli. According to Avalanche physician Dr. David Mellman, he has a blood clot in each of his lungs and will the rest of the season. He said “The nature of his condition requires him to be on blood thinners for several months and he will be unable to play hockey during this time.”

Fleischmann, who is only 26 year olds, was planning on playing against the Predators on Thursday night. However, he told head trainer Matt Sokolowski that he was having shortness of breath after his morning skate. He has had blood clots before, Fleischmann missed the first 11 games of last season with the Washington Capitals because of a blood clot in his leg.

Avs General Manager Greg Sherman said that he was just happy this wasn’t anything more serious. He said “Our trainers are very attentive to our players’ needs and when Tomas went to see Matt, Matt thought he should go see our doctor, and our doctor took it from there and did the necessary tests. Fortunately, at the end of the day, this was discovered. He’s a young man and obviously this is a serious condition.” He concluded “All the indications from our doctor are that he will be able to live a normal life. This is something that can be treated through medications.”

The Avalanche have been dealing with injuries all year, and this almost seems like someone is twisting the injury knife. The Avalanche team have already lost 231 man games to injuries and illness this season. Sherman said “Certainly Tomas was a big piece of our team, but we’ve dealt with adversity before. This isn’t the first time we’ve had to deal with injuries to a player this year or last year. The depth of our organization has come through in the past and we expect it to come through here in the future. We’re not the only team that has to deal with adversity. We’re confident with the personnel that we have and we move forward.”

This information really caught Sherman off guard, and he admittedly said he didn’t have all the answers, and he would have to meet with Coach Joe Sacco to lay out the options. He said “This is news that came to light in the last couple of hours. Certainly we’ll sit down with the head coach and have a discussion and assess where we’re at. I’m confident in the people we have in the organization, the players we have in the organization. We’ll assess where we are and go from there.”

Coach Sacco said the same thing, and insisted that the Avalanche were going to miss Fleischmann. He said “This is news that came to light in the last couple of hours. Certainly we’ll sit down with the head coach and have a discussion and assess where we’re at. I’m confident in the people we have in the organization, the players we have in the organization. We’ll assess where we are and go from there.”

Matt Duchene spoke for the players, and said it was going to be tough to fill his skates this year. “Tomas obviously has been one of our best forwards since he arrived. For me, he’s been a great linemate. It’s tough to lose a guy like that, but we’ve been a team all year when we’ve had injuries, we’ve pressed forward and had other guys step up. We’re going to move forward here and hopefully he has a speedy recovery and he gets back as soon as possible.”