Padres' Fernando Tatis Jr. Placed on IL with Hamstring Injury

One of the most exciting young players in baseball is on the sidelines after the San Diego Padres announced Tuesday that Fernando Tatis Jr. will be placed on the injured list.

He was diagnosed with a left hamstring strain, initially suffered on Sunday night. 

As Mark Zuckerman of MASN noted, Tatis went down after attempting to stretch for an out at second base. His official IL designation will begin on Monday.

The 20-year-old was one of the top prospects in baseball coming into the year, but expected to spend some more time in the minors before surprisingly making the major league roster. This turned out to be the right decision for San Diego.

Tatis stormed onto the scene with six home runs in his first 20 games while also showcasing the rest of his tools.

Through 27 career games, he has a .300 batting average, .910 OPS and six stolen bases.

Of course, his talent also means he has a bright future ahead of him and the Padres are going to remain conservative in their approach.

"We care a lot about him, we think a lot of him, we love the way he's started his big league career," Padres manager Andy Green said prior to the IL decision, per AJ Cassavell of MLB.com. "We're going to take care of him. We're going to put him in the position where he has his best shot at health for a long period of time."

The Padres remain competitive in the NL West with a 16-13 record entering Monday, but they don't want to risk the health of their young star.

Greg Garcia got the start at shortstop in place of Tatis Monday and could potentially see more at-bats going forward, but Manny Machado could also get a look at the position after sliding over from third base multiple times.