The Milwaukee Brewers‘ quest to repeat as National League Central champions just became a whole lot more difficult.

In the second inning of their 5-2 loss to the San Francisco Giants Saturday afternoon, newly acquired 35-year-old free-agent shortstop Alex Gonzalez appeared to have badly injured his right knee while attempting to steal second after singling in a run off Giants hurler Madison Bumgarner.

Gonzalez’s basepath snafu now marks the fourth straight game where a Brewers regular has exited with an injury. Gonzalez will now join fellow teammates Mat Gamel (torn ACL) and Carlos Gomez (hamstring strain) on the Brewers’ 15-day disabled list

Brewers beat writer Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that the Brewers plan to place Gonzalez on the 15-day disabled list. From his Twitter page:

 

In 88 plate appearances this season, Gonzalez has posted a .250/.318/.450 line with four home runs and 14 RBI, ranking third only to left fielder Ryan Braun and right fielder Corey Hart with 36 total bases. General manager Doug Melvin inked Gonzalez to a one-year, $4.25 million 2012 contract with a vesting $4 million option, hoping he’d help to shore up Milwaukee’s porous infield from a season ago, though he’s been a shell of his former self defensively this season, garnering just a .969 fielding percent and 4.42 range factor thus far.

The Brewers have called up 30-year-old journeyman shortstop Edwin Maysonet and 25-year-old infield prospect Taylor Green from Triple-A Nashville to fill the void left behind from Gonzalez’s injury. More details to come regarding the story in the subsequent hours.

Alec Dopp covers the Milwaukee Brewers as a featured columnist at Bleacher Report.  Follow him on Twitter @alecdopp and read his blog.

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