The Oregonian's Geoffrey C Arnold has reported via Twitter that "Eddie Johnson sustained another concussion during training Monday and has returned 2 [sic] Portland."
Merritt Paulson has also tweeted: "eddie's out indefinitely. His health and well-being are the #1 priority for everyone in the organization"
This news is a huge setback for the team. Johnson has a unique style among the Timbers' strike corps and is versatile enough to be effective in a variety of different lineups.
It is fair to say that he will need to take even longer to recover from this one, so his return to the team in 2012, and even beyond that, is certainly in question. Coupled with Jose Adolfo Valencia's injury, the Timbers' once vast depth at the striker position is now cut back to five, in Kris Boyd, Jorge Perlaza, Darlington Nagbe, Bright Dike and Brent Richards.
Most importantly, though, we hope for the very best for Johnson's health.
We will update this story as new information is available.
Update 2/10: Geoffrey C Arnold interviewed John Spencer about Johnson's status today and posted this report on oregonlive.com.