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What Up? Whats Happnin?
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: Gee From The G
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Kerry Wood Hurt
Pitcher's hot-tub flub 'almost funny.' Right.
February 16, 2007
MESA, Ariz. -- You've heard of tennis elbow? Turf toe? Runner's knee?
Run of the mill stuff, my friends.
Here's a new one for you: Hot-tub chest.
Yes, it's true. Kerry Wood, the man who is donating his body to science piece by piece, said he hurt his chest the other day when he slipped getting out of his hot tub.
This came to light Thursday when manager Lou Piniella innocently mentioned it after the Cubs' first workout of the spring.
"We had one little problem, and that was with Kerry Wood, with the rib," Piniella said.
You should have seen reporters' heads snap to attention after that simple sentence. It was as if someone had said, "And by the way, we've just invaded Canada."
That's because there are no little problems when it comes to Kerry Wood.
"Look, he's going to be fine," Piniella said. "Let's not get carried away with this. We have all the time in the world in spring training. It's just a little bruise, nothing more. It's just a precaution."
You always get Kerry-ed away with Wood. He has had nothing but bad luck when it has come to injuries. Elbow injuries. Shoulder injuries. For all we know, the heartbreak of psoriasis too.
So there's no such thing as "just a bruise." With Wood, "just a bruise" could be anything from malaria to botulism to a compound fracture of his entire body.
Piniella is new to the job, so he doesn't understand Cubs fans have thought bubbles over their heads right now that read, "Uh-oh, here we go again."
"Let's not get into that," he said. "There's nothing to do with let's go again or anything else. Things happen, that's all. That's why you have six weeks here. Things aren't done in one day or one week. We have plenty of time—I mean, plenty of time—to get these guys ready to play."
Nothing here, folks. Move along. The show's over. Pay no attention to the chalk outline on the ground.
Wood described it as an injury to the right side of his chest more than to his ribs. The Cubs say he'll be ready to throw off the mound in a few days.
Nothing against Wood, who deserves better than what he has received, but we have heard that before.
He is to simulated games what Picasso was to cubism (No, cubism is not a Chicago baseball affliction; it's an art movement.) He has spent the last several years recovering, rehabilitating, working side sessions or throwing simulated games from the mound. Much of Wood's career has been a blue period.
It has not been fun for anyone, Wood especially, although he couldn't help but laugh Thursday about his latest problem.
"It's almost funny," he said.
Someone asked him if he had reached the point where he wondered what more could possibly happen to him, and he correctly answered, "Yeah, a couple of years ago."
Wood said he's in the best shape of his life, having changed his diet and trained hard in the off-season. His goal is simple, yet Herculean: stay healthy.
What frustrates him as much as anything is that teammates of several years have rarely seen him pitch in a real game. They have seen the simulated Kerry Wood, the virtual Kerry Wood, the phantom Kerry Wood.
He went through drills with pitchers and catchers Thursday but didn't throw off the mound. They have seen that before.
He will pitch out of the bullpen this season. It's a long way from 1998, when he struck out 20 Astros in a game at Wrigley Field. He turns 30 this season. Hard to believe.
He is, in many ways, starting over. There are so many unknowns. Can he adapt to being a reliever? Will going to the bullpen prolong his career? Does a person seek relief from a hot-tub injury in a hot tub?
He has had so much go wrong for him that it would be a wonderful story if he finally made it through a season without a serious injury. We'll go along with the Cubs' prognosis on the chest bruise. In the ridiculous-injury category, it ranks right up there with Carlos Zambrano's elbow problem in 2005, which the Cubs' medical team attributed to too much time spent on a computer.
In past spring trainings, Wood has been hit by vertigo and bronchitis.
"Spring's a rough time for me," he said, laughing. "I feel great in October, December, January. Awesome."
And here he thought he was being safe by staying close to home.
"Just typical," he said.
Who could argue?
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