as the many cub fans here surely know, kerry wood has been placed on the dl with a shoulder injury. they also are aware that in his rookie season he both struck out 20 men in a single game and fucked up his elbow bad enough to need tommy john surgery. they also probably know that a major league caliber pitcher often fully recovers from tommy john surgery, sometimes they even emerge throwing harder than they did before. wood certainly didn't lose any stuff after his comeback.

but, what they don't know and what i don't know is what his shoulder portends. my prediction is wood will not reach 100 career wins, at least not within the next four years or so. serious shoulder injuries are awful for pitchers. if wood has a torn labrum or something along those lines it's possible he'll never be close to good again. beyond that, the cubs have decided to move wood to the bullpen to "reduce the stress on his arm."

now, in this forum you can read in any thread about the cubs how much dusty baker sucks handling pitchers. here's exhibit a. the problem with kerry wood is not that he has thrown a bunch of pitches. the problem is his mechanics suck and the cubs have shown no desire to change them in order to save the young man's arm. his mechanics sucked in 1999 and it led to him missing a year and a half of baseball. when he came back his mechanics were basically the same, and he's been injured pretty much the entire time since. the chicago cubs have all but ruined a promising career. in my estimation, in two years they will have completely ruined that career.

what do you think, people?

i dont folow the cubs enough to talk in depth...but i know when you keep having shoulder problems as frequently as he has been...its only bad news. It'll be a miracle if he pitches productively for 3 more years.

make him a closer, he could be the most dominate closer in the game, he can't go 9 innings anymore.

Isn't he typically iffy for the first inning or two of his starts, though?

why do you think this would help his health?

Becoming a closer would HURT not help his health at this point.

the best thing it could possibly do is postpone the inevitable. and that outcome would be provided he doesn't pitch back to back days, maybe even with two days between outings.

He needs to rest it, and not throw for at least a year maybe think about hanging it up. Then like John Smoltz after his surgery, learn how to pitch. Sit with Maddux, talk to Clemens etc. I think the problem might be that they don't know any better in Chicago. They seem to have tremendous problems with pitcher injuries. They have amazing talent brought in every year on the Cubs team, I don't know if it only falls on the head coach, the entire staff seems to be lacking to me. Wood is an enigma. I feel like if he ever does pull out of it, he'll put toegther a few great years, but it won't be this year next year and possibly not the year after that.

I agree with most of what everyone has already said.

He's got an amazing arm that he hasn't quite learned to harness yet, most likely because of a combination of injuries and shitty management by the Cubs.
I think Cubs fans are going to wonder what could have been for a long time. I don't think he's in Chicago 2-3 years from now.

As a fan, this is just plain frustrating. If he can pitch in relief and stay healthy then I guess that's the best thing for him and the Cubs. I've wondered why they haven't let him just sit the year out and try to learn to pitch correctly. It would probably be of help if he was able to build up his legs, too. Leg strength is important to get power and should lessen strain on the arm.

this is the common reaction from people who think the only requirement to being a closer is being able to throw hard.

kerry wood lacks the control to be an effective closer at this point in his career, not to mention the fact the cubs seem to have a closer who is doing pretty damn good so far (two blown in 16 save opportunities this year, i think, and the cubs went onto win both of his blown saves)

the cubs have about nine guys who can start games for them; wood should be shut down for the rest of the season and either learn how to pitch or start opening restaurants. he has some of the best stuff in the game when he has it and i like his competitive attitude, but either learn how to get out there 25+ times a year or go away.

i'm sure he's resistant to doing so, most likely fearing that without throwing across his body his pitches won't break as well.

I've got an interesting perspective on Kerry Wood from sitting where I sit occassionally at Cubs' games. I sit directly behind home plate about 10 rows up for about 20 Cubs' games a year. This is also where a lot of opposing teams' scouts sit. I've had many an opportunity to talk with a couple of scouts about Kerry Wood. They all say the same thing that Steve Stone said at the beginning of this year (not the exact words, but close): "If Kerry Wood doesn't change his mechanics, he will be selling cars for a living pretty quickly."

When Kerry Wood came back off the DL in June, reporters hounded him about the subject and whether he changed his mechanics or not. Wood refused to answer (probably because he was pissed about Stone's comments and didn't want to imply that Stone was right). It's been shown, however, that Wood did, in fact, change his delivery a bit.

Wood has so much torque in his arm, that the way he was delivering the ball overhead was putting a ton of pressure on his elbow. When he first came up in 1998, this wasn't a problem. When he pitched a season and a half for the Cubs, he eventually wore the elbow down. When he returned, he compensated for the elbow by putting more pressure on his shoulder. Again, at first this wasn't a problem. But then he pitched a ton of innings between 2002 and 2003, that it eventually became a problem. When he started this year, he began to compensate for the shoulder problems. The problem was, his delivery was so far out of whack that a lot of times it took Wood until the 2nd or 3rd innings to realize the problem.

Were the innings the problem? Probably to a point -- but only by virtue of exacerbating the problem. Prior and Zambrano also pitched a ton of innings in 2003. The difference between Prior's injury and Wood's, however, was that Prior's was caused by compensating for his achilles' injury at the start of 2004. The tendinitis in his elbow was not the result of innings. Plus, Prior's delivery is more fluid and erect than Wood's that he was able to recover from his injury quicker than Wood.

Now, who's fault is it? Who knows? Baker gets criticized for how he handles his pitchers whether it's too many innings or too few. The problem, I believe, lies with management's refusal to change things when it had a chance. Too often times it listens to Wood and how he felt he should handle things. Yet Wood is one of the most stubborn players on the team. He refuses to change mechanics.

Now he's on the DL and will be headed to the bullpen when he gets back. He'll have surgery in the off-season and return next year in the bullpen. He is owed $11 million next year, with a mutual option of $13 million in 2007 which the Cubs will not pick up. So, where does that leave him? Who knows? But his injuries have been marked by a little bit of everything: mechanics, stubborness, management's ineptitude and bad luck.

True, but like Chris just said he's stubborn. At some point you have to say enough is enough. If he wants to continue to be a major league pitcher, he is going to have to figure out how to stay healthy enough to be productive whether he is a starter, reliever, or closer. If he keeps goin on the DL after every 2 games he actually appears in, then he's not going to be in the big leagues much longer.

the thing is, and i agree with almost all of your posts, but i put the blame on the management of kerry wood instead of him. he would throw both sides of doubleheaders in high school. not his fault, bad management. the cubs drafted him, and as chris alluded to, any scout worth his salt could tell you his mechanics were going to lead to disaster. his injuries haven't been the kind that just happen, that is, one bad pitch and an elbow pops. his are gradual, with every pitch bringing him closer to serious injury. this is entirely because his mechanics have failed to improve, and every bit of the blame goes to the chicago cubs organization. the manager, the pitching coach, and on down the line. i only see two reasons, and i think it's a mixture. one is selfishness and the other is simply that the cubs don't know what they're doing. i consider cubs management to be made up of selfish people who don't know what they're doing, especially in regards to pitchers.

chris is exactly right about the torque wood produces that puts his elbow and shoulder at risk. everybody knows this, except apparently dusty baker and whoever the hell the cubs pitching coach is, probably some stupid old white ex-manager. not only has dusty not proactively changed wood's motion, he's had him throw 141 pitch complete games in the middle of the summer.

only mike maddux can save him now.

wood's future is with that hot ass wife of his!

Kerry has got to be one of the most over hyped players ever. He had one 20 strikeout game in 1998 and they named him the next Nolan Ryan. Now, he seems like a DL regular.

.215 avg. against in his first 3 innings over the past 4 years

I can't say this is a surprise. It wouldn't surprise me if they find serious damage in there and he misses next season too.

CHICAGO -- Chicago Cubs right-hander Kerry Wood will have season-ending arthroscopic surgery on his right shoulder Wednesday.

Wood, who switched to the bullpen Aug. 5 from the rotation to try and alleviate the soreness in his shoulder, was available to pitch Monday night before he is sidelined for the rest of the season.

The surgery will be performed by Dr. Timothy Kremchek at Beacon Orthopedics outside of Cincinnati.

Wood, the 1998 NL Rookie of the Year, missed the entire 1999 season after Tommy John elbow ligament replacement surgery. He has been bothered by arm problems the last two seasons.

Wood is 3-4 with a 4.29 ERA this season. He has started 10 games and made 10 relief appearances.