Chicago Cubs Baseball

Chicago Cubs baseball spring training is serving far beyond its role as a bridge between the stink of the 2006 season and the promise of the new one.

With each spring training day’s passing it becomes obviously clear the dysfunctional relationships that exists between the team and some of its players - particularly Kerry Wood and Mark Prior.

There is a distinction between a forest and its trees. Just like a clear thinking individual knows when as part of a sum, it’s sometimes better to cut and run. One might be the loneliest number, but as least it knows it stands alone.

With Wood and Prior’s ongoing injury problems, imagined or otherwise, only and continuously leaves the pitching staff standing on shaky ground. Will he or won’t - as in be able to pitch - is not a new phenomena. No, this is a yearly jaunt through the psyches and medical charts of two once extremely promising pitchers.

No longer. These two are casualties of their own hype and misfortune. Whatever hard promise Wood and Prior held in a Cubs uniform was seen and felt by the organization and Cubbiedom in 2003.

Four years later the Cubs organization and fans are still being treated to the same song and dance. Except only the tune is familiar and it’s not such a treat anymore.

In little more than a month’s time:

• Wood’s spring training start is delayed after suffering a chest bruise from slipping in a hot tub.
• A triceps pull shelves Wood a week.
• A combination of bad mechanics and a sinking psyche sends Prior to a minor league spring training game to rehabilitate both his spirit and his stuff.
• Uncertainty is the only way describe the opening day status for both.

To summarize the points, spring training 2007 isn’t much different than the previous three years.

And make no mistake, whatever health issues Prior and Wood have or had, the Chicago Cubs organization has been the enabling partner in this relationship.

I can only think it’s a combination of blind faith and dumb hope that keeps Cubs management and these two together. It’s like having an abusive spouse, but knowing one day Bubba’s going to put the bottle down and the beatings will stop.

Will Prior and Wood ever return to their “old” forms? Maybe. Maybe not.

I think the larger question is, so what if they do?

In a combined 13 major league seasons, neither has been a 20-game winner. Wood has amassed a total of 71 wins in eight seasons, and Prior’s got 42 wins in five.

And neither should ever have their names mentioned in the same sentence with the word “durability.” Only three times has the duo turned in 200-plus innings pitched seasons - combined.

As for leadership abilities, logic tells me if one is thought of as “soft” in baseball circles, that thought process transcends to the Cubs’ clubhouse as well. As for Wood, stay off the hot tub floor. Leadership requires presence - and not just in uniform, but reporting for duty.

If Chicago Cubs management continues on its dysfunctional path with these two, which it looks like it will, as Cubs fans it appears our only hope is intervention.

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