Jon

I felt like PSU's style of play matched up really well against NU's when I saw them play last weekend. If the Wildcats are just going to shoot 25 foot 3-pointers all game, they are screwed (unless they go like 15-25 from behind the line). If they can get the ball inside, they may have a shot. On the other hand, it's awfully tough to beat the same team 3 times in one season, so history isn't on Penn State's side. More so than the first matchup, Penn State's defense seemed to be a lot more aggressive against the Princeton offense than any other team's and Northwestern wasn't prepared for it at all. They couldn't hold on to the ball. Amazingly, though, they shot 15/16 from the FT line last night, which is a good sign. It's not going to be another blowout for Penn State, but Northwestern needs to make adjustments if they're going to win. They might have to go inside more, especially considering Penn State's size, but they're just so bad down there. Hopefully they can at least find more backdoor cuts.

Well, it's all how it's framed. Yes Prior has been "delayed," but only in terms of when they thought he was going to be ready to throw to hitters. Nobody can be expected to keep to a schedule exactly. The bottom line is that not only is Prior not being shut down, his actual progress isn't being delayed. He's still going forward, building up arm strength, and isn't experiencing pain. There's really nothing at all to worry about in terms of what Rothschild said today. What? They pushed back his first session against live hitters a couple of days, but he's still throwing and building up arm strength. Sullivan can call it a "delay," but his actual throwing isn't being pushed back at all. It's not like they've shut him down for a few days.

Well, it's all how it's framed. Yes Prior has been "delayed," but only in terms of when they thought he was going to be ready to throw to hitters. Nobody can be expected to keep to a schedule exactly. The bottom line is that not only is Prior not being shut down, his actual progress isn't being delayed. He's still going forward, building up arm strength, and isn't experiencing pain. There's really nothing at all to worry about in terms of what Rothschild said today. Bullpen sessions are overrated. Bullpen sessions are nothing compared to facing live hitters. Obviously his "bullpen" sessions haven't been to encouraging if they have "delayed" his scheduled time to face live hitters. If there's anything I've learned from the Cubs over the last couple years, especially when it comes to the 2 golden kids, is to read between the lines and to take everything they say with a grain of salt. You have to build up arm strength before facing live hitters and he's only thrown off the mound a handful of times. And for actual bullpen sessions, we're talking about only a few. It's not like he's been going at this for several weeks. I'm not sure how else to read this other than he's a little (and by little I mean a day or two) behind where they thought he'd be when they talked about his schedule a week ago.

Well, it's all how it's framed. Yes Prior has been "delayed," but only in terms of when they thought he was going to be ready to throw to hitters. Nobody can be expected to keep to a schedule exactly. The bottom line is that not only is Prior not being shut down, his actual progress isn't being delayed. He's still going forward, building up arm strength, and isn't experiencing pain. There's really nothing at all to worry about in terms of what Rothschild said today.

Looks like half an article of nothing. All they did was push back his first session against hitters a couple of days and he's still throwing a good number of pitches in bullpen sessions.

According to comments made by Angelo at the convention, the Bears are working on a long-term extension for Briggs.

The game will also be on WGN Radio.

Just got it today. Not bad for $10. I wish there was more, though. Ron talking about the streaker is always great. "When he came out of the bullpen, I could tell he was a short reliever."

http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/sp/getty/oly_full.56916144jg004_cubs_giants.jpg

Not a great win, but it was a nice way to finish out my time in the student section (I doubt I'm going to spend $83 for young alumni season tickets for basketball games). Horribly officiated game on both sides in the first half and Minnesota blew it on a defensive goaltend on an uncontested rebound attempt last in the game as the ball was bouncing off, but he clearly grabbed it while it was still over the rim. Major boner. I'm not looking forward to facing Penn State. The perimeter defense has really been lacking as of late. Oh, and Vedran won the first scoring title in Northwestern's history since 1951.

Time to go say goodbye to Vedran and Mo. :(

Pie with another triple!

It's basically the same, if not the exact same. Last year, I believe the changed it in the first week of the season.

Crushed. It was a hanging breaking ball.

DOPE SLAP!

Moore and Dope with very nice defensive plays that inning, although they ruled the one that Dope gloved a foul ball. Moore's was a strong barehanded throw on a chopper.

It was a single. He took a step back and then couldn't get to it in time. All he could do was trap it.

And Jones costs Williams a run. Didn't sound like he lost it in the sun at all, just misjudged it from the beginning.

Both Prior and Miller threw 50 pitches off the mound yesterday according to WGN Radio. Sounds like Wade is now ahead of Wood.

Based on how they played against China and Chinese Taipei, teams who have a combined, what, zero major leaguers? Agreed. I think how they fare against South Korea tonight will reveal much more about Japan's chances in round two. The Koreans have some decent pitching, perhaps even better than Japan's. And they should be well rested. I don't think they're going to have any pitch count issues.

I'm not going to claim to know how the arm builds up strength in pitchers, but he has only thrown off the mound a few times. Two more sessions out of the bullpen is a significant amount of throwing relative to what he has already done. The idea behind this seems to be that with these two extra sessions, his arm will be better able to respond to not throwing for over a week. Considering he's coming off of surgery, this may be best. You don't want to have to shut it down at all when you're rehabbing after surgery, but it seems like if you have to, you should try to do it when the shoulder is as strong as possible. That would probably create less stress on it when he starts to throw again. Is it a risk? I suppose. But considering that he hasn't felt pain in his knee at all while pitching and based what the doctors have said, it doesn't appear that it's a very significant risk. And having him throw may not be that significant, either, but it appears more so than the risk to his knee.

This is from Hendry: Without knowing anything about whether it could actually cause more damage or not, the logic seems about right (this time). If the surgery goes as planned, the real setback will be him losing arm strength. In theory, building it up before the surgery will mean that he has less ground to cover when he's able to get back on the mound. In theory. In theory Communism works. In theory. I acutally don't have any problem with what the Cubs are doing here. Well that didn't take long. Neither do I. Unlike August of last year, this isn't a significant delay in his surgery and there seems to be a good reason behind it. Only the Cubs know how strong Kerry's arm is right now, so it's hard to judge whether or not these two extra bullpen sessions are meaningless or not. And it's quite possible that the surgery couldn't be scheduled until around that time, anyways.