Lilly’s Surgery

Ted Lilly underwent successful surgery on his left shoulder yesterday. He won’t begin throwing until early March, which means he won’t be ready to go when the season begins. The Cubs are hopeful he’ll be ready to pitch sometime in April, but considering it was surgery on the shoulder I think that’s wishful thinking. Setbacks are common after surgery and Lilly isn’t likely to recover from this as perfectly as a mid-April timetable would require. I’d be surprised if we see Ted Lilly start a game for the Cubs before the middle of May and it wouldn’t be too surprising to see him out until the All-Star break. Ted Lilly said he hoped to avoid surgery, but that his left shoulder wasn’t getting any better with rest. So Lilly, who emerged as the ace of the Cubs pitching staff this season, gave in and underwent arthroscopic surgery Tuesday. If Carlos Zambrano put off surgery for one month, what do you guys think the media and fan reaction would be? Yeah, it wouldn’t be like this. Ted Lilly emerged as the ace? Really? Pretty close, but considering Zambrano was the ace going into 2009 and he had a slightly better FIP, Ted Lilly did not emerge as the ace of the staff. Let me repeat that, Ted Lilly did not emerge as the ace of the Chicago Cubs pitching staff in 2009. I’ve read this far too many times and each time it’s as wrong as it was the first time I read it. I’m guessing if this were Zambrano who did this, the writing would be something like this: Carlos Zambrano said he hoped to avoid surgery though inside sources tell me that the Cubs informed Zambrano he should have the surgery as soon as the season ended. The Cubs hoped Zambrano would undergo surgery in early October so he could be ready to go when the season started, but as the selfish Zambrano has so often done, he chose to wait a month putting the Cubs 2010 season in jeapordy. So Zambrano, who failed to win 10 games and is no longer the ace of the Cubs staff, gave in a month too late and had surgery on his oft-injured pitching shoulder. It would look something like that. My first thought when I saw he had surgery was that it made it more likely the Cubs would re-sign Rich Harden. After all, do you really want to go into 2010 with a rotation of Zambrano, Dempster, Wells, Gorzelanny and Samardzija? Me neither. It appears the Cubs are quite eager to suck in 2010. Cubs general manager Jim Hendry finds himself with a hole in his starting rotation for the beginning of the 2010 season, but he did not seem to think this latest development means there is any more urgency to retain right-handed starter Rich Harden, who becomes a free agent. Hendry’s top priority this off-season - aside from trading right fielder Milton Bradley - has been to try to re-sign left-handed reliever John Grabow. So Hendry’s top priorities this offseason are to trade a very talented RF for nothing, re-sign an average LOOGY and not offer arbitration to the best starting pitcher on the staff. You gotta love stupidity.