Ugh... The Sun-Times is reporting that  Harden has a small tear in his shoulder and is "not even close to throwing off a mound yet."

This clearly is not good for our pitching staff and should probably get  Hendry & Co on the horn about signing another starter. Lets just hope that  Harden doesn't have to take the  surgery route and can pitch effectively for us for the entire season.  I'm sure Al will have more on this later.

Same old story for 'The Employee.' I don't ever wish anyone to be injured but after Prior's falling out, I can't say I'm too upset. For those of you who thought we missed out by not holding on to him for longer, this should change your mind.

Its almost comical how often he gets hurt, the guy could have really been something spectacular. Looks like Shawn Estes doesn't have to worry about Mark stealing his gig for a while (although I'm sure his terrible pitching will take care of that).

So I made the 20 minute trip from Iowa City to Cedar Rapids to see Sandberg and the Chiefs play the Kernels. The Chiefs won 5-2 in a pretty exciting game. Some highlights:

Josh Donaldson (C- 1st Round 07)- Got the offense going with a 2 run homer in the 1st that was a blast to Left Field. He also got a hard hit single in between the SS and 3B in the 6th or 7th. He also should have gotten a stolen base as it appeared to everyone around that he slid under a high tag but was none-the-less called out. The call resulted in Ryne Sandberg running in from his 3rd base coach box and having a fun little 30 second argument with the umpire. On the negative side for Donaldson, he had a rough night behind the plate, giving up two stolen bases on throws that bounced to the bag. He also seemed to drop quite a few balls that were very easy to catch and in the strike zone. Donaldson also provided the funniest moment of the evening as he attempted to snap throw at a runner on first and ended up hitting the left handed batter in the helmet. All in all, he showed a nice swing but needs some serious work behind the plate.

Cliff Andersen (RF- 9th Round 06)- Broke open a 2-2 tie in the 7th inning with a 3 run blast to right field. I was very surprised to see a RF in the leadoff spot, but it seemed to work for the Chiefs today as Anderson had an additional 2 singles and scored 2 runs.

Dylan Johnston (LF- 4th Round 05)- Had 2 hits and a walk. He is a big guy at 6' 225lbs. and got caught stealing. He also tried to bunt for a hit in the 2nd inning and got thrown out by about 5 steps.

Kyler Burke (1B- Traded from Padres for Barrett)- Had a single today and made some nice picks at first base. Was surprised to see him at 1B because I had thought he was an outfielder but he looked nice at 1B (which isn't that difficult I guess).

Billy Muldowny (8th Round 06) got the start and threw 3.2 innings and gave up 2 earned. His fastball topped out at 86 and was consistently in the 83-84 range. Had pretty good command of the strike zone though. Jordan Latham (29th Round 06) threw 2.1 uneventful innings and got the win. I was most impressed with Craig Muschko (22nd Round 07) who pitched 2 hitless innings and was sitting in the 88-90mph range and was making the Kernels looks silly. Steve Vento (23rd Round 07) got his second save of the year walking one batter and striking out one.

Box score of the game here. I  Will be making the trip back up to CR for the Wednesday game.

Okay so I stole this title from a sports blog that I read, which also has the story-

http://www.mlb-rumors.blogspot.com/

I don't have time to do any research on this to see if there is anything too it (I am sitting in between classes and grabbing something to eat) but I wonder if anyone has heard of this before. As I'm not a superstitious person, I'm not purposing that this is a "curse" or is the reason for our 99 years of failure, but rather as a conversation piece to carry us to our game this evening.

Neal Cotts optioned to AAA Iowa

Koyie Hill assigned to minor league camp

http://viewfromthebleachers.com/

http://blogs.chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sports_hardball/2008/02/cubs-reliever-i.html

Apparently some guy tried to rob him and then punched him in the face a few times. Article says he has swelling but nothing too serious and will be able to throw fine on Monday according to Lou. Thank god nothing worse happened, as it probably could have.

For an irregular heartbeat. The rotoworld article said that DeRo was sitting up and alert so hopefully this turns out to be nothing.

The article also says this has happened to DeRo before, but I can't seem to remember how long ago this was. Can anyone help me out here?

http://rotoworld.com/content/home_MLB.aspx