So as we noted yesterday, the Chicago Cubs’ offseason prize, Milton Bradley, left his first Spring Training game very early with a strained quad. He says it’s not a big deal, but you’ll have to forgive me if I’m already near panic-stricken.
”I felt it warming up,” Bradley said. ”I just let them know I felt tight, tighter than I should have been. And since we’ve got a quarter-season worth of games in spring training, I thought the best course of action was to let them know right now. If it’s April 6, then I’d play.”
Even if the quad gets worse before it gets better, Bradley doesn’t seem concerned about missing time in spring training.
”Spring is spring,” he said. ”I had like five at-bats last spring and hit .320 [during the season]. So spring is overrated.” CHICAGO SUN-TIMES.
That’s probably true. But if you’re already feeling a mild strain – when you should be as loose as you’re going to be all season – what’s it going to be like in a month? Two months? Five months?
Lou Piniella doesn’t sound terribly concerned either. Which I suppose is good.
‘We don’t have to rush anybody or anything,” Piniella said. ”So we’ll give him a couple of days and run him back out there.”
I suppose you could read that another way, though. Maybe he wasn’t saying, “it’s not serious.” He may be saying, “Spring Training isn’t that serious, so we don’t have to rush him back from this possibly not minor injury.”
We’ll just have to wait and see. Frankly, I don’t care if he doesn’t play another Spring Training inning.