Other pitchers who had stress fractures of a rib in recent years:

Tim Wakefield
Matt Morris
Sterling Hitchhock
Jake Peavy

I don’t remember anyone suggesting that Wake or Peavy did something untoward to cause it, nor compared them to Pavano. It happens. Considering the stress and the torque exerted on the body every time a pitch is thrown, it’s surprising that it doesn’t happen more frequently.

Does this new partnership with SNY mean we’ll continue to be exposed to “ol’ gravel-pit”-voiced Scott Ferrall?

Ugh.

I never heard anyone project Kennedy to be more than a #3. The critical point was that he could reach that status sooner than Hughes or Joba might reach their projections.

Well, I didn’t watch the video, but people need to keep something in mind: when Kennedy was DRAFTED, before he ever even through a pitch as a pro, his OWN AGENT said he was a middle-of-the-rotation pitcher. That’s his own agent, none other than hype-ster Scott Boras. Kennedy was always thought of, even by the Yanks, as a three-four type of guy. I guess because Joba and Phil were projected as aces Kennedy kind of got lumped in with them and people are expecting too much out of him. He’s not Mussina back when Mussina was good — people need to cut that comparison out. Just because they both bend at the waist to check on baserunners doesn’t make them the same pitcher. Mussina, up until 2003, was an ace — 92-93 fastball, plus curve, plus control. Kennedy has none of that. Kennedy’s future is at the back end of a rotation. If people expect more, they will be disappointed.