Mark Prior: R.I.P.

I'm done. Finished. I quit. For 4 straight seasons, I've been waiting for Mark Prior to be "Mark Prior" again. For 4 straight seasons, I never gave up hope, trying to clear him a spot on my Fantasy Baseball teams and hoping he could turn things around. But not anymore.

As of today, I've given up on Mark Prior.

I won't pay attention to his rehab starts. I won't hope for him to get called back up. I would bet money on the fact that Mark Prior will never throw another major league pitch for the Cubs again.

Don't get me wrong...I loved the kid. When he got called up, I scoured eBay to find an autographed Mark prior baseball, a baseball that still sits on top of our bookshelf today next to my bobbleheads. I own 10 Mark Prior rookie cards. I only started watching baseball seriously in 1998, so I wasn't able to follow Kerry Wood's rise to the majors. Mark prior was my first "I will pay attention to every move you make from draft day till you get to the Majors" player. A large part of the excitement of the 2003 season was knowing Mark would go out there every 5 days and shut someone down. He went 18-6 that year with 245 strikeouts and would have won the Cy Young if not for Eric Gagne converting 100 saves or so (and it's a little odd how similar both of their careers have been from that year on).

When the Cubs were talking to the Orioles about a possible Prior for Tejada swap, I thought it would have been a terrible move for the Cubs. Now, it would have looked like genius. I can't help but think about how good we would be with a healthy Prior right now. Would you want to face this rotation in a short series?

Zambrano
Prior
Hill
Lilly


If Prior was healthy, we wouldn't have to worry about Wade Miller every 5 days. That would be amazing...

So what brought all of this on? Yesterday in his first minor league start, Prior was supposed to go 3 innings at least. He left in the second inning with "discomfort" in his shoulder. Honestly, I think he's more injured than he's letting on and he's not saying anything about it because he wanted his $3.5 million before he season.

A few years ago when Prior was accused of taking steroids, I thought it was crazy talk, but now I'm not so sure. The constant injuries are there. His velocity has dropped from 97 mph to about 89. And the most damning piece of evidence of all...the disappearance of Calfzilla.

Prior's teammates at USC nicknamed him Calfzilla because of the fact that he had massive cartoonish calves. Now all of the sudden, they're gone. Now before you say "Come on...his calves get a bit smaller and you accuse him of steroid use?" you have to keep in mind that his calves were bigger than most apartments in my neighborhood. And now, they're nothing.

Compare these two pictures (from his rookie year and from the 2004 game where he got hit in the elbow by a batted ball, respectively)...




...to this picture of Mark in Spring Training this year:


Whether it's steroids or not, something fishy is going on.

I'm giving up on Prior now, because there's only 2 ways this can end up:

1. Prior remains hurt and never comes close to being his old self.
2. Prior pulls a Lou Brock/Rafael Palmero, gets traded, and goes on to have a Hall of Fame career.

Either way, I think it's best that I cut ties with him now, once and for all. Here's to the 2003 version of Mark Prior. May he rest in peace.

Fuck Dusty Baker too.