If you haven’t bought a copy of Papelbon’s article that was featured on the cover, at least read it online. Verducci, as always, writes a great article.

Read the Full Sports Illustrated Article on Papelbon

There is a lot of emphasis on things like pitch counts, rest days, off days, wear and tear, and generally, a much more conservative feeling about how to handle baseball players today than there ever has been before. The new school thinkers point to statistics and other ‘hard’ evidence showing correlations between overuse and injury. The old school thinkers tend to be more short sighted and focused on winning today, becuase after all, anything can happen. Somewhere in the middle probably lies the truth. After all, statistical correlation doesn’t necessarily mean cause and effect - and there are thousand of other factors that affect every game in addition to what is consistently measured. But any way you slice it, baseball players are being micro-managed, at least physically, in the game today.

If you are one of those old school thinkers who just wants to win, your eyes may be opened up reading this article. If there ever was a case of medical advances and measurements making a huge impact on a season, it is in the case of Jonathan Papelbon as revealed in this article. After all, where would we be without Wild Thing coming to the mound in Fenway during the top of the 9th inning? Verducci shows just how important the medical side of baseball management really is, and even if you aren’t a Sox fan, you should appreciate what has gone into making Paps the guy he is today.

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