Chad Pennington Wants to Do More Than Throw Changeups

This is the first I'm hearing of this, but, apparently, Dolphins quarterback Chad Pennington has a noodle arm. And not only that, he's been plagued with the affliction his entire football career. Weird.

Well, he's had enough; after unceremoniously losing his job to Kellen Clemens last year in New York, Pennington decided to do something about it. He got together with his trainer Charles Petrone to meticulously reexamine his approach to throwing a football.

The quarterback conducted an extensive study into how he could alter his throwing mechanics to increase his velocity while maintaining his accuracy. Then, he and Petrone took his newfound devotion to the weight room.

Pennington and Petrone also sought assistance from a body alignment specialist and a rehabilitation specialist.

''We basically brought in a whole Team Pennington, and I was making sure everybody was doing their job,'' Petrone said. ``So this year will be even better because he's getting these alignments done and he's getting healthy.

``He has all this power, and his body feels good.''

That's all well and good, but I'll be honest, I haven't noticed any difference in Pennington's fastball. That's not to say he's a bad quarterback, or can't make it in the NFL (since, you, know, he's pretty good, and has been in the league for nine seasons), just that he still seems to be bringing the Charlie Hough heater.

If Pennington were really serious about this, he'd take Simmons' advice:

After watching Jake Delhomme throw frozen ropes this season, I couldn't help but wonder why Chad Pennington just doesn't get elective Tommy John surgery. It couldn't hurt and could only help, right?

Well, considering that just about everybody coming off Tommy John surgery is roughly 150 percent better than before, yeah, I'd say it couldn't hurt.