Robert Irvin update

With Penn's first spring practice less than a month away, it's time to start keeping an eye on the gridiron. First item of business: Robert Irvin's balky shoulder.

Quakers coach Al Bagnoli said that Irvin will be on the field in a limited capacity throughout the spring.

"We're not going to have him throw very much," Bagnoli said. "But he is going to be in the huddle, he is going to be able to hand off, he's going to be able to do some footwork stuff. I doubt he'll be cleared to throw all out."

The junior quarterback, who may end up taking a ninth semester, had surgery last March, then tried to come back for the 2007 season. It remains unclear to his coaches if he never fully recovered from that operation or if he took a hit in one of the first two games, but he was shut down after the loss to Villanova and went under the knife again in October.

"He's in much better physical shape, including arm strength, at this time of the year than he was last year," Bagnoli said. "One of the better things we've done is that once we saw the real state of his shoulder, we really shut him down very early. ... So now he's had from September virtually until [the coming] August [for] what should be a 3-to-6-month recovery time.

"Long-term, the prognosis should be outstanding. Short-term, we've got to be careful, because we don't want a setback"