"Now we understand a little better why Kerry Wood turned down at least $10 million more from two other teams for another season of bad baseball with the Cubs.

Now we know why the money Wood makes in the game matters less to him than the kind he plans to raise in the community alongside his wife and three children. Why Wood wants to stay in Chicago no matter how badly another city's baseball team might covet him before the trade deadline.

It's hard to launch the Wood Family Foundation to help Chicagoland kids, which Kerry and Sarah Wood will do Thursday at Wrigley Field, without actually being in Chicago. Wood's ambitious goals include building a high school baseball stadium, giving out 1,000 coats, buying school supplies for Chicago Public Schools students and expanding his reach for the first time via social networks such as Twitter.

Good luck finding a Chicago athlete more committed to use his platform in a positive way than the modern-day Mr. Cub.

"Our grand scheme is helping local kids any way possible," Wood said Wednesday. "We don't have a family business to hand down but this is something one day we can give our children (Justin, 5; Katie, 3; Charlotte, 20 months) to run for a long time. We're going to make a difference."

To get back to being a factor on the mound, Wood tested the blister on his right index finger in a simulated game Wednesday and expects to come off the disabled list before Friday's Cubs-White Sox series. Even before the layoff, this season couldn't have been what Wood expected returning to his baseball roots.

You don't plan a homecoming because you anticipate a housecleaning. You don't give Jim Hendry a bargain-basement, one-year, $1.5 million deal to spend the summer spiraling toward the NL Central cellar.

"It's been tough," Wood acknowledged. "We're all frustrated. We have to figure out at least how to make the second half fun to come to work because there have been times it hasn't been fun to come to work."

My sense is Wood should lead the National League in regrets. He disagrees."