Wilbon and Bob Ryan Got It Wrong On Pedro

first of all, pedro, welcome to the WFC phillies. glad to have you on board. i think i had forgotten how nasty your stuff was when you were with the red sox (thank you ESPN for the highlight package).

last night on PTI, wilbon and bob ryan had a debate in oddsmakers as to whether or not you would pitch in the playoffs. wilbon went 100% and ryan went 92%, but the backbone of their logic rested on the fact that the phillies would make the playoffs, not whether or not pedro would pitch in the playoffs.

there is a slight, but significant difference. of course, the phillies are going to make the playoffs (on a side note, they managed to get through the whole segment without mentioning that the phillies are the DEFENDING WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS, yet at the same time blasting the NL east as weak and even offering that the florida marlins could catch the phils for the division), and pedro is currently on the team, but pedro pitching in the playoffs is no slam dunk. he hasn't pitched in the bigs in quite some time. we know we aren't going to get the pedro of old, but we could get the pedro of the not-so-distant past (i.e. his tenure with the mets). if we get the pedro of mets vintage, the phillies front office would have NO PROBLEM shutting him down, especially for the bargain price of $1 mil. the pedro signing is low-risk/high-reward. if he pitches adequately, it will be a great signing. if he sucks, the team will be no worse off for rolling the dice.

i respect wilbon and bob ryan a lot, but on this case, their analysis was dead wrong.