Edit: Oh god we are so screwed
This could be bad news. This could be not news. What this can't be is good news. After going the rehab route for a couple months and seeing little in the way of progress, Bedard will undergo exploratory surgery on the 26th, which basically means Dr. Yocum's going to play What's Wrong With This Picture? with the important bits of Erik's left wing until he gets bored. The best-case scenario is that there's not much wrong and nothing major has to be stitched or stapled, but the possibility exists that they're going to discover something bad, which would obviously endanger much, if not all of Bedard's 2009. Which would suck. Although hey it would give us a reason to hang on to Washburn. So that's something.
I'm not going to write Bedard off, not yet; for all we know, he'll be patched up and ready to go in no time. But I was hoping it wouldn't come to this, because I'm easily spooked by a pitcher getting his shoulder cut open. There are all kinds of nasty demons they could find in there that would put Bedard on the shelf for a while. It's pretty much the last place you'd like to see a pitcher get the knife.
This is our reality, though, so I suppose we've little choice but to hope for the best. We didn't get to see the Erik Bedard we thought we were getting in 2008. Hopefully he's able to show his face in 2009. Because the Erik Bedard we thought we were getting is one of the best pitchers on the planet, and the longer he's gone, the worse things are - not just for us, but for baseball as a whole. Supreme talent should never be forced into dormancy.