Brian Wilson Says He'll Be Ready for Opener

Brian Wilson, who suffered an oblique strain over the weekend, doesn't think that the injury, originally slated to force him out for an "indefinite period," will prevent him from pitching in the Giants' season opener on the 31st.

Or at least, according to what Wilson said on Monday, he could throw a baseball right now but just doesn't want to risk further injury. (Which doesn't exactly mean the same thing, but, hey, it's Brian Wilson. What did you expect?)

"If you're asking me if I could throw today, the answer is yes," Wilson told Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle. "But there's no point throwing today on March 21 in the scheme of things. That's not what we're preparing for. The last thing I want to do is get three more appearances in (in spring training), which don't mean a whole lot. The worst thing that can happen is a tear, which is not worth missing the entire season for."

Wilson also made an analogy -- "It's like trying to be a public speaker with strep throat. You can speak but what's the point?" -- that doesn't really provide any reasonable information about his injury.

And he dropped some sarcasm about his presence on the roster -- "As far as making the team, there's a good chance I'll be there. I'll be dressing. Timmy will be starting. If they call me, I'll be warming up." -- that, again, doesn't provide any worthwhile information that should make Giants' fans feel better.

The reality of Wilson's situation is this: he has a strained oblique muscle, and there's no logical process that gets him on the field before he's properly healed. The Giants are coming off a World Series-winning season and Wilson is coming off an absolute monster (1.81 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 48 saves) of a season.

Rushing him back onto the mound just so he can pitch by the time the season starts makes little-to-no sense from either his or the team's perspective.

Unless of course the point of getting him in the bullpen is to keep him as far away from Charlie Sheen -- lest we forget, the two have been kicking it in the off-season -- as possible. Then the potential downside (awesome Vatican assassinations, Major League III getting green-lit) vastly outweighs the simple nightmare that is a season-ending injury.

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