Sunday marks the return of Mike Vick. Sure, he played a few meaningless preseason games, but that's not the same as coming off suspension to play in a regular season game. In those preseason games, though, Vick received a solid positive response from the fans. The question now is whether or not we, as fans, ought to cheer him and whether or not we ought to cheer the team on.

I, for one, will be cheering on both wholeheartedly. <ljcut="Wait... what?!">

The instant reaction to Vick's re-appearance in the NFL (or even in public) is to recall the atrocities committed while fighting and "training" dogs and to call for further re-punishment. While I agree that what he did probably deserves more than 2 years in prison, he did serve his time and, by any rule of society, he's now free to live his life, which includes practicing any trade he's capable of making a living from. The idea of constantly looking back to those days is not how a thinking person approaches any criminal, no matter how awful.

So, let's apply some thought from a thinking man. I'll arbitrarily choose Pascal. His wager was quite simple: We can't know if god exists, but we can control whether or not we act piously. It's best then to act piously on the chance of getting into heaven. The worst outcome there is a good life, rather than acting heinously and being put in peril whether god exists or not.

I'll be applying the same logic to Mike Vick. I can not know two things about Vick: How sincere he is about being a prodigal son and role model; How well he will perform on the field. I can control only one thing: Cheer Vs Boo.

With my "wager" the outcomes are simple, just as in Pascal's: With sincerity, the community gains a positive role model. With solid play, the Eagles do well and we (with luck) see another fancy parade.

Let's review the results if we boo Vick.
There's four possible outcomes: He's sincere but sucks on the field. He's insincere and sucks on the field. He's sincere and plays well. He's insincere but plays well.

Going one at a time:
Sincerity + Poor Play = The Eagles fanbase takes another black eye for bashing a guy trying and succeeding in turning his life around. Loss.
Insincerity + Poor Play = The Eagles fanbase can be justified for booing him in January, but they're watching other teams in the playoffs. Loss.
Sincerity + Good Play = "Boo-birds" label stays; Playoff berth and Super Bowl run comes with shame. Loss, esp if they win a Super Bowl.
Insincerity + Good Play = Asterisk. The entire season comes with an asterisk... and we know it. Loss.

Nothing good can come from us booing him, save for a sense of justification if he remains a jerk.

So... let's try getting behind him and we cheer him:
Sincerity + Poor Play: Maybe, we shed that "boo-birds" thing... or at least we have a mushy center underneath the booing exterior. But the community gains something and we're okay with that. Win, but small.
Insincerity + Poor Play: Eagles fans look like jackasses or desperate for a win in the Super Bowl. Loss.
Insincerity + Good Play: The Asterisk again. But this time we can ignore it, like the RedSox fans ignore steroids or the Patriots fans ignore the bevy of cheats. Loss, but we dance in the streets nonetheless.
Sincerity + Good Play: Here's the ultimate win for us. The community gets a voice of a man who turned his life from utter crap into something good again. The city gets to dance in the streets. Sports media has to acknowledge that Philadelphia's fans aren't the douches they say we are.

So... I'm going to put my bet in with the 25% chance of a positive outcome and cheer... and then hope hope hope that I'm "right."