Off-Season Thoughts/Hall of Fame Ruminations

Phillies Off-Season Grade= C- (So Far/Subject To Change)

I thought about doing two separate posts to grade the Phillies off-season and bitch about Jim Rice making the Hall of Fame. But hell, I'm lazy so here we all with one great big post. But I digress.

So far, Amaro's signings of Ibanez and Moyer to costly deals are looking worse by the day. At this point, it appears that Amaro brutally overpaid for both players and has seriously hamstrung the team financially. When you consider the impending arbitration raises, dead money tied up in guys like Jenkins and Eaton and now paying last year's prices for 2 aging free agents, the Phillies lack flexibility to improve the club if needed. The Mets got a bit better, the Braves revamped their rotation and the Fish are always dangerous due to their great young pitching. While I would still give the Phillies the inside track and taking their 3rd straight NL East crown, the road hasn't gotten any easier. If the Mets are able to fill their remaining hole by signing a legitimate #3 pitcher like Oliver Perez or even Ben Sheets (both strong rumors), then the Phillies could be facing an uphill fight.

The Phillies will start the season with question marks at 2B and possibly 3B as both Chase Utley and Pedro Feliz are returning from major off-season surgeries. While Feliz will likely be ready by Opening Day, Utley will probably not be. The Phillies could fill this temporary hole with UT Eric Bruntlett or scrapheap pickup 2B Marcus Giles (He was once an all-star...seriously WTF happened?!?) or bring up prospect IF Jason Donald. Likely, knowing the Phillies penchant for veterans, Bruntlett will start at 2B and Giles will make the team on the bench until Utley is back. Donald will start in AAA as either the SS or 3B with 3B being more likely.

Honestly, considering the Phillies are coming off their first World Series victory in 28 years, its hard to really complain about any of these moves. However, they don't appear to have read the market well and they also don't appear to be taking advantage of the drastically dropping prices of 2nd tier free agents. As they jumped the gun in November, they have no money left to spend. In the past week alone, the Red Sox have managed to load up on low-risk, high-reward guys like Brad Penny, John Smoltz, Rocco Baldelli, and Takashi Saito. Any of those four would have fit very well on the Phillies roster. Unfortunately, there was no room left as Amaro is banking the upcoming season on a costly 46-year-old starting pitcher and 37-year-old leftfielder.

The Phillies are clearly not done making moves. Their bench is very lefty heavy with Dobbs, Stairs and Jenkins. Jenkins is unmovable due to his albatross of a contract and Dobbs isn't going anywhere as he's currently the best pinchhitter in baseball. That leaves Matt Stairs as the lefty without a chair when the music stops. He's limited defensively as he's really more of a DH/1B guy and we already have two other lefty bats on the bench. New acquisition C Ronny Paulino and UT Eric Bruntlett are solid bets to make the team but C Chris Coste is likely gone. Replacing Coste and Stairs won't be hard and both will likely be traded or outright released by Opening Day. The Phillies main need is a righthanded OF bat as they currently don't have a player on the 40 man roster that can fill that role. A guy that could spot start in CF would be a plus as the Phillies next best option inside the organization would be Single A Clearwater "prospect" Quentin Berry. Berry is not nearly ready and it is unlikely he'll ever be more of a fringe guy. Thus, if Vic goes down, Werth has to move over to CF where he is below average defensively and Jenkins/undetermined outfielder is shoved into a starting role in RF. The Phillies also need another lefty arm for the bullpen as JC Romero can't play until 1 June after violating the league's substance abuse policy. Right now, the Phillies will probably use JA Happ in that role but Happ has not been impressive in relief. Other internal options include going with only one lefty in Scott Eyre and loading up on right-handed relievers. That MIGHT work but the Phillies will really miss have a top lefty setup guy in the pen. There's also long-shot prospect RP Antonio Bastardo who has posted impressive L/R splits and a high K rate so far in A, AA and the Dominican Winter League. His BB rate has not been nearly as impressive and he has extreme flyball tendencies so he could be problematic. Still, you can almost guarantee he'll get a long look in spring training. The Phillies could easily surprise us all by signing one of the remaining top reliever free agents. Righty Juan Cruz is still available and he would be a great candidate for a long-term solution in the pen. He'll cost the Phillies their 2nd round pick as he's a Type A free agent and he won't come cheap. He's a top flight reliever though and he can easily step into Ryan Madson's shoes after the season as Madson likely won't be back due to Free Agency. Will Ohman and Joe Beimel are also possibilities. Personally, I don't see them signing anyone for the pen. They'll likely add another outfielder and maybe even get something of value for Coste and Stairs through trades but I don't expect Amaro to add anymore payroll...at least not until he's taken care of all of the arbitration eligible guys. Until the ownership group knows how much money it needs, they likely won't ok anymore increases to the budget. Right now, the Phillies look to come in with a payroll in the $115-120 million range, or roughly $10-15 million higher than the highest previous payroll. They could go above that with no major issues but somehow, given their track record, I just don't see it happening. So here's what the roster would look like if the season started today:

Starters:

1B Ryan Howard
2B Chase Utley*
SS Jimmy Rollins
3B Pedro Feliz*
C Carlos Ruiz
LF Raul Ibanez
CF Shane Victorino
RF Jayson Werth

Bench:

C Ronny Paulino
1B/3B Greg Dobbs
OF Geoff Jenkins
UT Eric Bruntlett
OF Matt Stairs/C Chris Coste

Rotation:

#1 - LHP Cole Hamels
#2 - RHP Brett Myers
#3 - RHP Joe Blanton
#4 - LHP Jamie Moyer
#5 - JA Happ, Kyle Kendrick, Chan Ho Park, Carlos Carrasco, Adam Eaton


Bullpen:

CP Brad Lidge
RHP Ryan Madson
LHP JC Romero*
RHP Chan Ho Park (Likely he ends up here and not as the 5th starter)
LHP Scott Eyre
RHP Clay Condrey
RHP Chad Durbin

Longshots:

2B Marcus Giles (if indeed the dead can be raised...)
SS Jason Donald (depends on if Feliz and Utley aren't ready and is Spring Training performance)
LF John Mayberry Jr (outside shot at being the RH bat off the bench)
RHP Carlos Carrasco (will likely start in AAA)
C Lou Marson (almost definitely won't be on the 25 man barring a major rash of injuries at catcher)
RHP Drew Carpenter (almost certainly won't make the roster outside of a spectacular spring and some injuries)


* Obviously the Phillies will need to fill these holes as Utley, Romero and Feliz very well might not be ready by Opening Day.

So far, I'm grading this off-season as a C- as I strongly feel that Amaro hasn't really accomplished any of his stated goals and he vastly overpaid for Ibanez and Moyer. The roster still lacks a right-handed bat, they didn't get any younger or more athletic and there are some very legitimate injury concerns.


Hall Of Fame Elections and Travesties

So Monday came and went and with it an absolute travesty occurred. While LF Rickey Henderson deservedly was elected with nearly 95% of the vote in his first year of eligibility, the pity train/propaganda train came roaring into the station with the election of LF/DH Jim Rice. There was a reason that Jim Rice hadn't made the Hall yet. Actually there are many, many reasons he hadn't been elected yet. The main reason is that he simply wasn't that great of a ballplayer. By the stats, Rice is clearly in the Hall of Very Good players with guys like Jim Edmonds, Alan Trammell, Dick Allen, Tommy John (well now at least) and all those other good but not great players. He was a fearsome slugger for several years and a very good hitter for several more but he was limited defensively, didn't get on base enough, and played over 1/4th of his games as a DH. It literally took 15 years and a massive national propaganda by a Boston dominated national sports media to get Rice in. By the numbers of his era and by modern sabermetric standards, Jim Rice is simply NOT a Hall of Famer. His presence in the Hall of Fame drops the bar for future elections. After all, if Jim Rice is now in, why not guys like Dick Allen (superior offensive numbers in a tougher hitters era), Albert Belle (far superior numbers), teammate Dwight Evans (never even got 5% despite arguably better numbers), Bobby Abreu (far superior offense and even defense sadly) etc etc. Rice didn't hit any of the traditional benchmarks for Hall entry including hits, RBIs, HRs, or OBP. He did manage to post one very "impressive" stat during his supposed peak years (Age 29 - Age 32). During this time period he managed to lead the league in Grounding Into Double Plays (GIDP) all four seasons and he actually had more GIDP than HRs during those four seasons (131 GIDP vs. 118 HR). There aren't many HOF sluggers you can say that about. In fact, I believe he's the only one. Rice is notable for having GIDP well over 300 times in his career. So for as many moonshot homeruns he hit, he hit into almost as many backbreaking, inning-ending double plays for his career (315 GIDP vs. 382 HR). That stat is a microcosm of Jim Rice's career. He was very good at times but he is not and should never be a Hall of Famer. Had Jim Rice played for the Brewers or Royals or any other 2nd division club, he never would have made it past his 1st ballot. However, Rice played for Boston and thus he is a Hall of Famer. Just sad.