Phillies Nation

Love how that dick from SI called CBP the jokeyard! The people that talked about CBP are so stupid, F him too!

i dunno, i kind of think out ballpark has hurt us a lot this year. they take careless hacks at home, worse than on the road. i think they need to make it as big as they can make it now. itll teach tme to focus on contact.

howaever, i really hate jon heyman. hes a douchebag.

Sorry Geoff but thats crazy, Lidge may need his workload reduced over the coming weeks but no way in hell does Myers go back into the pen right now. Myers has turned in solid starts since coming back into the rotation and looks as if he could contribute heavily down the stretch. Move him to the pen and we create a void in the rotation and you cannot expect Happ in the answer in the 3 spot, you suffer waiting for him to adjust to being back in the pen and you then waste his upside closing as Lidge is the closer, Myers isn’t going to be a set-up man and is a waste in that role. Do you really feel the Phils pitching staff will be stronger all-around with Myers setting up?

IF you guys wat to trade Howard to the mets, we’ll take him

well, i just know that if they cant get to the playoffs with this lineup, im ready to blow it up. as much as i like and want to keep burrell, howard, utley and dare i even say rollins, i think the value of those guys is only going to DECREASE as their salaries INCREASE. maybe it wouldnt be such a bad idea to just, go out and and unload a few of them in the offseason. theyre all 29-30. i really like burrell but hes so slow and charlie will NEVER stop wasting substitutes on him as long as hes here. if we can keep him at a reasonable rate, im ok. howard, id rather keep but if someone knocks your socks off with him, utley, or rollins id probably take it. top young talent wouldnt hurt.

they need speed, contact hitting, patience at the plate. then youve got ruiz, coste, jenkins, taguchi, bruntlett, dobbs: what is all that? its garbage, throw it away because those guys are worthless and theyre all black holes up there.

hamels? stay
myers? get out unless willing to act mature and take starting seriously
blanton? stay, at the back of the rotation
kendrick? send down to minors next season if he hasnt yet developed a changeup. bring back when he does.
moyer? you know what? great career, but retire.

lidge? stay
durbin? stay
romero? eh, reduced role, but stay
condrey, seanez? get out
gordon? retired, shame, great career
eyre? get out
madson? get out

trainers? gone
amaro, gillick? gone
farm director? gone
owners (i wish): gone
scouts? gone

ballpark? make it bigger, even if its only by a little
logo, colors? gone, change back to 1980s uniforms, keep two alternate uniforms (current day alternate, plus the red spring training-style shirt that some teams wear a lot like the braves, mets, and marlins).

Two words ……. Aaron Rowand.

This is what happens when we don’t re-sign the spark plug from last year, and to a lesser extent, missing Vic from the line-up. They had life regardless, played the game like it was the 9th inning of the 7th game of the WS. The others ……….. just big fat bank accounts and fooling their customers (us).

Teams are usually really unwilling to trade their elite prospects and prefer making the veteran available like the White Sox have done. Pedro’s a solid contributor at third as he gives good D and he will be a 20/80 guy which he probably would have reached if healthy.

We need better contribution behind the plate but this year were suffering a case of lack of consistency across the board and particularly with the primary contributors who haven’t been consistent. We do though need to start finding younger internal solutions to replacing departing free agents so we don’t end up in the Eaton/Jenkins situation and the yearly bullpen saga.

We have to stop trying to play in the same league as the Yanks/Sox/Mets/Angels/Mariners and look at how we can do things better cheaper and that means a Danks and not Garcia type deal.

NJ..right on with the bullpen and jenkins things. thats what i mean. why bring in geoff jenkins at all? that doesnt make any sense. just get young players in there who have heart. they wasted millions of dollars on old trash free agents.

I agree wholly and I WAS pleased with the Jenkins move orignally as I was the Barajas deal the year before, there’s a reason their previous teams let them go as the WS did with Garcia who loved the package they got for a player on the down turn.

You look around the league and it’s the teams who are developing their prospects with the right attitude who are having success. We’re going to have the same problem IF we get Golson up that we have with Howard, if you groom a hit or miss hitter don’t be surprised when he can’t control his bat. We’re too obsessed with finding the next Drew and Myers that we miss those type of players like Markakis and Bucholz.

We have an all or nothing attitude running through the entire organisation and it’s not a healthy baseball ethic. The team does not need money to go on a shopping spree, they need to better use their money at all levels of the organisation.

and thats what don m and other will not acknowledge and it pisses me off. get REAL BASEBALL PEOPLE in there who know how to find REAL BASEBALL PLAYERS, consistent pepole who act professionally. there are some they developed on their own, yes, but not nearly enough. this lineup would sure look nice with a markakis type in there.

(^meant that to be a general read up to those who haven’t, didn’t mean to make that sound condesending Geoff).

$100m is plenty but we haven’t handled Howard well, are still eating contracts. There’s a big difference between a natural talent guy like the fast track guys that have been prominent in the last 3 draft and the Golson type of raw athlete with little bat development. Why did the moneyball A’s who don’t spend big on re-signing players give Rickie Weeks brother over $4m in the drat this year and we’re still playing draft the high school athlete and hope for the best?

The FO needs to get some direction going, the Gillick era has had positives but it’s falling apart, we got lucky last year and have been complacent and ambivilent this year.

The Phils and Mets are so similar but at least we haven’t sadled ourselves with the FA deals Minaya has with the Mets.

Are the Braves in panic mode…? No, because they know what their working towards and their not running forward like headless chickens waiting for the other shoe to drop like the Phils and Mets are.

When it comes to prospects the Phils are still reeling from the failings of their beloved Gavin Floyd and their inability to sign JD Drew out of the draft. Their too scared to groom a frontline pitcher or touch an advanced prospect in the first round of the draft. That said I do expect Savery to have success somewhere down the line and think a solid move was made at that point in the draft, but how can you make Travis D’Arnaud your 2nd pick in the draft when the farms was stocked with catchers with talent in A ball….

7. Pat Burrell, Phillies, OF
He’s come back nicely from a brutal year of a few years ago to reestablish himself as a pretty good offensive player. He’s had a lot of big hits this year. Of course, many of them have come in Citizen’s Bank Jokeyard. Best guess: $48 million, four years.

Timeout, “many of them have come in Citizens Bank”? REALLY?
Does he really consider himself a sports writer when he doesnt know the stats? Lets see this year of Pats 27 home runs only 9 of them have come in CBP and of his 28 doubles only 11 at home. This guy is a douche and Pat is clearly more effective on the road hitting .082 points better.

Feliz is a very solid all around 3rd basemen who can put up some good, not great but not bad, numbers at the Bank. I’m satisfied with him for now.

Stop mentioning Aaron Rowand. Stop living in the past. We are only one game out of first people, the Phillies will pull it off.

I’ve been saying this for quite sometime this season, players need to put their egos aside when on the field. Myers seems to have done so and look what he is doing. I’m mainly talking about Rollins when I say this but it seems as if Chase has gotten a little caught up in himself. This team has no fight but they do know when to try and thats when we are in second in the division. As ridiculous as it sounds, the players get too comfortable in first and coast. Never enough to pull away from the division. Hate to use the term but this offense as a whole is pulling a Manny, playing when they damn well feel.

Gillick’s made really suspect deals. I think the Blanton move was good and I think he’s one of the best guys to slot in at 3 in he league but we gave up Outman who Oakland love and Cardenas below what his value was likely to be down the line, we then manage to get Golson on other teams radars but hang on to him when we have similar guys in A ball, where does Golson fit in? He’ll be on the outside like Bourn was and his value will slowly drop like Jaramillo’s did.

*Nice

you can make an awful lot of money off of intentional failure in business and sports, by the way, so dont think it doesnt go on.

Manny Ramirez. ESPN had a great article ( surprise, I know ) on that exact perspective.

I though I agreed with you TJ but I’m starting to think we’re not going to be able to win with Rollins and Howard as the face of this team. Look at how the Sox turned things around and it was marked by moving on from Garciaparra, I’m not going to speculate who needs to go but this team needs to change their attitude with the FO making a show of direction more than they need to be freshened up.

yeah ramirez did use that tactic. i hate people that do that. thats what their doing in iraq to maximize profits off of contracts and its criminal. intentional failure applies in more than just sports…

I disagree with the idea that blowing up the team, except for 5-7 players would be the easiest way to WIN… we’ve been IMPROVING with the guys we have now.. IF they are worse at the end of this season then they were last year, they’ll know they need a stud starting pitcher, and an OF that can hit for average.. or at least a contact guy..

The point i’ll keep making is that owning a baseball team is the same as owning any other business… they are in it to make money..

In our eyes, they need to spend money to make money… and maybe overpaying for those 2 extra guys that MIGHT get us over the hump is well worth it.. but smart business won’t intentionally lose money to take a chance on gaining a little more in the future… they are content with making their $millions$ every year…

THAT drives me nuts, but its baseball, and I know how it works, so there is no point getting all crazy and hyped-up about it

See because if they have a couple guys in the Futures All-Star game, and the Olympic team, and most of their top-players are home-grown… then I think they do a fine job of scouting and development, etc..

They don’t spend money in Japan and in some Carribean countries like other teams do.. and they aren’t as good at picking-out top young pitching prospects as the Marlins (but who is??)

They pay their draft picks huge bonuses.. Gavin Floyd, Drabek, etc.. all got like $4 million or something crazy..

I completely understand your frustrations Geoff, I really do.. but I definitely think that you stretch for places to point the blame.. if there is one thing to blame, its that ownership should let them increase payroll to $130 Million and go get those 2-3 players that would put us over the top…

but like I said, you have to understand that they won’t want to lose money on moves that won’t gaurantee they win anything.

If Pat Gillick only has $3 million to bring in another player (due to ownership’s payroll restrictions)… how is it his fault for choosing “Player B”, out of a list of guys that consists of only B-players.. because A-players make too much money to bring in…

We are starting to improve within and its going good, I think. Happ and Kendrick are sytem products, Rollins, Howard, Utley, Hamels. Our core has come from our system.

i still dont know about a lot of those prospects they have though. too many guys that are too far away. junk in AAA except for happ and carrasco. 4-5 guys in AA. but the AA team is one of the worst in AA baseball team wise…they suck ass

And still I dont see him coming up until Feliz’s contract has run out if thats the case.