Phillies Nation

Yes, it was a team loss and not on any one player. So many missed opportunities as the team went 1 for 12 with RISP. It gave the Reds a chance to come back with four unanwered runs as Brandon Phillips figured out Happ and burned the pitcher’s high fastballs for 2 HRs and 3 RBIs. We must give some credit to Aaron Harang for hanging tough and making clutch pitches as needed.

As Chris Wheeler aptly described, it was a “character” win for the Reds after last night’s disaster that went down as their worst one sided defeat in franchise’s history. The win also demonstrates that they are not a “bad” team even against the Phillies as Mr Bintliff would have you believe in his previous blog.

Tomorrow night the Phillies will roll the dice again with Rodrigo Lopez going against a nondescript righthander by the name of Homer Bailey.
Let’s hope the Phillies revive their hitting stroke with RISP.

Let’s go Phillies!

“You all are mising it, we are sellers in this market now. How many games do we need to loose before you all admit we need to trade. We cannot compete with stronger teams like the braves or mets, so we must be sellers.” -mike mike

Wow – not only are you dead wrong, you are entertaining. The mets? They are averaging 3 runs a game IF that recently and their pitching is broken. The Braves? They can’t beat the nationals in a series…

You should probably get off the phillies fan website and back to your old life, I think it misses you.

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On the other hand, Happ is growing into his spot in the rotation quite nicely, any trade we make better not include him, because in my opinion he’s got the makeup and the stuff to be a legit #3 or even #2 depending on how hitters adjust to him, and IF they do.

Once we get ibanez back… this team will be fine and in the playoffs regardless of whether they trade for a starter… getting Halladay would be automatic World Series in my opinion, but I have never doubted this team, some day, I think we will look back on these years with a lot of fondness. They lead the league in runs scored, and once the pitching comes together, and it will, we should have some great baseball to look forward to…

I was really hoping I wouldn’t see that post, mikemike, but I kind of expected it. At least you’re consistent, sir.

The baseball gods giveth, and the baseball gods taketh away. However, the baseball gods mostly taketh away when teams hit 1-for-too-many with runners in scoring position.

And William, that would be disturbing.

I hope you mean scary bad. Happ is great.

The chances of Halladay being traded by July 31st have been put at 5-10% by Jayson Stark. As for Pedro a deal still looks unlikely and if he does sign the Phils won’t be trading for a front line arm.

Shame about last nights game though the Phils have been playing well enough to take that one on the chin.

Wait a second, “Blue Jays willing to consider trade’, to me, means “Blue Jays would trade Halladay”. Plain and simple.

The Dipsy

^Dipsy his availability is about on a par with you getting Ryan Howard to buy you dinner tonight, very remote possibility but don’t hold you breath and be angry if the Phils don’t get this deal done.

When Bruntlett was batting in the ninth last night the camera man panned by the Reds dugout and they were already in street clothes!

There has to be a better alternative than Bruntlett. I still can’t believe that Charlie used him in a late inning RBI situation last night

Once again, that old buggaboo of impatience cost the Phils last night. In the 3rd, right after Rhyno had a GREAT AB and worked a walk, Jatson came up and started flailing at Harang’s high cheese. The scouting report, according to Comcast was that he likes to go up in the zone with 2-strikes, and that’s what he got Jayson and Dobbs out on. Both were key outs (obviously). Jayson, in his previous AB (with nobody on base), took Harang yard oppo boppo. But with the based loaded, he get pull happy, going for the grand salami. Next up was Dobbs. He took a ball, then Harang comes up and in with a fastball, and Dobbs pops it up. The bases were loaded, the pitcher’s under extreme duress, and Dobbs let him off the hook. There were two wasted ABs, the kind that were all too prevalent during June…The other key wasted AB was Jimmy’s in the 8th. He’s been hitting these last 5 games because he’s been patient. But not in the 8th. Oh no, Jimmy comes up and swings at the 1st pitch. When is Uncle Chollie gonna start fining J-Roll for that? Yeah sure, he hit the ball sharply, but right at Votto. Once again, the pitcher was under duress. Make him throw more pitches in that situation!…Lastly, I have a question for Uncle Chollie. Dude, do you know that there’s this play called the “Squeeze?” With Carlos on 3rd after tripling to lead off the inning, why not try a squeeze with either Happ or Jimmy? Happ is good with the bat, and Jimmy is a good bunter.

They lost that one because they STILL dont have a legitimate right handed pinch hitter with power..its been ALL season. THis is ridiculous. That is their second or third greatest need. Oh, and Toronto was scouting JA Happ last night, even though I think including him in the deal would be a bad idea. Hes a thousand times more valuable than Moyer because hes young, cheap, and under team control for a while. Moyer is old an expensive.

If they move happ as part of that deal, then you STILL need another Starting Pitcher because youve just replaced a good starting pitcher – albeit with a great one. They would still need another guy down the stretch to be that 5th man. So to me including him would almost be counterproductive.

Its gotta be Carlos Carrasco, Jason Donald, Dominic Brown, and Kendrick/Carpenter/etc

You dont move Michael Taylor, you dont move JA Happ, and you dont move Kyle Drabek under any circumstances.

I completely agree with your last post, Geoff.

The big important pieces in a deal for Halladay we do have in a frontline pitching prospect in Carrasco and a major-league ready shortstop in Jason Donald.

I disagree the Phils lost because of a lack of a frontline right handed pitcher, the Phils lost because they couldn’t support the pitching they did get which was very good last night and when you loose in the 9th inning it’s not your starting pitchers fault. IF the bats had driven in guys on base it would be a different story and anyway this was the Reds fighting back to stop the Phillies winning streak.

Back to Halladay, no-one is going to be off-limits in a possible deal, Toronto will be cherry-picking the Phillies top prospects because any team who refuses will loose out, it’s a different situation than say Johan Santana where the suitors were slim and weren’t fully committed to a deal, here there are more than a half dozen serious players who will all have to show a very good hand to even stay in the running.

The Phils are in a good position to make a deal but I would still say don’t get your hopes up, a move for Halladay no matter how good he is, will be crippling on the Phils system and will prohibit the Phils from having any payroll flexibility in the next couple of years and that’s if a deal can be made which is still a long-shot. The starting pitching has been very good as a whole in recent weeks and many losses were down to anemic hitting or not being able to manufacture or drive in runs, Halladay won’t change that. Only team play will get those wins and right now the majority of the rotation is turning in 6-7 strong innings and as good as Halladay is he’s not going to be much better than Johan with the Mets (and that’s a bad contract). If a pitcher doesn’t get the win with 7 strong then he probably isn’t picking up the win going 8 so all I can say from here is careful what you wish for. I love Roy Halladay but I don’t love the price tag being anywhere near close to what can legitimately help the Phils nullify greater, niggling problems.

^Remember the Phils have to be thinking two years ahead to when Hamel’s contract situation becomes and issues and when Rollins, Utley and Howard are looking at mega-deals or walking. If the Phils press to hard no it has no guarantee of success and puts them back at the beginning of the Ed Wade era and looking at the basement of the division not at the top looking to contend for a long time.

It’s going to be a really tough call for Amaro. There’s no doubt Donald and Carrasco will be part of a deal I just wonder what point will the cost be too much, will the cost implode at crunch time time like Santana or explode like Teixera (Rangers to Braves)… Going to be interesting to see which way the wind blows…

The window to do something special is very small… 1.5 years of Halladay for a few prospects is not going to kill this team in the long run and it might help us solidify our place as the best of this decade. I think that it’s worth it… he’s as close to a sure thing as you’re gonna get.

When is Lidge going to start producing on a regular basis? Granted the team should have been up with him going into the game, but still you CAN NOT surrender the lead in that situation with your closer on the mound. It’s not like this was a one time thing. This is starting to become an every day occurance with Lidge. Is this guy every going to get into form this year?

As I see it obviously Halladay would be a great fit for the Phils. My first question before any trade is made, is can they re sign him. If the answer is no then you have to give up less if he is only going to be here for 1.5 years,
Say he will re sign for 3-5 years, then you can give up more top line prospects, I say no Happ, only untouchable guy, like I said before, even can’t miss prospects can miss, So if you have to give them Drabek, Marson, Carassco, and Donald then I am ok with that if he will re sign with the PHillies. Because that will give time for the younger pitchers to move up, and a Hamels-Halladay-Happ-Blanton would not be a bad 4 pitchers for the next 3 years

Doesnt matter right now if they can sign him. They have a year left on the deal afterwards. Liek Chris Pronger with the Flyers, they have an entire season to negotiate an extension. Pronger happened to re-sign quickly, but the Flyers had plenty of time.

I think we’d all take the Mayberry-Bruntlett swap right now. From what I understood of the radio broadcast, Charlie sent Mayberry to the circle, then called him back and batted Bruntlett. I guess he was playing his gut and trying to dial something up, but the way he changed his mind about it seemed pretty weird. Hey, at least Mayberry pinch-running – and burning him before he could pinch-hit – worked to perfection.

There are a lot of good (and conflicting) points here on giving up good prospects and likely Happ for Halladay. I still think it’s best just to go for it. If they can’t win another championship with a rotation that includes Hamels and Halladay, they can’t win another with this team. And I like the idea of having a rock solid No. 1 even if Hamels were to go down. I hate the idea of giving away too much and setting yourself up for a miserable future. But the Phillies are a successful franchise right now — a much richer franchise than they were at the start of the Ed Wade era. They ought to be able to plug a lot of future holes with money. How many franchises have good farm systems anyway? And somebody wins every year.

I had this whole big thing explaining it written out, but the site failed to load then I sent the post, so here goes again…

From MLBTR via SI.com’s Jon Heyman, he calls the Phililes the Early Frontrunners using the Dan Haren Trade (Carlos Gonzalez, Brett Anderson, & filler) & the Erik Bedard Trade (George Sherrill, Adam Jones, & filler) as the models.

If we use those models you can clearly see that the players headlining the deal are NOT the equivalent of the Phililes’ version of JA Happ, Michael Taylor, Dominic Brown or Kyle Drabek. The players in those deals are mostly MAJOR LEAGUE READY prospects and one roster player as a sweetener. THis means that the Phillies “untouchables” Drabek, Happ, Taylor are PROBABLY safe. So lets look at this type of framwork.

Major League Ready Starting Pitching: Carlos Carrasco (mostly ready)
Major League Ready Position Player: Jason Donald, John Mayberry, Jr.
Filler: Kyle Kendrick, Andrew Carpenter
Deal Sweeteners: JC Romero, Sergio Esalona, Jason Knapp.

These are my two predictions based on the Haren/Bedard Models.

Carlos Carrasco, Jason Donald, Kyle Kendrick, JC Romero & Jason Knapp for Roy Halladay & BJ Ryan. (Romero is a deal sweetener and compensation for BJ Ryan, who has a contract running out in 2010 also and would be salary relief).

Heres the simpler and more likely scenario than the first one:

Carlos Carrasco, Jason Donald, Kyle Kendrick, Sergio Escalona & Jason Knapp for Roy Halladay.

Thats fits the framework of the previous deals with adding a sweetener or two into the mix. Im sure there will be another filler guy or two that isnt central to the deal, those those are the key elements.

The second scenario isnt really that out of the realm of possibility. MAYBE Dominic Brown is in the deal instead of Knapp & Escalona. Maybe. But not Taylor, Happ, Drabek.

oh yea I forgot why I originally came on here, I just watched the game this morning on dvr, and I can not pin this loss on Lidge, for one, before that guy hit the double Lidge threw a slider for a strike, same as the first pitch he threw in that at bat. But like I said last night it is one loss as long as they win tonight, they take the series, you can not win them all, and last night was not that bad of a loss, Marlins lost and IMO that is the team to scoreboard watch right now, Mets are done until they get healthy, and the Brave even though they swept us, do not scare me

I agree with Greg B. This loss was NOT on lidge. Look at the player who scored the run. He was on first, followed by a bunt which was PROBABLY going FOUL, he made it to THIRD because R Howard screwed up! Not to mention, 0-5 with runners in scoring position with LESS THAN 2 OUTS! Are you freaking kidding me. bases loases NO OUTS and you cant get a run in. COMPLETE FAILURE. This is the SAME junk that happened last year. We break out and score 20+ runs, followed by yet another losing streak.