Comments on: Hated to Hero

By: Jim

Jim — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 02:41:16 +0000

Brian, I did read your comment and I just completely disagree with your position. I think that your central point is that “Honeslty I think MOST players would have caught the ball and probably forgot about one of the other 2 runners and gotten a double play, and it still would have been a darn good play.” In my opinion (and this is one of those things that we’ll never be able to actually prove) the vast majority of professional (I’m including pretty much everyone down to Rookie League) ballplayers have the situational awareness to tag the runner that is 10 feet away from them after executing the double play. Outside of Milton Bradley and Jose Canseco I can’t think of any other ballplayer who’d mess up the easiest part of the play. To sum up, you think that Bruntlett’s baseball acumen adds something special to the team while I think that based upon what we’ve seen out of him over the past couple of seasons he hasn’t shown anything to lead me to believe that he does.

By: Brian of CO

Brian of CO — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 22:53:13 +0000

Jim, did you read my entire post? I can guarentee that you didnt, or you didnt understand it…This was in the same post that you decided to only read part of “Bruntlett has a questionable glove” “Baseball brains by themselves didn’t and don’t win championships. Baseball brains, combined with fielding and hitting wins that trophy we all still talk about.” Is that a clearer for you?

By: Jim

Jim — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 17:12:22 +0000

Bruntlett’s worthlessness at the plate isn’t a big problem considering the power elsewhere in the lineup and the recent addition of Francisco, which gives Charlie a legitimate right handed batter off the bench. The problem with Bruntlett is that if he’s going to be the defensive replacement/utility guy then he has to be able to actually field the position well. The two positions that he would regularly play are SS and 2B. Looking at the numbers on Baseball-reference.com, he’s got a FP of .962 and .945 (respectively), both of which are way below the league averages for those slots. He has good range but his inability to make the plays once he gets to the ball leads to an overall negative for runs contributed defensively. No one expects the 25th man on the roster to be making a big contribution offensively and defensively. Eric Bruntlett, unfortunately, doesn’t make a positive contribution in either area.

By: beta sigma shag

beta sigma shag — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 16:30:38 +0000

People are still hating on Bruntlet, he had three hits right, ;my DVR did not record the whole game, so I did not get to see it. But three hits is three hits.
And is Pedro really better then Moyer still, i only saw the first few innings and he got rocked by a team that really is not very good. He was hit hard and often. I know most of you in here are in love with the guy, but really six innings seven hits and four runs isn’t that a line you all crusified Moyer for.

By: Don M

Don M — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:49:33 +0000

Dobbs is on the 15 day DL .. and is their #1 pinch-hitter… no chance he is the Odd-Man-Out of anything..

Bruntlett, Cairo, or whoever the 25th man on the roster is … they aren’t going to hurt you, because they hardly ever play. Bruntlett has faced MLB hitting, and played against better hitters all season .. Cairo has been in AAA (after fans demanded his demotion thanks his 1-for-11 start at the plate this year)

Bruntlett will be on the postseason roster.. and like every other 25th man, he will only be used in an emergency

By: Philly Texan

Philly Texan — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:46:29 +0000

RIght on, CH.

I don’t understand why people don’t like Bruntlett. What do they want? Manny Ramirez coming off the bench?

Bruntlett does a lot of valuable little things for a baseball team. He’s not a good hitter — though I hope the three hits (should have been four) yesterday will remind some folks on here that he’s not incapable of getting a hit. But as the last man off the bench and a utility guy and pitch runner, he’s a perfectly nice piece to have.

I think Dobbs is actually hurt. He was hurt in Friday’s game and had to come out in like the 5th. That doesn’t happen if the FO is faking an injury. And they’re not going to move Dobbs out for Cairo.

Cairo sucks. We saw plenty of him in spring training and early in the year and he couldn’t do anything. The only guy on the roster who’s a worse major league hitter than Bruntlett.

BTW, the Mets are 15.5 games out. I guess K-Rod’s team-to-beat prediction was a little off….

By: The Original Chuck P

The Original Chuck P — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:30:27 +0000

It’s kind of interesting to see this “bench bat/utility man” thing playing out…

Didn’t I predict that Dobbs might be the odd man out? While I think that he will rejoin this team at some point, it’s pretty obvious that they want to give Cairo some AB’s to determine whether they can do without Bruntlett. Smart move by the FO… put a little pressure on Bruntlett to see how he responds. So far, the bearded punt has done well but we’re all still very skeptical (and rightfully so). I will say this, Bruntlett is a pretty smart baseball player. While he’s not great in the field or at the plate, he’s smart and adequate in many facets of the game. He doesn’t make base running errors, he doesn’t hit into many double plays and he does the little things very well. He’s not going to hurt the team and that’s important from a utility guy (although he needs to be better in the field… those errors/miscues cannot happen).

I kind of forgot that rosters expand in September… it will be interesting to see what the Phils do.

By: Phillies Fan in NYC

Phillies Fan in NYC — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:29:54 +0000

Didn’t Bruntlett score the winning run in game 3 of the WS last year? He came in for burrell and walked, scored on ruiz’ dribbler. I think he also hit a HR in the game they lost… a game where the phils offense did nothing for 7 innings. He went 1-3 in the series with 3 runs and an RBI… being that all but one of those games was close, and if you take out the HR in a losing effort, those 2 runs proved to be pretty important. In almost 1900 innings, all over the field in his career, he’s only made 33 errors. I think what happened yesterday was a fluke… i was there, and honestly, the whole team played tight once lidge came in the game. the worst error was howard, who inexplicably tried to side that ball instead of getting in front of it.

By: Don M

Don M — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:09:14 +0000

It was nice to see Bruntlett get some playing time… and to see him get 3 hits (and a great catch prevented his 4th of the day!) If Rollins is really getting the day off today, Im guessing Bruntlett starts at SS instead of Cairo , right?

By: CH

CH — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:57:25 +0000

if you hate Eric Bruntlett or think he should be cut you don’t understand much about baseball!

By: Manny

Manny — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:22:24 +0000

I find this whole thing hilarious… out of all players in our organization, it happened to Bruntlett!

By: The Original Chuck P

The Original Chuck P — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:09:36 +0000

Crazy historical reference… heard this near the end of Sportscenter… this was the SECOND time in baseball history that a game included both an inside the park homerun and a triple play. The other time that it occurred was 1988(?). Please correct me if you saw this and I’m wrong… one of the umpires was a part of both crews.

By: Jim

Jim — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 13:36:51 +0000

@ Brian of CO – Bruntlett caught the ball practically standing on 2nd with another Met running right at him. Do you seriously think that more than half the middle infielders would have not tagged the runner standing 2 feet away from them? If your definition of “Baseball brain” is “can count to three” and “can see players of the opposing team less within 10 feet” then I guess Bruntlett does indeed have a “baseball brain.” Nothing that happened yesterday is any justification for the Phillies wasting a roster spot on this stiff. I don’t know if Cairo is a better option or if there is some other utility man floating around that is available but Bruntlett isn’t it. I could live with his non-existent offense if he could field. After yesterday, I’m done with him.

By: Mr. Phil

Mr. Phil — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 12:07:07 +0000

Good point, George. I know I like to read things written and spelled correctly too. And like Amanda, I realize we all make mistakes and need to be reminded or taught when we do. It makes us better writers.

I too felt sorry for Lidge and thought to myself, here we go again, snakebit. All three of the plays should have been made by Howard and Bruntlett before the triple play. It should have been a clean save.

By: Jeff Y.

Jeff Y. — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 11:32:42 +0000

After the second boot, I was screaming for Charlie to yank him out and put in Chase. I guess everything happens for a reason.

By: George

George — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 10:45:19 +0000

I note that the error on “tug” has been rewritten, and I admire that. It shows that some people actually acknowledge simple criticism instead of calling a person a “douche.”

Yes, even I make mistakes, but I will correct them if they are pointed out to me. I avoid name-calling when doing so, as that only baits people. Amanda, too, I note, refrained from crude terminology, and simply made her corrections.

Tell yourself, Repeat!, that you never point out others’ errors. Tell yourself that your choice of language is never inappropriate. Tell yourself that you don’t have a holier-than-thou attitude at times.

I’ll continue to read Amanda’s writing, because it’s basically good, and continually gets better because she’s eager to improve, unlike some other people on this site.

By: » Phillies Beat Mets on Ninth Inning Triple-Play | Blogging-Baseball.com

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 08:51:40 +0000

[...] Phillies Nation’s Amanda Orr explains Bruntlett’s insertion at 2nd base: With Chase Utley getting a regular day off, Bruntlett got the start at second base. Not much is expected from Bruntlett, who entered today with a .128 average. He started off by going 3-for-3 and made some solid defensive plays. [...]

By: ulrich

ulrich — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 07:48:16 +0000

Amanda — great writing. I don’t mind “tug” at all, personally, but realize you’re gonna get shit for it from people for as long as you use it. I think you’re an excellent writer — most importantly, you have a voice that is noticeably different than most sports writers and that, imho, is the thing you really want to try to hang on to. Factual errors do bug me tho: one here is saying EB’s hit/caught ball to Frenchy was in the bottom of the 9th. It was in the top, of course. But this nowhere near as bad as SBNation’s boxscore showing the Phils w/no errors in the game!

By: Benjamin

Benjamin — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:02:51 +0000

Brian of CO,

I submit these two YouTube videos as evidence to my claim that the unassisted triple play “takes no more skill than average baseball instincts to pull it off”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKeORb5yWnM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64T5EnMwTeo

If these KIDS can do it, does Bruntlett deserve our applause or the Phillies Nation Ashburn Award? I’d have given the Ashburn Award to the entire Phillies offense (thereby excluding the evenings pitching staff who did their best to keep the game close!).

By: Miles

Miles — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 04:22:23 +0000

I disagree Brian…..just about any player makes that play. Even if he had hesitated, the base with right there and Murphy was almost standing on second. Plus Jimmy was yelling in Beardo’s ear just to make sure he didn’t blow it. I’m pretty sure I could have made the play and I didn’t play past high school ball.