Phillies Nation

A lot of the complaints about the bullpen have been pretty reactionary from Saturday’s loss. One problem that’s been consistent, however, is Danys Baez. Signing him was a mistake from the beginning and he has shown that he does not belong on a major league roster. Crashburnalley.com has a good article up about him, highlighting the fact that his K/9 has been in steady decline since 2010. Not going to cut it for a reliever. If anything he should be your garbage reliever, but for whatever insane reasons, Charlie prefers to use him in close games. He really should be DFA’d and replaced by Scott Mathieson.

Also, I think Herndon is a much better pitcher than he gets credit for and should be used more often. While his 4.30 ERA may not be impressive, we can see that he’s suffered some bad luck with a .378 BABIP. His 60.5% ground ball rate is also encouraging. I really hope the Phillies do the right thing and try to keep him. He’s also just 24.

I agree with Trevor, I also think Herndon should get more work. He is a sinkerballer and they get better with steady work. Moreover, Danys Baez really is NOT clutch and was a poor signing.

I’m sorry, the phils bullpen is bad because it is bad. That isn’t a reaction to Saturday, that is a reaction to alll of 2009 and 2010 up to now. Brad Lidge may have cost us another world series when he blew game 3 last year. 2008 was the exception for Brad Lidge. He has been consistently mediocre, at best, for his entire career.

Your right, I do want to go out and get a REAL closer. I think spending all of this money on the likes of Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins and Roy Halladay is a waste if Lidge is gonna come in and blow the entire game.

As far as I know, MLB hasn’t shortened the game to 8 innings so, yeah, I think it is somewhat important to have someone with the ability to pitch in the 9th.

The other thing with the Baez deal is, while I can sort of understand taking a chance and signing him, there was absolutely no reason to give him more than 1 year. No other team was going to sign this guy for 2 years. Ruben loves bidding against himself.

Lidge’s total inability to hold runners on is still a big concern. It turns singles or walks into triples…It’s basically how the Twins got their 3rd 9th inning run on Saturday

Lidge recently destoryed any goodwill he earned so far this season. It’s rather disappointing. The bullpen isn’t terrible, but Baez is a black hole in terms of productivity and they’d be in better shape if Madson didn’t act like an idiot.

The crappiness of the over all team has really hidden this. I said all along the biggest problem is the bullpen. The difference now is there is a slew of other problems so it wont be so magnified.

My biggest issue is what Madson did. He really should be booed for at least a week if/when he returns. I think alot of people are giving him a pass. Again because there are so many other problems. He is our self inflicted wound. Poster boy for the 2010 season.

Ah yes. Booing. That will solve problems.

Seriously though Madson is the best reliever on this team and like the least of the problems in the bullpen once he comes back.

Ah yes, as soon as he collects the shreds of his ligaments and tendons strewn about his house and somehow synthesizes them back into a working arm. Good call Dipster

Pleasant surprise if you’re Bobby Cox and you find out that we still have to run him out there because we have no SP depth

Pat are you going to produce a ‘report card’ soon?
Just consider the plus and minus of the season todate:

On the plus side:
Doc Halladay – his pitching, his leadership, his style itself I think have immensely helped our pitching staff, not to mention the fan base.

Cole Hamels – by far and away, improved.

Moyer – improved.

Blanton – its the same as last year

Happ vs Kendrick – degraded, as decent as Kyle has been, Happ was terrific last year.

Overall, the BP is probably faring better than last year, Lidge is improved, Contreras, Durbin all upsides.

Offense:
Rollins – big, big downgrade to Valdez or Castro

Utley – huge problem –

Poly – definitely upgrade from Feliz

Howard – up from last year. Average is up, power is so so – I think his numbers look just fine.

Werth – comparing him to last year? He was on fire early, cold lately – I’d say slight improvement

Ibanez – you do the math – huge, huge disappointment – power numbers, average, rbi all down.

Ruiz – an improvement –

Vic – down, I’d say a disappointment – he will have a few games where he looks on fire then dissapear for a week. No consistency.

Castro/Valdez – sorry, both down.

Bench – other than a flash from Gload once in a moon, very, very down.

The impact player last year in the first half was Raul. He carried the Phils and thier terrible pitching early on, keeping them contention during the first half of the season. He is virtually non-existant, not to be relied upon.

If we had a ‘Raul’ in our lineup this year (or a more consistant Jayson) – we would not be in 3rd place now.

Dipsy,

I think Eyre will be back also. I like Matt Thornton of the White Sox. If they become sellers he’s a lefty in the Pen I’d look seriously at.

Danys Baez owes us money at this point.

Brad Lidge is currently sporting a 80% successful save rate. This compares to 73.8% last year.

Scott Eyre isn’t coming back, Dipsy. Why would he and why should he? The Phillies would have to make him an offer he flat-out couldn’t refuse.

sat’s game was nuts.. as long as it doesn’t happen again and the phils can steal a game like that i’ll let it go. lidge has been good -sat so far. ok he was shaky against the yanks. but who isn’t? baez has had some good outings and he does have that 95-96 fb. he just has to be more consistent with the location and he could be an asstt. esp in games where moyer pitches. that fb will look like 115 if placed in good spots and mixed with other pitches. durbin has been good too mostly and jose cont is our new chan ho park. the part that hurts is that this team looked ready to take off and the blown sv on sat was a killa. not time to for them to feel sorry for themselves. the braves and mets sure won’t. maths. was really dispp. i hope he gets another shot though. but mad-dog could be ready soon.

his completed healed, veteran lefty arm would a nice addition come sept

If the Phils can go 15-5 till the allstar break they will be at 50-37. Probably not in first, but enough for the Braves and Mets to be very concerned. I think it is do-able if you look at the schedule…that should be their goal!!! If they go .500 to the AS break…looks like wait till next year

Cito Gaston, you should be fine so long as you don’t wear anything related to Joe Carter, in which case I will personally hunt you down. Just kidding (about hunting you down, but serious though about being okay unless you wear Joe Carter gear).

Don’t get me wrong….I would LOVE to have Scott Eyre on the team again. I would think that the Phils would have to be “in it” by the end of July in order for him to consider that. Even then, the man retired to spend more time with his family. I don’t know….it’s a very interesting thought.

The Phils were too optimistic when they signed Baez, and I think Manuel now realizes that he isn’t cutting it. Saturday’s game, he came into a pressure situation only because there was no one left except the inexperienced Herndon.

Personally, I have HUGE doubts about Madson. He stunk at the beginning of the year, even in a set-up role, and now that he’s had his ridiculous temper-tantrum injury he could even be worse. I hope he’s dumped after this year, because other teams appear to be on to his pitching tendencies.

Lidge so far has been decent enough. Closers rarely hold runners, concentrating on getting the hitter. Every team advances runners on “indifference” from time to time, and it means nothing when the batter makes an out.

It would be good for the Phils to sign or trade for another reliever, because no team ever has enough pitching. They won’t get Thornton, however, because only a front office full of idiots would let him go. The White Sox are not idiots.

In any case, I agree that the ‘pen “is what it is,” and that it’s not all that bad, Saturdays game being the exception.

off the Phillies for just a minute..

I saw last night on ESPN’s bottom line, that Mark Texiera was leading Miguel Cabrera in the All-Star Voting by like 80,000 votes!!!!

Cabrera: .328 average, 19 Hr, 60 RBI, 50 Runs
Tex: .225 average, 12 HR, 44 RBI, 48 Runs

Cabrera also has less at-bats, has higher OBP, SLG%, and OPS

he has 82 hits, compared to 61 for Tex .

…
Cabrera is probably the AL MVP right now, but he’s not even going to start the All-Star game ???

MLB needs to fix this system because nobody wants to see Yankees vs. the NL every year

Read on MLB.com that Rollins should be coming back this week and maybe even tonight. Anybody have any more insight as to when he’s going to be in the lineup?

It’s a shame…because Castro did a nice job the first time around when Rollins was on ther DL.

Seriously, though….Dobbs is a waste. I’d much rather see someone
like Cody Ransom get a shot.

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The All-Star game election process is a joke. For someone like Cabrera to not be starting is ridiculous.

Twins are a good team already. With Lee they would have to be among the favorites in the AL to go deep into the playoffs.