There is no shortage of questions as fans and the Phillies front office sort through the rubble of the team’s disastrous first half of the season.
But while Carlos Ruiz, Cole Hamels and Jonathan Papelbon exult in the glow of their All-Star break, and the rest of the team licks their wounds, two stand out to me.
One of them is not whether Charlie Manuel should be fired. No, I don’t think Charlie is ever going to be compared to Tony LaRussa as an in-game technician. I also don’t think Charlie is what is wrong with this team.
Instead, I would focus on two things that actually happened last winter.
First and foremost, how exactly is it that Chase Utley managed to show up for training camp and then discover that his knees would not allow him to take part?
Was Utley having problems all winter? Did he ever alert the team? Was Ruben Amaro and the rest of the Phillies just as surprised as the rest of us when Utley was unable to go, and eventually would do a repeat of the year before, when he missed the entire spring training and a chunk of the regular season?
Secondly, I distinctly remember a press conference at which both Amaro and Manuel, frustrated at the Phils’ silent bats in their loss to the Cardinals in the National League Divisional Series, talked about how the Phillies would have to change their methods at the plate. They wanted the team to show more discipline, take more pitches, and work counts vs. opposing pitchers.
Anybody see any sign of that happening anytime soon?
The problem was compounded when it became clear that both Utley and Ryan Howard would be unavailable for the start of the season. “Small Ball” was all the talk among the Phillies.
How did that work out.
Jimmy Rollins was given a new deal and once again installed as the team’s leadoff man. Rollins has had a great career, but he’s never been the prototype leadoff guy.
Before the Phils start the second half, it would be nice to get answers to a couple of nagging questions.
I’m not going to hold my breath.
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Oh, they also can’t go over some arbitrary budget even though the fans have sold this stadium out an ungodly number of consecutive games allowing for ownership to pocket an unprecedented level of profit.
This smells of Norman Braman and Harry Gamble running the Eagles in such a nonsensical manner in two decades ago.