But alot of things did go right last year....Papelbon was quite good, Kendrick gave us alot of value as a starter, Rollins shrugged off his poor start and turned in a better season than expected, Pierre played well, Lee and Hamels were very effective, Frandsen & Kratz came out of nowhere, Ruiz had another good season, Galvis flashed his defensive skills at 2B, Howard & Utley came back and did not suffer re-injury etc.

Sure, Halladay had a tough season and Amaro got unlucky Howard had the infection setback, but alot of the other issues were risky conscious choices made by Amaro that predictably did not pan out i.e. relying on Polanco, Contreras, Qualls, Nix, Wigginton; expecting Howard back in May, signing Thome when he was nothing but a DH, seeming to not understand Utley's injury, not monitoring him during the off-season and being "surprised" 2 days before ST that he was not ready; yo-yoing Brown, not bringing Ruf up and playing him until it was too late etc.

Amaro has largely dug his own hole, jumped in and shoveled the dirt back in around his feet...his approach has always been to win now with little regard for the future or adaptations if the approach did not work. Eventually, everyone has to pay the piper and the bill is coming due. Getting Revere was good in that he is young, controllable and cheap, but unfortunately he's also not that good and certainly not worth Worley/May who were sold low...Young is another in a long string of previously very good players acquired when past their prime, he could be ok or quite bad. Lannan is meh, going from Worley to Lannan is not an upgrade. Adams could be decent and let Manuel sleep better at night, but there are red flag injury issues on a pitcher who will turn 35 in July.

ek wrote:Oh god. not you

I give up

ek wrote:Oh god. not you

legit

ek wrote:Oh god. not you

things broke so wrong for the Phillies last year, i can't possibly see such poor luck again. it would be incredible.

plus, Qualls and Wigginton cost us 4 or 5 games alone. any mediocre player would be an update.

get excite

Gelb says see you in 2014

maybe ill read something by him in 2014

Last year Ty Wigginton had a higher OPS+, wOBA, wRC+, WAR and SLG than Michael Young. Wigginton was a butcher at 3B, but Young was not much better.

i know, i suppose im banking on him rebounding, because it's all i can do

JFLNYC wrote:Last year Ty Wigginton had a higher OPS+, wOBA, wRC+, WAR and SLG than Michael Young. Wigginton was a butcher at 3B, but Young was not much better.

Fiddle-dee-dee. Next season is another year. Young will battle Howard and Halladay for comeback player of the year.

#pollybergen

i guess what i''m rooting for now is a combination of desperation and stupidity by both the mariners (overpay for ross) and rockies (i would consider fowler an overpayment for kendrick+prospects, since i''ve decided i really like fowler).

JFLNYC wrote:Last year Ty Wigginton had a higher OPS+, wOBA, wRC+, WAR and SLG than Michael Young. Wigginton was a butcher at 3B, but Young was not much better.

knock it off.

Last year Kyle Kendrick had a better year than Roy Halladay. We should extend Kendrick to a five year 75 million dollar contract and cut our losses by releasing Halladay.

JFLNYC wrote:Last year Ty Wigginton had a higher OPS+, wOBA, wRC+, WAR and SLG than Michael Young. Wigginton was a butcher at 3B, but Young was not much better.

Don't question Rube

Ace Rothstein wrote:

JFLNYC wrote:Last year Ty Wigginton had a higher OPS+, wOBA, wRC+, WAR and SLG than Michael Young. Wigginton was a butcher at 3B, but Young was not much better.

Don't question Rube

Shoulda kept.

Seriously, fielding percentage is certainly not the best measure, and is good only for gross evaluations. But Wigginton managed to make 8 errors in only 48 chances at third base, while Young had 2 in 58. That's gross enough for me to conclude that Young was maybe more than a "little bit" better.

I'd have a little trouble accepting that Wigginton made up for it with his range.

Young played SS at some point in his career. Has he really lost so much range that he can't handle 3B at all? Wiggy was never close to being a SS ever. Bill James has suggested the Phils have access to data showing Young isn't that terrible at 3B. Our favorite team has liked to have glove men at 3B in recent years.

I don't thing Young will be a good defensive 3Bman. But he might be better than we think.

JFLNYC wrote:Last year Ty Wigginton had a higher OPS+, wOBA, wRC+, WAR and SLG than Michael Young. Wigginton was a butcher at 3B, but Young was not much better.

We can't keep basing our whole evaluation of Michael Young on one season.

MLBTR is running with Gelb's Eyore story that we're punting 2013. wtf.
but if we overpaid for Upton or Pagan we'd be roasted for that.

this offseason is confirming my darkest fears that 2008-2011 was a ridiculous fluke. Got lucky developing homegrown talent, got INCREDIBLY lucky on bringing in Wertz and maximized that peak by trading for high profile players who wanted to come here. We're a perennial third place team with a boated budget and a mediocre product. IOW, best case scenario we're a less scuzzy version of the Mets. This is what we get for mocking Fugees all these years. We used up our karma and now we've become them.