FTN wrote:hoping this guy has a good but not great spring and is there for our first round pick in june

looks like he's projected top 5, if not number 1, as of now. some of the lhp are intriguing and i'm sure they'll get a lot of looks at kaminsky. aaron judge has quite the makeup. love that type of player.

Would we draft a catcher first?

ek wrote:Singleton at 1b? Lol. the guy isnt even going to be on the astros on opening day

He's not going be on anybody's active roster opening day,is he? Drug suspension, right?

swishnicholson wrote:

ek wrote:Singleton at 1b? Lol. the guy isnt even going to be on the astros on opening day

He's not going be on anybody's active roster opening day,is he? Drug suspension, right?

High Times has him #1

haha nailed it

BigEd76 wrote:Heyman says the Phils were interested in Miguel Olivo before he signed with the Reds

jfc

hope you guys are ready for a Jeff Francoeur trade next offseason

Is Olivo the catcher who wears short sleeves to show off his huge biceps?

makes it look like he's trying hard when he's swinging through a curveball six feet off the plate

didn't see it was a minor-league + ST invite thing. i guess I wouldn't complain about that since our current depth chart is 1. Kratz and 2. Quintero

RealKen twitter avatar switched from his pic w/Phanatic to a shopped pic of him winning Nats' president race. Down the pecking order we plunge

Rockinghorse wrote:Yes, ripping Rube for the Howard contract is fine but we'd have hated the alternatives even more. No way we'd have paid up for Pujols or Fielder.

I'm confused. Ruf?

iladelph53 wrote:

Rockinghorse wrote:Yes, ripping Rube for the Howard contract is fine but we'd have hated the alternatives even more. No way we'd have paid up for Pujols or Fielder.

I'm confused. Ruf?

Also, Fielder gets paid less than Howard. Not saying he would have come here, but one thing the Phillies seem to do is pay up.

I meant there would have been clamoring for Pujols/Fielder, then we wouldn't have gotten them and instead had to plug in a Brandon Belt/Mitch Moreland type that everyone would have hated more than Howard+contract. But I haven't gone back to see exactly who was available at what time.

Grotewold wrote:

phorever wrote:

The Ibanez thing is so tired.... Cubs and Angels and Mets were reportedly in on Ibanez.

The other stuff is basically fair, although I'd add the Kendrick deal to the plus column, as well as the Mayberry and Horst trades.

As for Howard, I don't think it was realistic for Amaro cut bait with him and not bring in a high-priced replacement for 2012. ....
If they hadn't extended Lidge, were they just gonna let him walk, coming off a WFC and perfect season? That would have been real ballsy.

it looks like we disagree on things for which it is hard to make a strong evidence-based case either way. opinions, in other words. so what follows isn´t an argument, just a statement of my reasoning
disagree on ibanez: i didn´t see enough confirmation at the time to convince me there was real competition for him, and i think that a third year option would have been enough.
disagree on kendrick. he´s been about break-even overall and could easily turn into a negative this year. mayberry too.
disagree on lidge. his velocity was already in decline in the 2007-8 seasons which should have been enough to make them wait. after the world series, a pre-signing physical would have shown that he was broken. world series hero or not, the phils would be forgiven quickly for not signing a damaged closer.
disagree on howard for multiple reasons. he was given an extension pretty much the equivalent of a top free agent signing, a value level below which he had already fallen, even with his 2009 rebound. the likelihood was even then extremely high that by 2012 you could get more value for the same cost. and there were still two years to go on the old contract. why the heck not wait one more year to get a better idea of how much to pay him beyond 2011?

Rockinghorse wrote:I meant there would have been clamoring for Pujols/Fielder, then we wouldn't have gotten them and instead had to plug in a Brandon Belt/Mitch Moreland type that everyone would have hated more than Howard+contract. But I haven't gone back to see exactly who was available at what time.

not sure how we would have gotten Brandon Belt but Adam LaRoche would have been an inexpensive flier that would have been worth about $25 million more than Ryan Howard was last year. I don't know how reasonable that is, because nobody would have been excited about signing LaRoche to be our first baseman. But that's why you don't lock yourself into 5/125 with 30-somethings a year and a half before they hit free agency

Barry Jive wrote:

Rockinghorse wrote:I meant there would have been clamoring for Pujols/Fielder, then we wouldn't have gotten them and instead had to plug in a Brandon Belt/Mitch Moreland type that everyone would have hated more than Howard+contract. But I haven't gone back to see exactly who was available at what time.

not sure how we would have gotten Brandon Belt but Adam LaRoche would have been an inexpensive flier that would have been worth about $25 million more than Ryan Howard was last year

I just don't see letting Howard walk and replacing him with LaRoche as a realistic option for a max-payroll, big-market team coming off a 100-win season. Not saying it shouldn't be, but that it's not.

And that's assuming they let him play out his contract, which isn't the Phillies' m.o. most of the time for guys they want to keep. I didn't mean to rehash the Howard thing, just disagreed that we could have parlayed it into the Uptons

I mean, we joke about 'worse than the Ryan Howard fiasco' but it's really the move that's tying Rube's hands behind his back. When you have 37 million committed to a 0-2 WAR first baseman and a closer who, while great, is more of a final piece than a keystone AND those moves preclude you from filling an outfield with major league baseball players, you've made a pretty big mistake.

JUburton wrote:I mean, we joke about 'worse than the Ryan Howard fiasco' but it's really the move that's tying Rube's hands behind his back. When you have 37 million committed to a 0-2 WAR first baseman and a closer who, while great, is more of a final piece than a keystone AND those moves preclude you from filling an outfield with major league baseball players, you've made a pretty big mistake.

If Howard regresses further, it's definitely going to hurt us. But what would have been done differently? Give BJ Upton $18M (to woo him from Atlanta, assuming that could happen) and play Utley at first and Galvis at 2B (and no Revere trade)?

I'm guessing most here would love that but I don't know that it's a slam dunk for a better team.

Grotewold wrote:

Barry Jive wrote:

Rockinghorse wrote:I meant there would have been clamoring for Pujols/Fielder, then we wouldn't have gotten them and instead had to plug in a Brandon Belt/Mitch Moreland type that everyone would have hated more than Howard+contract. But I haven't gone back to see exactly who was available at what time.

not sure how we would have gotten Brandon Belt but Adam LaRoche would have been an inexpensive flier that would have been worth about $25 million more than Ryan Howard was last year

I just don't see letting Howard walk and replacing him with LaRoche as a realistic option for a max-payroll, big-market team coming off a 100-win season. Not saying it shouldn't be, but that it's not.

And that's assuming they let him play out his contract, which isn't the Phillies' m.o. most of the time for guys they want to keep. I didn't mean to rehash the Howard thing, just disagreed that we could have parlayed it into the Uptons

well, probably. the "max-payroll, big-market team" thing only works if you're not working against a luxury tax you're doing everything to avoid. there's still a limit to what you can spend.

the reason they couldn't get Justin Upton is Hunter Pence.

Good points. I should have said in my grade for Amaro, though, that he put two tremendous teams on the field in 2010 and 2011, which could have easily won us a second title. That belongs in the conversation about Pence, even though it doesn't necessarily justify it

Grotewold wrote:

JUburton wrote:I mean, we joke about 'worse than the Ryan Howard fiasco' but it's really the move that's tying Rube's hands behind his back. When you have 37 million committed to a 0-2 WAR first baseman and a closer who, while great, is more of a final piece than a keystone AND those moves preclude you from filling an outfield with major league baseball players, you've made a pretty big mistake.

If Howard regresses further, it's definitely going to hurt us. But what would have been done differently? Give BJ Upton $18M (to woo him from Atlanta, assuming that could happen) and play Utley at first and Galvis at 2B (and no Revere trade)?

I'm guessing most here would love that but I don't know that it's a slam dunk for a better team.

I'm not sure, really...but I hate the idea of giving massive extensions 18 months before you have to. Hamels' deal was deservedly huge and came at the right time.

Barry Jive wrote:

Grotewold wrote:

Barry Jive wrote:

Rockinghorse wrote:I meant there would have been clamoring for Pujols/Fielder, then we wouldn't have gotten them and instead had to plug in a Brandon Belt/Mitch Moreland type that everyone would have hated more than Howard+contract. But I haven't gone back to see exactly who was available at what time.

not sure how we would have gotten Brandon Belt but Adam LaRoche would have been an inexpensive flier that would have been worth about $25 million more than Ryan Howard was last year

I just don't see letting Howard walk and replacing him with LaRoche as a realistic option for a max-payroll, big-market team coming off a 100-win season. Not saying it shouldn't be, but that it's not.

And that's assuming they let him play out his contract, which isn't the Phillies' m.o. most of the time for guys they want to keep. I didn't mean to rehash the Howard thing, just disagreed that we could have parlayed it into the Uptons

well, probably. the "max-payroll, big-market team" thing only works if you're not working against a luxury tax you're doing everything to avoid. there's still a limit to what you can spend.

the reason they couldn't get Justin Upton is Hunter Pence.

Agreed on Pence and I didn't really like the deal at the time, but then again if they score two fucking runs in game 5 and make a run, I probably would be OK with it today. But in the long run, it made us marginally better at the expense of our future.