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Utley's "Little Things"

Rather than dwell on the fact that Adam Eaton let Rod Barajas of the Blue Jays -- yes, that Rod Barajas -- beat the Phillies almost single-handedly tonight, lets focus for a second on two very heady defensive plays made by Chase Utley.

On the first play, Jayson Werth did the majority of the work, making a great throw from deep center field to Utley, covering second base as Marco Scutaro was attempting to advance from first base on a fly ball out.  Utley's back was to Scutaro and as he caught the throw from Werth and as he did, he knew enough to place his left foot in such a way to cause Scutaro to take the slightly longer way to the base, giving Utley just enough time to tag him out.

Again, most of the hard work was done by Werth, making a tough throw, but it was a great example of a player, Utley, doing "the little things".

The second play came later in the game on a double steal.  On the play, Hector Luna took off from third for home as Phils catcher Chris Coste threw to Jimmy Rollins at second base.  Noticing what was happening, Utley ran towards the pitcher's mound, cut off the throw, and threw home in time to get Luna.

There's no doubt, Clutchly's greatest value to the Phillies comes from his 165 OPS+, but my guess is that if there was a statistical category called "field awareness", he's lead the league.

After all, remember this play?  "Chase Utley, you... are... the... man!"

Jayson Werth is Accident Prone

"They say that home runs are accidents... I hope that I have about 20 more accidents this year."  ~ Jayson Werth, following last night's game [link]

Just when you thought Jayson Werth's hot start to the season might be coming to an end, part of the natural ebb and flow of any season, he goes and has a game like the one he had last night.

In case you missed it, Werth had three home runs and eight RBI, the power supply for the Phillies 10-3 rout of the visiting Blue Jays.  The most impressive was the second of the three home runs, a grand salami.  He's hit 9 homers on the year and his OPS+ stands at 136.

Not only that, the performance garnered a place for Werth in the history books as he tied the franchise record for the most RBI in a game with the likes of Kitty Bransfield (sounds like the female owner of a house of ill repute in the Old West, July 11, 1910, at Pittsburgh), Gavvy Cravath (Aug. 8, 1915, at Cincinnati), Willie "Puddin' Head" Jones (Aug. 20, 1958, at St. Louis), and Mike Schmidt (April 17, 1976, at Chicago) .

The win gets the Phillies to 24-19 on the year, tied for first in the NL East with the Florida Marlins.  The Phillies magic number is 121.

Not LOST for Things to Watch Thursday Night, Including Cole Hamels

Cole Hamels has had some flashy starts in the past, the ones where he strikes out ten batters or so in seven or eight innings of work, maybe gives up a home run in a moment of weakness, spoiling a potential no-no.

Last night's start however, while not as flashy, may have been one of his best.  He went the distance, a full nine innings, did not allow a run, and got outs with great efficiency (five times he got an out on just one pitch), striking out "only" six batters.

It's really fun to see him mature as a pitcher.

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A few days ago, the excellent pop culture website A List of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago wrote about missing the old LOST, so to speak.  The gist isn't the usual LOST backlash -- "the show sucks now, the plot moves very little every episode" -- but more of a reminiscing about the old days while fully acknowledging that today's version of the show is pretty good too.

I would agree with that sentimentality.  It was much different when we were wondering, bordering on paranoia, what or who was out there just after the crash, rather than why what or or who was out there in the jungle as we do now.

Watching last night's episode, it occurred to me that we are almost watching an entirely different show.  Still quite good, still quite intriguing, but different.

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By the end of the night, my DVR was sucking wind like a two-pack-a-day smoker forced to take the stairs.  Also receiving my attention was the season finale of The Office.  So many good jokes, from the new HR Person, Holly, thinking Kevin was "challenged" to the token Jim-on-Dwight prank to lead off the show that ended in Dwight demolishing his own cell phone.  But perhaps the best was Ed Helms' Andy Bernard knocking over Darryl's keyboard in the spastic fashion that only Andy can.

It was almost as good as when he tried to play golf in last week's episode.

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Finally, a "thank you" to everyone who has filled out the BS&S.com Reader Survey.  If you haven't had a chance to do so already, I would greatly appreciate your input [link].

Analysis Chase Utley's High School Shot via Google Earth

A few days ago Paul Hagen of the Daily News profiled Chase Utley's hitting prowess -- a "This is Your Life" of his hitting stroke.

In the article, a story is recounted about when Utley, as a high school player, hit a ball over the scoreboard in right-center field at Long Beach State's Blair Field.  When I read that, I immediately thought of when I went to Google Earth and measured the length of twelve-year old Ryan Howard's prodigious shot at Red Lobster.

A quick Google search locates Blair Field and for some reason, the aforementioned scoreboard is not there, but there is one in left-center field.  Either way, the field is fairly symmetric and it would take quite a bomb to carry over a scoreboard.

My guess?  420 feet.

Not as impressive as Howard's feat as a pre-teen, but still pretty darn good.

 

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Notes: Myers, Eaton, Erin Andrews, center field and some good tunes

I've been on record in numerous places saying that Brett Myers would not have trouble transitioning back to the rotation after being a closer for most of last season.

In hindsight, that was not one of my better predictions.

Given his start tonight -- 6 ER, 4 1/3 innings -- I think we have to begin to question his health.

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According to John Dewan's State of the Week, Chase Utley ranks as tied with Oakland's Mark Ellis as the best fielding second baseman in baseball so far this season using the Plus/Minus system as a metric.

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A lot of Adam Eaton's problems come from between his ears, but sometimes, trouble just follows this guy:

Adam Eaton shagged fly balls in the outfield and tossed one to a fan near the railing in left field. Another fan stepped in front, but leaned over too far. His weight propelled him over the railing.  

Luckily, he grabbed the railing with one arm as he fell to the warning track, allowing him to land on his feet, rather than his head.

"It was one of the scariest things I've seen," Eaton said.

  I would not stand near him during a thunderstorm.

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Spent the weekend in New England, and caught Ben Sollee on XM Radio.  Good stuff.  Apparently he's got a record coming out in June.

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When I first read that a fan fell over the railing at Citizens Bank Park, I thought this might be the reason.

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Finally, Shane Victorino should be playing centerfield when he is in the game.  On Tuesday night, in the ninth, Jayson Werth made a bad jump on a ball and ended up letting it get over his head.  If Victorino gets a bad jump, he has the speed to recover.  Some will argue Victorino has the better arm for right, and that's true, but a center fielder has more occasions to use his arm than a right fielder, so it's better to have your best arm there.

The One That Got Away and the One That's Coming Back

There seems to be a lot of hand-wringing as of late over Pat Gillick including Gavin Floyd in the trade with the Chicago White Sox that sent Freddy Garcia to the Phillies.

In case you've missed it, Floyd has flirted on two occasions with no-hitters in the first six weeks or so of this season and the 25-year old has a 173 ERA+.  Given the struggles of Adam Eaton, fans are wishing Floyd was still in the fold.

The thing is, Gavin Floyd would not be putting up those kind of numbers here in Philadelphia.  His problems were strictly mental and somehow, someway, pitching here got in his head.  Was it the demanding fans?  Was it the small ballpark?  Who knows, but anyone who saw him pitch in red pinstripes should know he wasn't going to have success here.

No, the issue shouldn't be that Gillick traded Gavin Floyd, if anything, fans should still be upset over the fact that Gillick did not demand a physical of Freddy Garcia before the deal was finalized.

Tell me Mr. Gillick, with all do respect, when you bought your houses in Seattle and Toronto, did you get an inspection done first or did you just take them "as is"?

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It appears as if sometime during this weekend's series with the Giants in San Francisco, the Phils will activate Jimmy Rollins from the disabled list.  He hasn't started a game for the team since April 8th, over a month ago, and the Phillies sure could use him.

At 20-16, the Fightin's have done just fine without Rollins, but it's been on the backs of Chase Utley, Pat Burrell, Jayson Werth and their hot bats.  All three have begun to cool off a bit -- as expected, no one could keep up that torrid pace forever -- and having Jimmy back will be a shot in the arm.

Howard Misses Pitches and the Point

I guess Adam Eaton being unable to find the world's largest strikezone last night still has me in a bad mood, because I'm about to take things out on Ryan Howard.

From Ryan Howard, via Scott Lauber at The News Journal:

"To me, it's all about seeing the ball and having good at-bats," Howard said. "To everyone else, it's about results. That's how it is in the media and everywhere else. So that's that. People see what they want to see. There's a lot of stuff that you don't see, other stuff that's going on. I try to do what I can to help the team win in whatever ways I can."

 

OK, I believe Ryan is probably being a good teammate and helping out in some small way behnd the scenes.  And I do believe that Ryan is trying the proverbial 110% at the plate, but for him to say we should only judge him on the quality of his at bats... well... that isn't going to make him happy either.

According to Fangraphs.com, Howard swings at 20% of the pitches he sees outside of the strikezone, and when he swings at one within the strikezone, he misses 25% of the time.  In comparison, Pat Burrell only swings at 13% of pitches out of the zone and Chase Utley misses on swings at pitches within the strikezone only 8% of the time.

Now, that is comparing Howard to two of the hottest hitters in all of baseball, but you can't tell me that after watching Howard flail away all spring that he is "seeing the ball" the way he wants us to believe.

Fine Ryan, we'll judge you on quality of at-bats, not results, just be careful, you might get what you asked for.

Eaaaaaton!

As I write this, the Phillies are down 6-2 in the fourth inning against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

In an inexplicable fashion, Adam Eaton just walked Randy Johnson with the bases loaded to force in a run.  He'd already given up a walk, a double, and another walk in the inning, but hadn't yet surrendered a run.  With one out, had he struck out Randy Johnson or gotten him to hit into a double play -- two likely possibilities -- he would have been very close to out of the inning.

The final of four total pitches to Johnson was thrown with as much conviction as a groom at a shotgun wedding.

Deplorable.

Phillies Lead Baseball in LHP Prospects with Unique Names

A few days ago the Phillies converted Josh Outman and Fabio Castro, two left-handed starters, to relievers.  Those moves drew some attention away from the fact that they also promoted 22-year old left-handed starting pitcher Antonio Bastardo to AA Reading.

Bastardo earned the promotion after striking out 47 batters in just 30 1/3 innings pitched at A+ Clearwater.  Impressive to say the least and consistent with his efforts in 2007 when he struck out 110 batters in 96 2/3 innings pitched.

Razor Shines, his manager at Clearwater [while they're at it, is there room for World B. Free in the organization somewhere?], had this to say about Bastardo:

"He's got the gamut. Fastball, slider, change that he can throw for strikes on any count he wants. His changeup has really come along this spring and he's causing a lot of problems for opposing batters."

He also thought that Bastardo would pitch for the big league Phillies this year [link].

At 5'11'' and 168 lbs., the Dominican will undoubtedly face questions about his durability as a starter, and he still struggles with his control a bit, but the fact is, he misses bats.

Outman and Castro are good young pitchers, but it might just be Bastardo that becomes a lefty out of the pen for the Phils this year.

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At 18-14 and atop the NL East, the Phillies head west for a 7-game road trip against the Arizona Diamondbacks and the San Francisco Giants.  If they return 22-17, I'll be happy.

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Began watching the DVD Richie Ashburn: A Baseball Life and after one disc down and one to go, I can, without any reservations whatsoever, highly recommend it.  The footage of Whitey playing is just plain cool to see.  Oh, and one other thing:  Harry Kalas slings a pie in Whitey's face.  Priceless.

Good Times Call for Desperate Measures?

Without a doubt, the most pleasant surprise about the Phillies this season has been how utterly dependable and clutch the bullpen has been.  No doubt, the Phillies brass has been pleased with the results as well, but that isn't stopping them from looking to improve the pen, nor should it.

Their particular focus now is to acquire a left-handed arm for the pen, and since they haven't been able to find one to suit them externally, they are now turning internally.  According to Mike Drago of the Reading Eagle, word has come down from the big club's front office that they want LHP's Fabio Castro and Josh Outman converted from starters to relievers so that they can possibly help the Phillies this season.

To convert two promising AA starters (Outman more so than Castro) to relievers so that they can help the big club this year as situational relievers/LOOGY's smacks of desperation.  And it's hard to see where the desperation is coming from.  After all, the Phillies are 16-13 and are atop the NL East, and have gotten there in large part, as I mentioned earlier, to a very good bullpen.  Here's the team's relievers so far this year versus left-handed batters:

Not too shabby.  The strikeout rate could be higher, and Castro and Outman can help with that  The walk rate is a smidgen high, but on the other hand, Castro and Outman aren't necessarily going to help with that.

Hey, I'm happy Pat Gillick and Ruben Amaro think they need to continue to improve all areas of the team, not just the obvious ones.  But it does make you wonder, what do they know about the current Phillies relievers that we don't?

It must be something because again, converting two AA starters to relievers certainly seems desperate, particularly for a team that traditionally has had a hard time developing starters from its farm system.