2011 Philadelphia Phillies: Are the Wheels Falling Off the Bandwagon?

What are those strange sounds coming out of Clearwater, Florida?

Are they the sounds made from assorted injuries to Domonic Brown, Brad Lidge, Placido Polanco and, of course, Chase Utley?

Is this what it sounds like when the wheels start coming off the bus?

Is it the thud of some members of Phillies Nation hitting the ground after leaping off the bandwagon?

Are we simply hearing a lot of collective whispers that the prohibitive favorite Phillies are ready to be overtaken by a younger, healthier Atlanta Braves team?

And yes, are we hearing the (carnivorous) sounds of Braves, Marlins and others licking their chops?

Well, my antennae are picking up a lot of white noise from all these sources and it is hard to turn a deaf ear to it all or pretend that this season will still be a cakewalk.

Of course, after the Phils signed Cliff Lee (and despite their losing Jayson Werth), there was unprecedented optimism around here. There was talk that the Phillies would set a franchise record for wins, if not a Major League Baseball record.

Every other team in the division—if not all of baseball—was merely playing for second place.

Perhaps fans and pundits alike (and yes, I may even have sounded an overly optimistic tone once or twice) may have overstated how much of a juggernaut the 2011 Phillies would be, but should expectations be lowered to the point where the men in red pinstripes are now thought of as underdogs?

No, not at all.

Every season has its own quirks and story lines and, for the most part, this preseason has not gone all that well for the team. The team perceived as the most talented and most experienced in the game is now being described as the oldest—with all the connotations that go with it.

I won’t pretend to play doctor here, but below are my very quick takes, judging from what I’ve read and heard, with admittedly some optimism thrown in for good measure.

 

• Domonic Brown: Whatever we get from him this year will be a bonus. He was a question mark anyway, and Ben Francisco (having a good spring) is more of a sure thing who also bats from the right side. The team will miss some of Werth’s production, but the drop-off will not be too precipitous.

• Brad Lidge: He says he should be okay by Opening Day and, though we’ve heard this all before, I tend to believe him.

• Ditto for Placido Polanco.

• Chase Utley: This injury is scary, both because of the nature of it and because it has befallen the team’s best all-around player. I truly do not have a strong sense of how long Chase will be out or how effectively he will play. Still, given his work ethic and team-first mentality, it is hard to imagine Utley not producing by the second half of the season and through the playoffs.

 

Playoffs? Are we still talking about playoffs?

Of course we should be, unless you want to call them the postseason.

It does feel a little gloomy right now, but let us examine three big reasons for Phillies fans to still be optimistic about 2011.

 

The Phillies Have Won the Last Four NL East Pennants

The team, led by manager Charlie Manuel, knows how to take this to the finish line and overcome whatever adversity it may face. There’s something to be said for “Been There, Done That,” and, well, they have—four straight years.

That earns them an 0-0 record to start the season, but they do have that intangible in their corner.

Still not feeling it? Let’s go all the way back to last year.

 

The 2010 Phillies: Just Look at Last Year

In 2010, the Phillies got only 88 games of service from Jimmy Rollins, subpar ones at that.

Chase Utley only played in 115 and posted career-low numbers.

Their other infield cornerstone, Ryan Howard, also struggled with injuries and had his worst season as well.

In fact, the only Phillies regular to match or exceed his career average numbers last year was catcher Carlos Ruiz.

You may also recall that lefty Cole Hamels (through no fault of his own) once went eight consecutive winless starts.

Brad Lidge? He appeared in a career-low 50 games and pitched only 45.2 innings last year.

One may see all these ominous numbers as the start of a team in decline, and admittedly it would be nice to cultivate or acquire some younger stars.

But look at it this way: Despite all of the adversity of 2010, the Phillies still won an MLB-best 97 games last season.

 

There’s Still R2C2

Unless you were scared off by Cole Hamels’ last Grapefruit League start and the subsequent vow of revenge by the fearsome Billy Hall (the curse of the Billy Hall?), there is no reason to feel anything but optimistic about the four-headed monster of Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Roy Oswalt and Hamels.

Throw in Joe Blanton as a terrific fifth and, yes, there’s still huge cause for optimism.

This pitching staff—and indeed, this whole roster—is built to win right now.

One may debate what this team will look like in three to five years or maybe even in 2012, but for this regular season, the Phillies have more than enough—even with the rightful concern over the health of Chase Utley and others—to get into the postseason.

 

Shhh—please listen a little closer now.

I think I can hear a few Phillies fans jumping back on the bandwagon.

Some Braves and Marlins fans have stopped licking their chops.

Hope still springs eternal, even during an injury-plagued spring.

Correction: It’s still winter up north.

 

For more information on Matt Goldberg’s new books, other writings and public appearances, please e-mail: matt@tipofthegoldberg.com or contact him via his Bleacher Report homepage.

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Philadelphia Phillies: Are Chase Utley’s Injuries Making Ruben Amaro Smile?

The Philadelphia Phillies’ dream season is on the rocks.  The uber-prospect and rightfielder is injured and struggling.  The superstar second baseman and linchpin of the offense is beginning to show his age, and his 2011 season seems more and more in doubt each day.  The third baseman is having issues, the closer has suffered his annual injury, and suddenly Mount Rushmore, the once-in-a-lifetime pitching rotation is all the Phils have going for them.

It is beginning to look like even if the Big Four pitch as well as expected, the offense will not be able to give them any run support and the bullpen will not be able to come in close the door.

So why do I get the feeling that general manager Ruben Amaro and manager Charlie Manuel are smiling? 

Today’s word, children, is a big one that any Philadelphia sports fan knows all too well, and that word is:  

“Expectations”

Expectations are what got Donovan McNabb run out of town despite arguably the most successful quarterback tenure in the 75-plus year history of the Philadelphia Eagles. 

Expectations are the reason why Philadelphia 76ers fans have a bittersweet taste in their mouths regarding Allen Iverson.

Expectations are the reason Pat Burrell and Bobby Abreu were generally loathed by Phillies fans despite enjoying very successful careers in Philadelphia.

And expectations are what threatened to be the absolute undoing of Ruben Amaro and Charlie Manuel just one month ago, with the attention of the world turned towards one of the more remarkable pitching staffs that baseball has ever seen.

After all, Major League Baseball is a funny game.  Year after year baseball teaches us that no matter how you draw it up on paper you simply never know what it is going to take to finish the season on top of the world.  The examples of unfulfilled promise, and unmet expectations, abound in just the last 15 years alone. 

Despite the most well-paid rosters in the history of professional sports, the New York Yankees have won only one World Series in the last ten years, and have been a shadow of the team they were in the 1990’s, when they weren’t paying their players as much, but had far better chemistry, cohesion and depth.

The Atlanta Braves had the last greatest rotation in baseball history, and emerged with only one World Series victory in a sport in which pitching is thought to win championships.  On the other side of the spectrum, the Cleveland Indians of the 1990s produced a wealth of offensive stars and future Hall of Famers, and came away with not a single championship.

Meanwhile, upstart teams in Arizona, Florida, Anaheim, Chicago and San Francisco have come out of no where to win championships when people least expected it.

All of which, frankly, put the Philadelphia Phillies on the wrong end of the expectations game as recently as one month ago.

On the day that the Phillies’ called the first press conference to display their Big Four (plus Blanton) pitchers to the world, the impossibility of the expectations that had been placed upon the team and the city was palpable. The media was giddy, the fans were psyched, and the team was frankly embarrassed by the barrage of questions featuring words like “greatness” and “of all time” and “ever.” 

Indeed, the tone of that first presser was set by the near-constant need of the Four Aces to dial down everyone’s enthusiasm. Cliff Lee had to remind the media that they hadn’t won anything yet.

“I think we haven’t thrown a single pitch as a group yet,” Lee said. “So it’s kind of early to say we’re one of the best rotations in the history of the game. Obviously, we’re a very talented group, and there is potential for all of that. But it’s just that, it’s potential.”

In response to a question regarding what the group was like when they were alone together, Cole Hamels had to point out that they’d really only spent about two hours together to that point.

While all of the enthusiasm was justified, to a certain degree, the enthusiasm was also raising the bar for the season quite high.  In fact, it may have been raising the bar impossibly high.

And that is where expectations rear their ugly head.

After all, when people expect your rotation to be potentially the best rotation of all time, what does it take to meet those sorts of expectations?

Would Halladay, Hamels, Oswalt and Lee each have to win 20 games, like Dave McNally, Jim Palmer, Mike Cuellar and Pat Dobson did for the 1971 Baltimore Orioles?

Would “R2C2” all have to finish in the top ten in ERA in the league, like Mordecai Brown, Ed Reulbach, Jack Pfeister and Carl Lundgren did for the 1906 Chicago Cubs?

Would Mound Rushmore have to dominate the Cy Young Award voting the way Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux and John Smoltz did in the 1990s?

Finally, the biggest question of all: Would anything less than a World Series championship have been considered a failure for the 2011 Philadelphia Phillies?

And that is where the problem arises, for two reasons.

First, as discussed above, the World Series is a crapshoot.  The team that is favored at the beginning of the year is rarely the team that wins, and the team that the conventional wisdom says has the most talented team very rarely wins.

But second, and more importantly for Charlie Manuel and especially Ruben Amaro, all the hub-bub surrounding the Fab Four was obscuring a simple truism regarding the way in which Amaro had conducted the 2010-2011 offseason: by signing Cliff Lee to a huge contract to bring together this amazing pitching staff, Amaro was answering a question that wasn’t being asked while leaving unanswered several questions that were.

In 2010, the Philadelphia Phillies offense was in decline. Oh sure, the team finished second in the National League in runs per game, but the team’s overall numbers were down across the board. The Phils’ power numbers were down, the team on-base percentage was at a five year low, and the offense struggled through several prolonged slumps. Overall, the Phillies scored 772 runs, their fewest runs scored since 2002.

Meanwhile, the Phillies’ pitching staff was the finest that it has been in a while.  In fact, in a long while.  In 2010, the Philadelphia Phillies’ pitchers gave up 640 runs, the fewest runs the Phillies have allowed since…anybody?…1983!  Prior to that, the last time the Phils gave up fewer than 640 was in 1980.

On balance, this makes Ruben Amaro’s off-season gambit a risky one: ignore an inconsistent, aging, and perhaps even declining offense, and bolster the team’s one major asset. 

And it isn’t like Amaro merely maintained the status quo with the Phillies’ offense.  He actually let go of Jayson Werth, who admittedly was overrated in Philly and not worth what the Nationals decided to give him, and failed to do anything whatsoever to replace him.

Frankly, one month ago the Philadelphia Phillies, and more specifically, the expectations set by the Philadelphia Phillies, were a ticking time-bomb for Amaro.  After all, this is a city that gets disgruntled when the Eagles merely make the playoffs, or when the Phillies merely have a winning record.

Here’s an illustrative example of what Phillies fans had in store for themselves this season just one month ago: look at the season Cole Hamels had in 2010.  Hamels was stellar by any measure last season.  He pitched 208.2 innings, he struck out over a batter per inning, he allowed fewer than a hit per inning, and his 3.06 ERA sparkled, especially in a hitters’ park.

But he went 12-11 on the year, and enjoyed five games in which he gave up one earned run or less and came away with either a no-decision or a loss.

And that was with Jayson Werth, and with the offense a year younger than it will be in 2012.

What was going to happen when suddenly all the Phillies’ pitchers were getting no-decisions and losses as a reward for well-pitched games.  What was going to happen when the Greatest Rotation in the History of Baseball was suddenly pitching for a team struggling to make the playoffs because the offense couldn’t put any runs on the board?

Calamity.  An avalanche of despair as the sky-high expectations came rocketing back down to earth.  And Phillies fans never have to ask who to blame; they always know.

That was, of course, a month ago, and a month has changed our world quite a bit.  As my buddy Will so eloquently put it in an email today:

I think we’re f****d. I don’t know what we did to offend the baseball gods (oh, wait, yes I do), but in the less-than-estimable words of Glenn Macnow, they sure seem to want to pick a fight with us.

OK, so we have the best rotation in baseball. That’s a great start. Let’s recount our spring so far.

• Dom Brown goes 0 for 156, then gets a hit, then breaks a bone. Out at least 6 weeks.

• It is announced that Chase Utley, who should have had surgery in November, has a knee “ailment.” I’d bet my one remaining t**ticle that he isn’t playing by June.

• Brad Lidge, who came into Spring Training healthy for the first time since we got him has “biceps soreness.” Isn’t that something that pitchers get in August? Oh yeah – his fastball has topped out a 88mph this spring.

• Polanco leaves today’s game with a hyperextended elbow. Remember how good he was last year BEFORE he hurt his elbow?

Why do I have a feeling that we’re going to be the laughing stock of the league this year? Particularly of Rangers and Yankees fans.

That pretty much sums up the outlook of the Phillies fanbase right about now.  Our train is on a one-way trip to Panic City, and picking up steam in a hurry.  Where once we had boundless optimism, we are now beset by grief-stricken gloom and doom.

So why are Ruben Amaro and Charlie Manuel probably smiling right about now?

Take a look at who Will and Glen Macnow have decided to blame for the gloom and doom.

The baseball gods.

After all, this is kismet.  This is fate.  This is destiny.  This is the karma of the Philadelphia Sports Fan, whose hopes and dreams are always dashed right when they are the most ripe.

The avalanche of Great Expectations has come crashing down in the City of Brotherly Love, and it has somehow swept right past Amaro and Charlie, and they remain unscathed. 

And now, expectations are hilariously, preposterously, impossibly low for this Philadelphia Phillies team, almost to the point that they will be impossible to not meet.  If Utley is playing by the end of May, if Domonic Brown can hit his weight in a platoon with Ben Francisco; if Jesse Barfield’s kid can play second base; is Wilson Valdez can be as sure with the glove as he was last season; if Raul Ibanez can produce any runs whatsoever; if, Heaven forbid Ryan Howard can be the MVP of this team, and Jimmy Rollins can stay on the field, and Shane Victorino can get on base . . .

We’re going to have a pretty good team.  And at this point, that is all the Phillies fans want and expect.

If I were Ruben Amaro, I’d be smiling, too.

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Philadelphia Phillies: Brad Lidge, Placido Polanco, Mike Stutes & More

With the Grapefruit League in full swing now, there is plenty of news and notes making it’s way out of Philadelphia Phillies’ camp, and it isn’t all bad (though, most of it is, so don’t say I didn’t warn you.)

Be it injuries or hot starts, spring training always seems to have its fair share of surprises for the Phils.

The first bit of news should be a bit of a concern for the Phillies, though most people who have spoken about it have stated it isn’t. Closer Brad Lidge missed his scheduled appearance this week with what the team has been calling “biceps tendinitis.”

Of course, the word “tendinitis” has been terrifying Phillies’ fans over the past couple of weeks in association with Chase Utley. The good news? Apparently, the two cases are on different ends of the injury spectrum.

“Honestly, it’s not really a big thing,” said Lidge. The closer expects everything to go his way over the next couple of days, stating that he’s had this type of soreness several times before.

“If it doesn’t, then obviously it would be cause for concern. But right now we’re good. I have plenty of time to be ready for April 1.”

Apparently, it really isn’t a big deal this time. According to Ryan Lawerence of the Delaware County Times, via Twitter, general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. is on the record saying that, if everything goes well, Lidge will be throwing off of a mound again this week.

The right-hander played catch today, will throw tomorrow and could be on the mound by as early as Thursday.

That’s good news for the Phillies, who will need Lidge to be strong this season. Though their rotation is phenomenal, there are no guarantees at the end of ball games, and a healthy Lidge and Ryan Madson combination goes a long way in shoring up the Phils’ chances.

Continuing with minor injury news, third baseman Placido Polanco left today’s game against the Toronto Blue Jays early, injuring the same arm he had surgery on over the offseason.

Once again, the Phillies have stated that the injury is no big deal, and according to one team official, “It was the opposite side of the arm.”

Polanco’s injury is currently being described as a hyper-extended elbow, something Polanco says he has dealt with before in the past.

“It’s right where I had the surgery, but it’s nothing bad,” said the third baseman. “I’ve had it before. I’ve had it a million times. But the fact that I had surgery in that elbow, we’re being safe. We’re playing it very safe. We’ll see how it feels tomorrow and the next day, take it a day at a time.”

A day at a time is what the Phillies are hoping for, though Polanco said he’s not sure when he could return to Grapefruit League action. The injury may not be a bad thing, as long as the third baseman is ready by Opening Day.

Infield hopefuls like Josh Barfield and Delwyn Young could see some increased playing time, which would be beneficial to the Phils’ 25-man Opening Day roster.

In non-injury related news, rookie pitcher Michael Stutes has been impressing the right people this spring. A day after the Phillies’ made their first roster cuts, the young right-hander was still around and for the right reasons.

Though the Phils’ bullpen seems to be stocked to the brim, the team is keeping Stutes in camp long enough to give the young pitcher another look. Appearing in nine innings this spring, Stutes has allowed just one earned run on three base hits. He’s walked just one while punching out nine batters.

Though Phillies’ manager Charlie Manuel called Stutes making the roster on Opening Day a “long shot,” there are obviously some within the organization who think that his chances might be a bit better than that, after an excellent outing against the Minnesota Twins.

“That went better than expected,” Stutes said jokingly after three near-perfect innings against the Twins on Sunday. “I thought it was pretty cool to face Justin Morneau and Thome and guys I watched growing up.”

At this point, I would consider Stutes making the team a long shot as well, with guys like Danys Baez almost assured a roster spot. In the event of an injury though, which is quickly becoming a problem for an older Phillies team, he could be one of the first guys the Phillies call on, and having that depth isn’t a bad thing either.

In other non-injury related news, and almost non-baseball related news, Bill Hall had some interesting comments about Cole Hamels following the Phillies and Astros matchup on Monday.

During the game, an erratic Hamels, who struggled with control for most of the game, threw a pitch up and in at Hall—something he apparently wasn’t all to satisfied with.

When the new Astros’ second baseman got back to his feet, he had some words for Hamels, none of which were very kind, and according to sources, Hamels jawed right back at him.

After the game, both men had very different views of the way the situation played out.

“I don’t know if he was mad he gave up a homer or if he was mad the umpire gave me time, but I’m not going to let him speed-pitch me,” said Hall. “He threw a pitch in, and I’m not going to let him disrespect me either. He kind of said something I didn’t like too much. It’s over with.”

It was far from over with, however, as Hall had some more not-so-pleasant comments shortly after that, when he told reporters, “[Hamels] is definitely a marked man for me now, so when I can do some damage off him, I’m going to let him know I did some damage off him. I can guarantee that.”

For a guy who is a life-time .136 hitter against Hamels, I don’t see much “damage” being done any time soon.

Hamels, on the other hand, didn’t take the situation as seriously. He had “no hard feelings” after the game and reiterated to reporters that he was simply trying to speed the game up—something that Hall was admittedly trying not to do.

“I don’t know him personally, but I do know he’s a good guy,” said the Phils’ starter.

“That’s just something you do to get the game going,” said Hamels, who continued trying to explain what happened on the field between he and Hall. “It wasn’t anything major. I don’t really want to talk about it.”

Finally, we’ll end with a couple of important Phillies’ stories to keep in mind this week. Though it doesn’t have the same type of ring to the position battle that recently ended with Domonic Brown’s injury, the battle for the final spot on the bench is really starting to heat up in a big way.

While some believe that Michael Martinez has an upper-hand on the job thanks to his Rule 5 status, Delwyn Young (hitting .333 with a home run), Josh Barfield (hitting .476) and John Mayberry Jr. (hitting .350 with four home runs) certainly aren’t going down quietly.

Also, in something I’m not sure constitutes as an injury for this Phillies’ team, left-handed reliever JC Romero was hit on his pinky finger (glove hand) with a line drive today. He finished his inning of relief, so everything seems to be okay.

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Brad Lidge: Will He See His Injury History Repeat?

The grocery list of Phillies’ player injuries has just grown a bit longer.  It began with Chase Utley’s bum knee, moved on to a broken hand bone for Domonic Brown, a sore neck for Ben Francisco and now, Brad Lidge has joined the party.

According to Phillies sources, Lidge has bicep tendinitis.  Pitching coach Rich Dubee said, “He generally has it in the spring,” indicating that this is business as usual for Lidge.  The Phillies insist it is not serious.  Then again, we have heard that one before.

There are also reports that Lidge’s fastball is not up to speed.  Combined with his injury history, and the fact that he has yet to get through an entire spring training with the Phillies healthy, there may be reason for concern.

Speaking of Lidge’s history, did you know that Lidge missed parts of his first four professional seasons—from 2002 to 2005—with a variety of injuries?  These included a torn rotator cuff, right shoulder tendinitis and a broken forearm that almost ended his career.

Here is a closer look at Lidge’s history of injuries:

• 2002—a strained intercostal muscle near the rib cage.
• December 2003—arthroscopic surgery on his left knee.
• June-July 2005—shut down with elbow issues.
• May 2007—bone bruise on his right femur near his knee.
• June-July 2007—left oblique strain.
• October 2007—surgery to repair torn cartilage in his right knee.
• February 2008—tore the meniscus in the same knee he just had surgery on during his first pitch off a mound in spring training.
• June 2009—sprained right knee and a sore elbow, specifically the flexor pronator tendon.
• January 2010—surgery on both the elbow and the right knee again.
• March 2010—the elbow is still an issue and Lidge gets a cortisone injection.
• March 2011—bicep tendinitis.

While history does not always predict the future, the long list of injuries is a bit scary.  The amount of time Lidge has missed is an issue as well.

Of the top 10 closers in baseball who remained basically healthy in 2010, the average number of innings pitched for each closer was about 68.2 innings per year.  Lidge pitched only 45.2 last year and 58.2 in 2009.

The current injury for Lidge may indeed be nothing to worry about.  Phillies fans certainly hope that is the case.  But at the rate Phillies players are dropping, any injury is scary. 

Adding to the Phillies woes, Placido Polanco left a spring game early today after hyperextending the same elbow he had surgery on this offseason.  Just like Lidge, the Phillies say he is not expected to miss much time.

For both Lidge and Polanco, many are hoping that history will not repeat itself.

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7 Phillies Pitchers and Realistic Expectations

Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Cole Hamels, Roy Oswalt… What is and what isn’t with the best 1-2-3-4 of the decade?

They’re not going to win 80 games. They’re not going to have the top three Cy Young vote getters. They’re not all going to stay healthy.

They’re not all going to win 20 games or make 30 starts. In fact, I bet they don’t all make 25 starts.

They will be good enough to win the NL East. They will be very difficult to beat in the playoffs.

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Rumors: Albert Pujols for Ryan Howard Swap Likely by the Dedline?

Ever since last season, there have been rumors of an Albert Pujols for Ryan Howard swap between the Cardinals and the Phillies. Since Albert Pujols did not get a contract extension done with the Cardinals this offseason, St. Louis may want to get something out of their star first basemen, instead of having him walk. The Cardinals want to avoid being “Lebron’d” in other terms. The Phillies would benefit greatly from this trade, gaining the best first basement in baseball, and losing a power-hitting, strike-out machine Ryan Howard.

However, I do not see why either team would do this trade. The Phillies yet again, will probably have to give up prospects. With their depleted farm system after the many trades made, this would not be in the Phillies interest. Also, the Phillies signed a $125 Million extension through 2016. Why sign a player to a huge extension then trade him the next year? That is not logical. 

On the other hand, Albert Pujols is one of the best, if not the best player in baseball. The Cardinals still do have a great chance of resigning Pujols in the offseason. They will exercise ever single chance they get to resign Albert. No matter how many teams go after Pujols, the Cardinals will still make there push to resign him. There is no way Albert will not consider resigning with the Cardinals; after all he has spent his whole career in St. Louis. The rumor of a Howard-Pujols swap will heat up towards the trade deadline, but after all the trade will be very hard to complete.

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2011 MLB Preview: Are Philadelphia Phillies a Playoff Team Without Chase Utley?

For the last few years, the Philadelphia Phillies have made their name as an offense-heavy team that occasionally pitched well.

That’s not to say they had no good pitching—they just didn’t have very much of it. Cole Hamels carried the team in both 2007 and 2008, and Cliff Lee was lights-out down the stretch in 2009, but beyond that, Philadelphia’s rotation didn’t scare anyone.

Even in 2010, manager Charlie Manuel sent Roy Halladay to the mound every fifth day (not “every fifth game”) because he didn’t trust anyone else to take the ball.

But by the end of last season, something had changed. The Phillies were the near-unanimous favorites to win the National League pennant not for their bats, but for their arms.

While assertions that the Phillies’ tremendous trio would be unbeatable in a playoff series were quickly proven false, this was a clear shift in the composition of their roster.

Philadelphia still had the offensive prowess to win in a slugfest, but opposing teams were more worried about scoring enough runs than allowing too many.

Now with Lee back in the fold, Philadelphia’s 2011 rotation is undoubtedly the best in the game, and may end up among the greatest of all-time. In the minds of baseball’s talking heads, the Phillies have already wrapped up the NL pennant.

But it’s too soon to crown them the champions. The Phillies have a problem that could end up costing them a playoff berth: the lineup.

The Phillies managed just 772 runs in 2010, down from 820 in 2009 and 890 in 2007. Part of that can be blamed on the league-wide drop in offense last season, but the team’s 99 wRC+ shows Philadelphia’s bats to have been slightly below average.

Surprised? Check the stat sheets. Jimmy Rollins battled injuries and continued his descent into mediocrity, tying or setting career lows in nearly every offensive category as his OPS dropped to .694.

Thirty-eight-year-old Raul Ibanez slumped through his worst offensive season in a decade, finishing with an OPS below .800 for the first time since 2005 and missing the 20-homer mark he had cleared the previous five years.

Even Shane Victorino’s game took a turn for the worse; he hit just .259 and posted the worst full-season OPS (.756) of his career.

Even the mighty Ryan Howard looks like he may be past his prime. After averaging 50 homers and 143 RBI from 2006-09 (never dropping below 45 and 136, respectively), he managed just 31 homers and plated only 108 runs last season. His .859 OPS was the worst he’s ever posted.

Throw in his abysmal defense and his premium offensive position, and he finished the 2010 campaign with 2.0 WAR. That’s right, folks—Ryan Howard was a league-average player.

The outlook is even worse for 2011. The Phillies already lost their second-best position player, Jayson Werth, to free agency, and his replacement, young right fielder Domonic Brown, is out for at least a month with a broken wrist.

But now Philadelphia faces an even bigger problem. Face-of-the-franchise Chase Utley’s knee problems are turning out to be worse than we’d thought.

They are understandably hesitant to let Utley undergo surgery for his tendinitis, but with the non-surgical treatments failing this far, things don’t look good for the five-time All-Star.

Utley is almost assuredly going to miss Opening Day, and while the front office doesn’t expect him to miss the whole season, there is no timetable for his return. If he ends up needing surgery, it could take him months to recover fully.

The salient question is: Are they still the favorites without their keystone man? Thanks to some sabermetric projection systems, we can get a good idea of the answer.

The easiest system to use for measuring players’ projected impacts on their teams is FanGraphs.com’s FAN Projections.

Here, the Phillies hold a five-game lead in the NL East over the second-place Florida Marlins; a six-win drop would put them in a four-way tie for the Wild Card.

The fans project 7.9 WAR per 162 games for Utley and -0.2 WAR/162 for his chief replacement last year, Wilson Valdez. In other words, for every 20 games Utley misses, the Phillies lose a win.

By that standard, if Utley misses a month or two, the Phillies are still the favorites in the NL East, but it’ll be closer than they’d like.

If he’s back at 100-percent capacity after the All-Star break, the Phillies will be in the thick of it, but a playoff berth is far from guaranteed.

And if he misses the whole season or comes back before he’s fully recovered and plays poorly, the Phillies will be lucky to win a Wild Card spot.

What of the more advanced projection systems? CAIRO’s latest projections have the Phillies 6.5 games ahead of the second-place Braves, while PECOTA has them ahead by four.

Using a 5-4-3 weighting system for the last three years, we get a projection of 7.9 WAR/162 games for Utley; making the generous assumption that whoever replaces him will be worth 1.0 WAR/162, the Phillies lose a little more than a win each month Utley is out.

By CAIRO’s standards, the Phillies still win the division as long Utley comes back by September, Meanwhile, PECOTA says the Phillies will fall to second unless he’s back by the trade deadline.

And that’s assuming the rotation stays healthy, Rollins and Howard don’t slip any further and Utley is feeling comfortable upon his return—far from a given with this kind of problem.

There’s no way to know how Philadelphia will fare in 2011 until we know more about how serious Utley’s injury is, how it can be fixed and how long he’ll be out.

Barring a complete disaster elsewhere on the roster, the Phillies should be serious contenders, but in spite of their amazing starting pitching, a less threatening offense and the loss of their best player mean they are far from clear favorites for the pennant.

 

For more of Lewie’s work, visit WahooBlues.com. Follow him on Twitter @LewsOnFirst or @WahooBlues.

Read more Philadelphia Phillies news on BleacherReport.com

Philadelphia Phillies: 5 Candidates to Take Domonic Brown’s 25-Man Roster Spot

With Domonic Brown’s hand injury, another opportunity presented itself as an extra roster spot opened up. 

Who knows when Brown will get called up this season, if he even gets called up at all?

Ben Francisco continues to hit the ball hard during spring training, and he’ll be the starting right fielder.

Nobody knows what’s going on with Chase Utley’s knee, and this will play a role in regards to whom the Phillies will select to make the opening day roster as well.

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MLB Trade Rumors: Will Phillies Chase Aramis Ramirez If Utley Injury Worsens?

Chase Utley is a ballplayer who should at the very least be respected and admired—even in the eyes of opposing fan bases.

A tireless worker, Utley is a rare breed of middle-infielder with the ability to hit for both power and average.  Additionally, he is a very reliable defender and is known to raise his level of play at the largest of moments.

Unfortunately for the city of Philadelphia, this battler has another fight on his hands—though this one is not taking place between the white lines of Citizen’s Bank Park. It is instead an internal war with cartilage, bone and tendons in his balky right knee.

The Phillies already have lost promising rookie Domonic Brown, and are looking for ways to compensate for the loss of clutch slugger Jayson Werth.

Add in uncertainties over Raul Ibanez’ age and Jimmy Rollins’ injury history, and question marks have suddenly been placed next to one of baseball’s most imposing offensive attacks.

Utley is a tough man, and one who would refuse to let down his teammates under any circumstances. As such, let us assume he attempts to tough it out with injections and rehabilitation over the season’s opening months.

Here we are now in the middle of June, and the situation has simply deteriorated too far for Utley to ignore further. Doctors recommend a procedure that could have him ready for the postseason, but he is otherwise lost for the regular season.

Simultaneously, a struggling Chicago Cubs team is mired in fourth place in the NL Central and looking for a way to shed salary in a season lacking playoff contention.

Needing some added pop in a solid but inconsistent lineup, would the Phillies make a call to Jim Hendry for third base slugger Aramis Ramirez?

Current Phillies third baseman Placido Polanco is truly a second baseman by trade—earning two Gold Gloves in his time at the position in Detroit. He could very easily transition back to his old home to leave room for a power hitter at a traditional power position.

Philadelphia is far from a small-market team, and they will have virtually no issue taking on the then $7-8 million left on his deal (one that can be bought out for $2 million after the season). They would essentially be renting a quality hitter who can handle big cities in a risk-free scenario.

A team that has previously been exposed in the heart of their lineup by left-handers (Howard and Ibanez vs. Pettitte, Sabathia, Marte) would now have replenished the righty power they lost in Werth’s defection to Washington.

Their lineup would be more balanced, and they would have some added firepower to knock out a stubborn Giants team likewise loaded with pitching talent.

While the Phillies could potentially boast the best pitching staff since the 90s Atlanta Braves, there is nothing wrong with ensuring a few more runs will be thrown up on the scoreboard in postseason action.

Another option in this midseason scenario would be Texas Rangers infielder Michael Young, but the $32 million left on his deal beyond 2011 makes him an unrealistic and irresponsible trade target for Philadelphia.

The deal would also make sense for the other franchise involved, as the Cubs are looking to get younger and cheaper in some areas to entertain making a push for Albert Pujols’ services at first base.

Chicago could request a quality but unproven arm like Kyle Kendrick from an already crowded and star-studded rotation—while also discussing the inclusion of supplementary prospects.

An expiring contract attached to an aging player would not provide a large haul in return, but grabbing a back-end starter like Kendrick while receiving added payroll relief would be a solid move for the Cubs if in fourth place come June.

Hopefully this will not come into the equation for the Phillies in 2011, and perhaps Utley will make it through 140 plus games with consistent production in the middle of the lineup.

Vegas odds would likely not lean in favor of that scenario, however, and it is not unreasonable to expect a risk-free splash like this one to take place midseason.

Fans in Philadelphia should keep a very close eye on the standings in the NL Central throughout the early months of the season, as a dangerous veteran like Ramirez could be re-energized by a change of scenery and World Series contention.

Read more Philadelphia Phillies news on BleacherReport.com

NL East: 10 Questions for the Philadelphia Phillies in 2011

The Philadelphia Phillies have proved to be the class of the National League in recent years.  Their successes have included two World Series appearances (one title) and four straight NL East crowns.  

As of late, they’ve done everything possible to keep the proverbial “window” open for as long as possible.  With winning comes more money—money that the Phillies have spent more and more freely.

Last winter, the Phillies rid themselves of Cliff Lee to acquire Roy Halladay.  Turn one calendar year and both Halladay and Lee are members of the same rotation.  Not to mention Roy Oswalt and Cole Hamels are also members of the rotation known as “R2C2.”  

The only potential negative to these outcomes is the money that’s tied into these big-name pitchers for the next handful of seasons.  In addition, the Phillies have virtually given up every prospect not named Domonic Brown over the past few seasons.

Currently, the Phillies have all of the ingredients needed to make another run at the title except for one glaring issue: health.  The Phillies’ health could be a major problem this season if Chase Utley is indeed on the shelf for an extended period of time.  Otherwise, they have the most coveted asset in the league in their lethal rotation.  That’s something that every team in the majors wishes that they could build.  

Ruben Amaro Jr.’s free spending has kept the Phillies relevant and will continue to as Philadelphians enjoy the most fruitful time in team history.  The Phillies are near the top of the mountain that is the MLB and don’t appear to be going anywhere anytime soon.  The window of opportunity remains wide open.  

However, so many questions surround this team as age becomes an issue.  Here are 10 questions for the Phillies heading into 2011.

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