Philadelphia Phillies: 6 Players Who Could Start at Third Base in 2012

After a “shocking” defeat at the hands of the St. Louis Cardinals, the Philadelphia Phillies find themselves vacationing early this offseason. There are many questions that general manager Rubén Amaro Jr. will have to examine in the coming months. Obviously an early exit in the playoffs was not in the “cards,” if I am permitted a pun.

Amaro will have several decisions to make in regards to free agency, including third base. I would like to inspect the third base position of this team, currently occupied by Placido Polanco. 

Polanco is coming off an injury-riddled season that has some fans speculating if Polanco’s time is up in Philadelphia. The 36 year old third basemen had a less than stellar regular season, and an even worse postseason. 

Is it time for a change at third base for the Philadelphia Phillies? 

Let’s take a look at our options.

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Grover Cleveland Alexander Might Have Been a Greater Phillie Than Mike Schmidt

Mike Schmidt is the overwhelming choice as the greatest Philadelphia Phillies player of all time. Steve Carlton is considered the greatest Phillies’ pitcher ever.

In a recent poll by a national newspaper, the players selected as the greatest Phillies were Richie Asburn, Steve Carlton, Ed Delahanty, Robin Roberts and Mike Schmidt. It was no contest as Schmidt received 64 percent of the votes. Carlton finished second with 22 percent.

A player who might have been the greatest of all Phillies was not even listed.

In 1911, 24-year-old Grover Cleveland Alexander joined the Phillies. He set a rookie record that will never be broken when he won 28 games. Alexander pitched 367 innings, had a 2.57 ERA and a 133 ERA+.

Alexander pitched for the Phillies from 1911-17. During those eight seasons, he was 190-88 with a 2.12 ERA and a 143 ERA+. He averaged 27 wins a season.

In 1915, “Pete” won 31 games as the Phillies won the pennant. He followed that by winning 33 games in 1916 and 30 in 1917.

During the offseason,  Phillies’ owner William Baker sent Alexander to the Chicago Cubs. The excuse was that the Phillies thought that Alexander would be drafted to help the imperialistic goals of Great Britain and the United States, but Baker admitted that the deal was made because he needed the money.

Steve Carlton played for the Phillies from 1972-86. He was 241-161 with a 3.04 ERA and a 123 ERA+.

A strong case can be made that Alexander, despite pitching for the Phillies for only eight seasons compared to Carlton’s 15, was the greater Phillies’ pitcher.

Alexander topped Carlton with respect to ERA, ERA+, games won, innings pitched, and wins per season. Carlton led the league in strikeouts five times. So did Alexander, but Alexander did it in five of his eight Phillies’ seasons.

Mike Schmidt is another story. He was a great defensive third baseman who hit 548 home runs. Schmidt batted .267/.380/.527 over 18 seasons, 16 of which were full seasons.

It is impossible to credit any player with the victory when his team wins, even the pitcher.

When Mike Schmidt hit a “game-winning” home run, we tend to ignore the contributions his teammates made to put him in the position to hit the home run. When Carlton pitched one of his six one-hitters, he needed help from his teammates, without which he would have had no better than a tie game.

Whether Alexander was a greater Phillie than Schmidt is a matter of opinion.

Alexander averaged 40 starts a season, completing 31 of them. He pitched about 356 innings a season and was credited with an average of 27 wins.

Schmidt averaged about 134 games a season, with 30 home runs and 89 RBIs.

Schmidt’s Phillies played approximately 1,450 innings a season. Schmidt played approximately 1,200 of those innings.

Alexander’s Phillies played approximately 1,390 innings a season (154 game schedule). Alexander pitched 356 of those innings.

Now to use statistics to make a point. Remember, Mark Twain quoted Ben Disraeli when the latter pointed out there are “Lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

Mike Schmidt played defense 1,200 innings a season, but he batted 678 times a season, which averages to four plate appearances a game. 

Taking 1980, which was Schmidt’s best season (48 home runs and 121 RBIs), he made 652 of the Phillies 6,265 plate appearances. That is 10.4 percent of his team’s plate appearances.

Taking 1915, which was Alexander’s best season, he pitched 376 and one-third innings. He faced 1,435 of the 5,478 batters the Phillies faced. That is 26.2 percent of the batters his team faced.

The above points out that pitchers such as Alexander, Christy Mathewson, Walter Johnson, Mordecai Brown, Nolan Ryan and Randy Johnson are involved as much as regular star players over the course of  season.

It is a baseball axiom that great pitchers stop great hitters more often than great hitters succeed against great pitchers. Or not.

Maybe Grover Cleveland Alexander really was the greatest Phillies’ player of all time. Maybe not.

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MLB Free Agents 2012: 5 Possible Acquisitions after Phillies’ Recent Comments

During the Philadelphia Phillies historic regular season, any talk of the upcoming offseason centered on resigning Jimmy Rollins and Ryan Madson, and potential improvements in left field and to the team’s bench.

However, that was before the Phillies exited the playoffs following their Game 5 loss in the NLDS to the St. Louis Cardinals.

And it was also before Ryan Howard injured his Achilles tendon on the final play of the game.

Now following comments by general manager Ruben Amaro Jr., the Phillies’ offseason priorities have changed since the July non-waiver trade deadline.

In addition to attempting to re-sign Jimmy Rollins, the Phillies have also stated that the starting left field position will be up for grabs, and that the team will look to bring in a free agent should Madson sign elsewhere, rather than using a current member of the bullpen in the closer’s role. 

The Phillies also received news that Howard’s recovery time may continue into spring training, and possibly even the regular season.

Third base may be a position that is upgraded this offseason, as well.

After winning 102 games during the regular season, the Phillies now enter the offseason with a chance to find the right players to add to a roster with World Series expectations.

Here are five players who the Phillies may attempt to acquire.

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Phillies 2011: End of Season and Grief Counseling Advice

Good grief!

Yeah, what’s so good about it?

Hopefully, at least some of you recognize this rather quaint expression popularized by good ol’ Charlie Brown—that lovable loser from Charles Schulz’s Peanuts strip.

We all know Master Brown, who pitched for a baseball team that never won a game. They were the kiddie, amateur version of the Chicago Cubs, but much more lovable—and without any of the excessive payroll.

So, what does this have to do with the Philadelphia Phillies—“my” Phillies—who lost 1-0 to the St. Louis Cardinals last Friday night to be eliminated from the MLB playoffs?

a) Nothing

b) Anything

c) Everything

d) You decide

To dispense with some word play, the Phillies, baseball’s best team in the regular season with a record of 102-60, were not playing for peanuts.

They had the second-highest player payroll in MLB (at $173 million, behind the New York Yankees) and Phillies Nation (as rabid a fan base as exists) shelled out a lot of money for tickets, concessions, parking and merchandise this year.

 

 

Good grief!

So, do I really need to explain or analyze the grief experienced by Phillies fans who suffered through that cruel loss that ended our baseball season and our dream-goal of another world championship?

The team lost, and we fans experienced an almost palpable, tangible loss.

So, what did we lose? That all depends on what our perceived stake was, and that’s something that is very hard to define.

How about all of these—in no particular order:

1. Collective sense of self-esteem
2. Bragging rights
3. A psychic victory for our city, and for ourselves
4. Money (for those who bet)
5. Vindication of a sort
6. The chance to watch our team play more games
7. A true sense of loss for a group of players we’ve really come to…watch it now…love.
8. A chance to get drunk—on suds and/or life—at the championship parade.

In truth, it’s hard to do justice to everything we may have lost last Friday night. There’s an element of exaggeration to this essay, but there’s also one of understatement.

To be a sports fan is to experience both invigorating triumphs and dispiriting losses. It’s all about being elevated by breathtaking plays, surreal performances and laudable accomplishments, but also being deflated and humiliated by crushing plays and stinging defeats.

 

As a Philly sports fan, it’s sometimes about being slapped in the face and being kicked in the nuts at the same time. Hard to manage, and hard to endure, yet we manage to endure.

 

When it comes to the Phillies and the end of the baseball season, there is also an element of being left in the cold. Baseball ends right as the weather is turning colder.

Please consider this quote from A. Bartlett Giamatti, poet supreme and former commissioner of MLB:

“[Baseball] breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall all alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops.”
― A. Bartlett Giamatti, Take Time for Paradise: Americans and Their Games

So, add to my list what he said, and you almost don’t have to be a sports fan to identify with what Phillies Nation (and other fan bases) are going through.

Where do we turn to give voice to our baseball-related grief? How about the writings of a recently deceased Swiss psychiatrist named Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Why, of course.

In her 1969 (the year of the Amazin’ Mets, but I digress) book, On Death and Dying, Kubler-Ross identified five stages of grief, which are:

 

Denial

Anger

Begging

Depression

Acceptance

To simplify Kubler-Ross’ groundbreaking, seminal work, she noted that individuals who are trying to recover from such a loss may not all go through these exact five stages in this exact order.

So, what about those losses experienced by sports fans? They seem kind of inconsequential compared to death and dying in the real world.

Yet, the grief is still palpable, and many sports fans also feel more control over this kind of loss. We certainly need a way to process our grief.

 

Kubler-Ross gave us DABDA; Goldberg offers you SPORTS.

Check out the following guideline, and feel free to move through it at your own pace. It’s only been six days since the unceremonious end to the Phillies’ season, and I’m not sure where I am in this whole process, either.

 

 

SHOCK 

Immediately, Phillies fans went into a sense of shock as their once-potent offense could not find a way to score a single run in their bandbox of a field when it mattered most.

 “This can’t be happening again” is likely to be voiced in this stage, if we truly can find our voices in these moments. Most of us had no words for the site of slugger Ryan Howard grounding out to second to make the last out of the season two years in a row, and then crumbling to the ground halfway down the first baseline.

 

Sometimes words are not needed to express these moments of exasperation. Good grief may have been an option for a kid…in the 1960s…in Minnesota. Not now, not yet.

 

PRAYER (PERSPECTIVE)

Immediately after the event, many fans offered up a prayer that their team would get a mulligan and earn another shot at Game 5. Right now!

“This didn’t just happen…what the ___?!”

You get the idea. Some of us were more philosophical shortly after the disaster, and sought refuge and comfort in statistics that prove that the best team usually does not win in baseball’s postseason, especially in a best-of-five format.

Yeah, like that helps us ease the pain.

 

OBLIVION

Some of us are so oblivious to the loss that we are still matching up the Phillies and the Milwaukee Brewers in our mind—and on paper. Who would do such a thing? By the way, I have the Phillies winning in six.

Many of us are not exactly oblivious to the loss, but may be oblivious to everything else in life. All that real stuff we’re just not ready to face yet. I’d make a list if I could think straight.

 

RAGE

This is Philly. We get pissed off when our cereal’s too soggy.

Many were the chairs I’ve broken and holes I’ve punched in walls after my teams lost crucial games. But that was then.

Now, I just go ballistic verbally; well, I usually do. But there’s just one problem this year: I don’t know who to get pissed off at.

There’s always the umpires.

Heck, Philly sports fan of a certain vintage still get enraged at the very mention of a certain hockey official named Leon Stickle. Stickle refused to make an easy offside call in a Flyers-Islanders NHL championship game 31 years ago! Take a look if you wish to; sorry about the quality of the video feed.

 

Well, there wasn’t a Leon Stickle this year to vilify, although home plate umpire Jerry Meals absolutely reeked in our crushing Game 2 loss. The less said the better, but…

Meals’ absolute clueless interpretation of the strike zone did pitcher Cliff Lee no favors as he ended up blowing a 4-0 lead in the 5-4 loss that gave the Cardinals life.

So, let’s kill Cliff Lee, as some are. Well, it’s not as if the guy stunk out there or walked the whole ballpark. It wasn’t his best game, but the guy always pitches his heart out, pitched pretty well that night (freakin’ Meals!), tried his best to find the postage-stamp of a strike zone (and managed to strike out nine and only walk two) and also took the blame afterward.

Lee remains as likable an elite athlete as has played in this town in decades.

How about Charlie Manuel? He doesn’t always make the best moves, but to know Uncle Cholly is to love him.

Ryan Howard? Yes, he’s about to make 25 million big ones per year, and he came up tiny again, especially his final fruitless 15 at-bats. But he did hit a three-run bomb to win Game 1, and he’s one of the nicest, coolest guys around. Plus, there’s that Achilles tendon he ruptured on the last play.

In truth, the Phillies are an incredibly admirable, lovable bunch of guys. I can’t really vent my rage at anyone, even the front office. Now that ticks me off.

 

TV OR NOT TV

 

Some of us try to seek solace in watching lots of television.

The more provincial baseball fans among Phillies Nation really want nothing more to do with the sport until next spring and try to get by watching sitcoms, videos and the like.

I’m way too much of a baseball lover to go this route, and I still get excited watching the ALCS and NLCS. Having said that, and even while watching my favorite player in the game, Albert Pujols, do his thing for the Cardinals, it’s just not the same. He’s not playing for my team.

 

SPRING

The last stage in the grieving process is to simply wait for the spring.

I’m not even ready to focus on the 2012 season yet, even though I’ll eventually re-assume the role of pundit and unofficial general manager while considering which players should be re-signed, cast aside and pursued.

I’m just not there yet, even if some of my fellow grievers may be well into this process.

I expect to face a long, cold, icy winter, and I don’t expect the Philadelphia Eagles to provide much shelter and warmth.

Let the spring come in its due course and when we really need it to boost our morale and regenerate all that positive energy and optimism that we Phillies fans need.

So, there it is: an unspecified period of SHOCK, PRAYER, OBLIVION, RAGE and TV prior to SPRING.

I’m willing to go through these four or so months of grieving; I also won’t complain if the next four months go by relatively quickly.

Good grief, I don’t ask for much.

 

As always, thank you for reading. Please check out my other books, blogs and speaking information…from (the) TipoftheGoldberg.com

Read more Philadelphia Phillies news on BleacherReport.com

Top 5 Offseason Questions Facing the Philadelphia Phillies for 2012

For a team that finished 2011 with the best record in baseball (102-60), you would expect a fairly quiet offseason.  Sure, an early playoff exit may stir up a few issues, but nothing really major.  Such is not the life for the Philadelphia Phillies.

Free agency and injuries have the team facing some major decisions before the 2012 campaign.  After signing Cliff Lee a year ago (as well as trading for Hunter Pence during the year) we all know they aren’t going to shy away from making a splash, but will they have the money to make a similar move?

Let’s take a look at the major questions facing the team this year:

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MLB Speculation: Philadelphia Phillies 2008 World Championship a Fluke?

Six days later, this article can finally be written.

If you’re a fan of the Philadelphia Phillies, it’s hard not to let your emotions get the best of you. Especially after witnessing what 45,000-plus at Broad and Pattison, as well as millions of television viewers around the globe, saw for themselves in Game 5 of the 2011 National League Division Series between the Phils and the St. Louis Cardinals.

The shock that overcame the crowd at the Citizens Bank Park and the entirety of Phillies’ nation, had more to do with the way the Phillies lost as opposed to the fact that they did lose. When you get to a Game 5 in a best-of-five series, any self-respecting fan is aware that said game could be the team’s last of the season.

But, 1-0? Really?

With that loss, and three consecutive disappointments in the postseason, comes that nagging voice in the back of your mind asking the inevitable question:  Was the Phillies’ 2008 World Championship a fluke? The answer, I’m here to tell you, is yes… sort of.

Now, before you fire off your dissenting emails and comments below, I should tell you that, as this article will point out, my use of the word “fluke” does not have the negative connotation you might think it does. Allow me to explain.

First, let’s be real. If the Phillies had beaten the New York Yankees or the Boston Red Sox in the 2008 Fall Classic, we wouldn’t really be having this discussion. Instead, the Phillies ousted the inexperienced and unpedigreed Tampa Bay Rays in fairly convincing fashion.

Were the Phillies blessed with the luck of the draw in 2008? Perhaps, but remember, they had to get past the Dodgers, a team that everyone had advancing to the World Series thanks to a mid-season acquisition of Manny Ramirez. As you will see, most of the surprising champions of the last decade had that signature upset victory. For the Phillies in ’08, the Dodgers were it.

Still, the competition the Phillies tore through on their way to the Commissioner’s Trophy in ’08 (Brewers, Dodgers, Rays) had not had a lot of recent success, and certainly did not possess the pedigree or the mystique that the Yanks and Sox did, and still do.

This, alone, exacerbates the appearance of a lucky journey to a world championship. But let’s dig deeper.

Increased expectations are the worst thing to happen to this franchise. It is easy to sneak up on teams and win a World Series when Brett Myers is the No. 2 starter in your rotation.

When you add guys like Cliff Lee, Roy Halladay, Roy Oswalt, Cliff Lee again and Hunter Pence, however, the target on your franchise’s back grows that much larger. Everyone brings their A-game and their A-gameplan to the ballpark when they face you. That, no doubt, has made the Phils’ quest for a second world title in the Charlie Manuel Era that much more elusive.

And don’t think it’s all external, either. You don’t think guys like Ryan Howard, Chase Utley and even Pence know and feel the enormity of the expectations placed on this team by the local fanbase, let alone the media? Of course they do. It’s a safe bet that this pressure directly contributed to the 1-0 outcome of Game 5.

Now, while I am here to tell you that the ’08 title was a fluke, I am also here to tell you that you should enjoy it for what it manifestly is:  a world title. Ask fans of the Cubs or Indians if they would take what we have. You already know the answer to that.

Look, winning a World Series is hard. As we’ve seen in the last decade, teams that are built to win a World Series very rarely do. The ’08 Phils were not built to win a title. They were built to not get swept in the NLDS like they did in ’07.

Let’s look at all the world champions since 2002 and you will see that the best, most talented team rarely wins the last game in October:

2002 – Anaheim Angels – The Angels were a surprise and a team built similarly to the Phillies (circa. 2007-2008): great, explosive offense and a largely no-name pitching staff. Name me the top three starters in the Angels’ 2002 rotation. You might remember John Lackey, but Ramon Ortiz and Jarrod Washburn didn’t exactly strike fear in opposing lineups. The Angels were the AL’s wild card in ’02, finishing second in the AL West behind the same Oakland A’s team featured in Moneyball. The Angels did defeat the heavily favored Yankees (who added former AL MVP Jason Giambi in the offseason) in the ALDS, but were spared from facing the team tied for the best record in the AL (the A’s).

The AL side of the 2002 postseason definitely didn’t go as planned, with the Angels and Twins advancing to the ALCS. Again, I think expectations (and lack thereof) came into play. It can be argued that the Yanks and A’s felt the pressure of their regular season success in the first round. It can also be argued that the Angels had an easier time sneaking up on teams in the postseason because, again, they were the cinderellas of the tournament.

2003 – Florida Marlins – Another wild card. They differed from the Angels in that they got hot the last two months of the season and carried that into the postseason, while the Angels were strong for most of the year. The Marlins certainly were not built to win a title, winning it with mostly no-name, homegrown or young talent such as Josh Beckett, Derrek Lee, Juan Pierre, Luis Castillo and Mike Lowell. The Fish did beat the Yanks in the World Series, however. While you have to tip your cap to them for that, this also points to my theory of lower expectations having internal and external benefits.

2004 – Boston Red Sox – Although the Idiots were a wild card, they were supposed to contend for a title, even while being considered second banana to the Yanks, who had added A-Rod in the preceding offseason. In fact, the Red Sox season appeared to be over, down 3-0 in the ALCS, but, well, you remember what happened next. While the Sox were not as much of a surprise as the Angels or Marlins, they certainly weren’t the prohibitive favorites to win it all, either.  Especially if you take into account their history prior to this season.

2005 – Chicago White Sox – The Pale Hose were winners of the AL Central, posting the best record in the American League. However, the Sox were largely picked to finish fourth in their division prior to the season and actually traded some of their surplus power (Carlos Lee) in order to go with more of a small ball approach (Scott Podsednik). And, even though the Sox pitching staff was considered to be talented, it was not chock full of future hall of famers. Mark Buerhle, Freddy Garcia and Jon Garland were their top three starters. And, by the way, Chicago swept the Red Sox, defending world champs (and de facto team to beat), in the ALDS.

2006 – St. Louis Cardinals – The Cardinals went 83-79 in the regular season yet won the NL Central. ‘Nuff said. Seriously, their closer was a rookie named Adam Wainwright and their postseason rotation consisted of Chris Carpenter, Jeff Weaver, Anthony Reyes and Jeff Suppan. With the exception of Carpenter:  yawn.

2007 – Boston Red Sox – Once again, these Sox were considered a title contender before the year and they would have won any other division in 2007. These Sox were that good, and were an exception to the theory that the best team rarely wins the World Series.

2008 – Philadelphia Phillies – Hamels/Myers/Moyer/Blanton. The fact that the Phillies won a title with that rotation has to boggle the mind. While it’s easy to say that the Phils got lucky, just about every team listed here had to get past a team that was favored above them. The Phillies’ NLCS victory over the Dodgers was that win.

2009 – New York Yankees – This is the most obvious case (and one could argue, the only case) of the prohibitive favorite from wire-to-wire winning the World Series. Although the Phils were defending their title, the Yankees added Mark Teixeira, A.J. Burnett and C.C. Sabathia in the offseason. The Yankees then proceeded to win 100 games in the regular season and unseated the Phils for their 27th world title.

2010 – San Francisco Giants – The Giants’ signature victory of the postseason was in the NLCS against the Phillies. Otherwise, they faced teams not ready for the bright lights and expectations of the postseason (Braves and Rangers). The Giants’ rotation was world class, but when your lineup relies on Pat Burrell, Aubrey Huff, Buster Posey and Cody Ross, you’re a surprising champion.

2011 – ? – Obviously, we don’t know who will win the World Series yet, but the three teams considered to be the favorites (Phillies, Red Sox, Yankees) are all out and none of them made it to the LCS. You can even add the Atlanta Braves, who were the NL’s second-best team for most of the season, to that list.

The point of all of this is to say that, yes, the Phillies got lucky in 2008. But as the list above illustrates, it is most definitely better to be lucky than to be good.

If you were to say that the Phillies are the class of the National League right now, no one could successfully argue against that. Unfortunately, that status does not translate to a world title.

The point I am making has been made many times by many baseball experts around the country. The Phillies and their fans, however, have now seen this trend hit a little too close to home in the last two years.

Thus, I reiterate, the Phillies’ 2008 world title was indeed a fluke. However, since that has been the trend in baseball over the last decade, the Phils’ apparent luck in ’08 does not diminish what they accomplished that year.

On the contrary, the trend of the last decade has shown us that these current Phillies are right where they ought to be. And that would make a second world title in the Charlie Manuel Era that much sweeter.

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MLB Philadelphia Phillies: Picking Up the Pieces and Moving on

Though it finished with one painful groundout to second, the end of the Philadelphia Phillies’ season will be remembered as a dream that disintegrated slowly in front of a stunned, sell-out crowd. Deflated, broken and let down, 46,000 red-clad Phillies fans trudged out of Citizens Bank Park to join a dejected city that was only guilty of falling into the trap of high expectations.

As the NLCS carries on without the favored Phillies, the team’s faithful are left a week later wondering what could have been had any of the Game 5 balls hit to the warning track been picked up by a gust of wind. With defeat so fresh, it’s only natural to look back at failure instead of thinking ahead to next time this ball club will play a meaningful inning.

Six days after 2011 came crashing down, the organization and its followers are picking up the pieces of a best-of-five gone horribly wrong. But when your star player hand-delivers the best team in baseball to rock bottom with one tendon-tearing swing, what pile of wreckage do you sift through first?

Blame. Someone has to be the fall guy for Phillies’ fans to close the book on the premature ending to such a fine season. Much like last year, however, there is more than enough culpability to go around in Philadelphia’s clubhouse.

Coming off of a regular season where fans could choose a new hero on a nightly basis, the aftermath of the NLDS loss to the St. Louis Cardinals has transformed that positive attitude into a rousing round of finger-pointing. This time, failure lands on the shoulders of a number of offensive stalwarts, including Ryan Howard, Placido Polanco and even Carlos Ruiz.

Was is the subpar starting pitching of their historically dominant rotation, or did Charlie Manuel lose the chess match to St. Louis mainstay Tony LaRussa. Even with two key hits in important situations during the series, is it fair to say the Phillies shed their label as a team that couldn’t hit when it mattered?

In truth, it was a combination of each that led to the Molotov cocktail that burned down Philadelphia’s playoff hopes, a perfect storm that built the ideal brand of bad baseball. But after a six-month layoff, 162 games will rise from the ashes and serve as the end point for 2011’s disappointment.

As Phillies’ nation counts down the seconds until Roy Halladay throws the first pitch on Opening Day 2012, there is a considerable amount of work that needs to done in order to prepare the team for a run at redemption. Buried in the rubble are the expiring contracts of Raul Ibanez, Jimmy Rollins and Ryan Madson, the options for Roy Oswalt and Brad Lidge, and the recovery of their much-maligned first baseman.

The City of Brotherly Love likely won’t lose much sleep over the departure of their aging left fielder, as John Mayberry, Jr. and Domonic Brown seem poised to step into the role. Platooning the two young stars is not out of the question for Manuel, who may look to capitalize on nightly matchups depending who takes the mound.

Rollins is an interesting case as the offseason draws closer, representing the loyalty-vs.-compensation debate with a pinch of age thrown into the mix. The veteran shortstop has been the team’s outspoken leader during their string of five straight NL East titles, backing up his talk with an MVP season in 2007. It would be tough to see the Bay Area-native walk away for a deal that takes him into his late-thirties. Reportedly seeking a five-year agreement, Rollins will not give Philadelphia a hometown discount and could suit up for another team next year.

The smart money would say that the Phillies are going to drop the inconsistent Lidge and hand his paycheck over to Madson, a lifetime Philadelphia reliever who has finally become comfortable with the ninth-inning duties. Keeping a top bullpen intact will be crucial to another hot start in 2012.

The largest source of optimism for Phillies fans is certainly the return of their three aces for the 2012 campaign. The new season could see Kyle Kendrick take the place of Oswalt, who may be bought out of his contract for $14 million less than his salary. If the pitching is there, Philadelphia will once again be a top club when Opening Day rolls around.

In baseball, there are no guarantees or givens, evidenced by the greatest Phillies team in franchise history being shown the door after just five October games. The front office can put the best talent on the field, making upgrades around the infield if necessary, but success is had by the teams that can come through when it matters most.

With the ability up and down the roster locked in for at least another year, Philadelphia can take comfort in knowing they still have one of the most feared squads in Major League Baseball. Picking up the pieces is much easier when you are being led by three Cy Young candidates and a dugout full of hustling fan-favorites. 

But when October rolls around in a little less than 12 months to the day of when the Phillies’ Achilles heel was exposed, talent will be far outweighed by the team’s ability to come through in the clutch.

For a team and fan base that was left speechless by monumental disappointment and unexpected defeat, another chance at the ultimate prize can’t come soon enough.

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Philadelphia Phillies: Possible Ryan Howard Replacements for 2012

When the final out was made in Game 5 of the NLDS, the Philadelphia Phillies lost more than just the series. The team also saw their star first baseman, Ryan Howard, rupture his Achilles.

Howard will be out for at least 5 to six months and could miss most or all of the 2012 season if his injury lingers like many Achilles injuries do. The Phillies will need to change their approach to the offseason. The Phillies will now need to find someone who can fill in for the year at first base.

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2012 MLB Free Agency: Most Likely Destinations for Jimmy Rollins

Jimmy Rollins has been an All-Star, MVP and World Series champion throughout his career in Philadelphia, but, for the first time, J-Roll faces free agency. Rollins himself, at a press conference held in the days following the Phillies‘ stunning playoff exit, stated that he is seeking at least a five-year deal from whatever team is looking to sign him.

While he later admitted that, for the right price, he would consider a four-year deal with a player option for the fifth year, this is an interesting development as it requires whoever intends to sign Rollins to commit long-term to the aging shortstop.

At 32, Rollins has already shown some signs of slowing down and one must not forget that he spent his first few years in the big leagues playing on the notorious Veterans Stadium turf. His $8.5 million salary last season was in the top 10 for shortstops, and one must expect that, based on his postseason performance especially, Rollins will seek considerably more than the $7 million a year average he was awarded with his last contract.

The question is, should a team commit five years and more than $7 million a year to a 32-year-old shortstop who missed a 20-game stretch due to injury in 2011 and managed to play in just over half of his team’s games in 2010?

Or should a team more strongly consider that Rollins is year in and year out one of the most productive shortstops in the game and is coming off a postseason series in which he hit almost .500, delivering clutch hits at a time when the rest of his team largely struggled?

It will be interesting to see if some team is willing to meet all of Rollins’ demands in order to land the star shortstop, or if Rollins will realize that his best shot at another World Series lies in Philadelphia and give his only major league club a hometown discount.

The next few months will surely answer those questions.

Here are five teams that have the financial capabilities, need at shortstop, and winning attitude it will take to sign Rollins, in order of likelihood that Rollins will go there, lowest to highest.

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Ryan Howard: Quick Surgery Good Sign for Phillies’ Star 1B

Craig Calcaterra of NBC Sports reports here that Phillies‘ first baseman Ryan Howard underwent surgery to repair his left Achilles tendon today.

Assuming the surgery went off with no problems, this is a very good thing for the Phillies. The exact recovery time is not really known. Expectations last week were that he would be out until mid-May to early-June.

There were some delays in the initial surgery, so it’s good that they got it done relatively quickly. It’s a six to 12 month recovery period from the surgery, so any delays would only add time in 2012 that Howard would miss.

I said here that the Phillies could survive parts of 2012 without Howard. Their lineup is still very strong and the starting pitching staff is probably the best in the league.

Now, even though the official recovery time is six to 12 months, it’s more than likely that the actual time is somewhere right in between them. That’s where we get the mid-May to early-June recovery time from.

It’s doubtful that the Phillies will have any reason to rush Howard back. Make no mistake, they want him in the starting lineup as soon as is humanly possible, but they will be in a good enough position to be patient with him. The last thing you would ever want to do would be to have him come back too early and get hurt again.

Howard’s not a speed guy, but his swing is very powerful. That’s going to put a lot of pressure on the injured areas.

But again, while they can likely win without him, Howard’s power will be nearly impossible to replace. It may not show up in wins and losses, but it will show up in how impressive they are.

The more time he misses, the more it hurts Philadelphia’s chances of getting to the playoffs and winning the World Series.

The fact that the surgery came today likely means that Howard will be back in full swing by the end of next season.

With a completely healthy Howard at the end of the year, the 2012 Phillies will be left with no excuses.

Read more Philadelphia Phillies news on BleacherReport.com

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