Philadelphia Phillies: Second-Guessing Charlie Manuel’s Roster Decisions

Let me start by saying that Charlie Manuel is the man. He’s the bees knees. He’s the perfect manager for this club.

You also have to love his interviews after the game. Not only is he as candid as it gets, but when listening to Charlie Manuel talk after games, I’m convinced that someone just took Foghorn Leghorn and slapped a baseball uniform on him.

With all due respect to Charlie though, he has made a couple decisions with the roster this Spring that leave some room for second-guessing. I’m not necessarily saying Manuel made the wrong choice in any of these situations—I just want to highlight how tough each decision was, and how these five in particular could possibly have gone a different way.

Also, keep in mind that as I write this article the entire 25-man roster is not quite fully determined, so for one of the “second-guesses”, I speculated and analyzed what is most likely going to happen. 

All stats used in this article are current up to April 2, so the Phillies‘ last couple exhibition games against the Pirates aren’t included.

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