Top Moments for Every Phillies Player Voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame

The 2013 Hall of Fame ballot is one that has been five years in the making and a hotbed of discussion, but still hit the voters, fans and other baseball folks like a ton of bricks, the elephant in the room being, “Do players who have been caught or accused of ‘cheating’ have a right to be inducted into the Hall of Fame?” 

Now, that’s a long discussion for a different day. When you sit and think back on some of these careers, however, it’s easy to make a case for their inclusion. No man in history has more home runs than Barry Bonds. Roger Clemens won the Cy Young Award seven different times. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. 

Luckily for the Phillies, this isn’t a debate that is going to rage in their inner circle. The Phillies haven’t had a player inducted into Cooperstown since Jim Bunning finally got the call in 1996, and probably won’t see another one any time soon. 

But it does get one to thinking, what was the greatest moment of each member of the Phillies in the Hall of Fame? This slideshow will take a look back at the careers of some of baseball’s all-time greats.

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Phillies Rumors: Fact or Fiction on All the Hottest Rumors in Philadelphia

Let the bargain shopping begin! 

Then again, the Philadelphia Phillies are a team that has been “bargain shopping” all offseason long; have they not?

This is a club that was expected to make a pretty big splash in the free agent market and, instead, made their biggest moves through a pair of trades, acquiring center fielder Ben Revere and third baseman Michael Young. 

The Phillies shored up their pitching staff with a few free agent signings, adding Mike Adams and John Lannan, but the big free agents passed them by with Zack Greinke, Josh Hamilton, Nick Swisher, B.J. Upton and others all finding new homes, with none of them relocating to the “City of Brotherly Love.”

So what’s next for the Phillies? For all intents and purposes, this is a club that would be comfortable with their roster as is moving into spring training. They have battles in the outfield and in the bullpen, but other areas are settled. 

But it is in those same areas that the Phillies could still upgrade this winter. As the calendar rolls into January and teams look for bargains on the remaining free agents, here are a few names to consider.

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One New Year’s Resolution for Every Philadelphia Phillies Player in 2013

With the month of December roaring to a close and New Year’s Day so close that you can practically touch it, it’s that time once again—New Year’s resolutions. You know, those things that—after a careful examination of things you hate in 2012—you tell yourself you’re going to correct in 2013. Not ringing a bell? They normally last about a week. Or is that just me? 

Well, anyway, a New Year’s resolution is officially defined as a “commitment that an individual makes to a project or the reforming of a habit, often a lifestyle change, that is generally interpreted as advantageous.” If the Philadelphia Phillies want to be successful in a tough National League East in 2013, they’re going to have to make a bunch of resolutions. 

In the following slideshow, I’ll make one resolution for each player—something that they’re going to have to accomplish on an individual level to help the team. If this is a club dreaming of a World Series, they’ll make sure these resolutions don’t fall by the wayside.

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25 Bold Predictions for the Philadelphia Phillies in 2013

So the end of the Mayan calendar did not bring a fiery death to we Earth-living beings, who now ask in equally as much confusion, “What in the world is in store for the Philadelphia Phillies in 2013?” Excellent question. 

The reality here is that the Phillies’ season could play out in a couple of different ways. If you’re willing to write off 2012 as an anomaly, then this club has another shot at a World Series title with an aging core. But with that in mind, those guys aren’t getting any younger. Was 2012 the beginning of the end for the Phils? 

You know what that means, right? It’s time for some predictions. This slideshow will offer up a range of predictions beginning with January 1, 2013 and spanning the entire year. For the sake of this slideshow, no prediction is off limits. 

So with that in mind, what is in store for the Phillies in 2013? 

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Phillies Rumors: Fact or Fiction on All the Hottest Rumors in Philadelphia

We’ve reached the point in the offseason where free agency becomes a waiting game. Players are waiting for teams to get desperate enough to overpay them, and teams are waiting for players to become bargains. Something has to give. 

The Philadelphia Phillies have filled almost all of their needs this offseason. While a right-handed, power-hitting corner outfielder would be nice, there isn’t any one player on the market that undoubtedly fills that need. They’ll wait for a bargain. 

Of course, that bargain doesn’t necessarily have to be a free agent. Heck, it doesn’t even have to be a bargain. There are still players available that would help the Phillies in 2013, and possibly beyond. So with that in mind, here are a few names to consider as the rumor mill continues to churn.

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Grading Each of the Philadelphia Phillies’ Last 25 Free Agent Classes

It has been an offseason of going against the grain for Ruben Amaro Jr. and company, leaving fans of the Philadelphia Phillies thinking, “That’s a solid move, but there’s more, right?” Amaro has made this team look different, but have they improved? 

Moreover, has this team improved through free agency the way that we thought it would? After all, when the 2012 regular season came to an end, that was where it seemed as though this club would do its heavy hitting. 

They needed a center fielder and there were plenty of free agents available. Instead, they made a trade for Ben Revere. There were a few third basemen available, but they swung a trade with the Texas Rangers for Michael Young. 

In fact, this offseason’s haul of free agents, though possibly incomplete, is a little underwhelming. It doesn’t tell the entire story of their winter by any stretch, but for a team that looked like it was going to fill nearly all of its needs on the free agent market, to walk away with pitchers Mike Adams and John Lannan is intriguing, to say the least. 

Then again, the free agent market is a fickle mistress, especially in the history books as told by the Phillies. This is a team that has landed huge free agent hauls (Cliff Lee) and one that has been ridiculed for some of the worst moves of all-time (Adam Eaton). 

So how does this free agent haul stack up against the rest? With the Phillies on the verge of making just a couple of free agent signings in a year where they were expected to make a bit of a splash, I thought that now would be a good time to take a look at their last 25 free agent classes. 

Each class will be graded as a whole, but players will be analyzed on an individual basis. Players will only be eligible for this list if they were signed as a free agent during the offseason. On a similar note, we will only be analyzing “notable” free agent signings. That is to say that only players who made noticeable contributions at the MLB level will be analyzed, unless otherwise noted.

*Wins Above Replacement statistic is courtesy of FanGraphs, and divided into “batting” and “pitching” accordingly. 

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Odds of Every Philadelphia Phillies Player Being Enshrined in the Hall of Fame

Voting for the Hall of Fame is about to get a lot more interesting this year. It’s a ballot that writers have been counting down to for years, stuffed with names like Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens and all of the moral dilemmas that they present. 

Regardless of who actually gets the nod, this vote got me to thinking—how many of the current players on the Philadelphia Phillies roster have a shot at making the Hall of Fame when their playing days have come to an end? 

So, how will we decide those odds? Well, let’s be honest here—the Hall of Fame voting has become about numbers and accolades, and each player’s chance hinges on the success he has had in his career. Now, the fun part about this slideshow is that for a lot of players, we are talking about future projections as well.

With that in mind, here is each player currently on the Phillies’ roster and his odds at being enshrined in Cooperstown in the future.

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Phillies Rumors: Fact or Fiction on All the Hottest Rumors in Philadelphia

We are at that point in the offseason where it isn’t hard to picture Philadelphia Phillies general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. leaning back in his comfy office chair, resting his chin on his folded hands and quietly murmuring to himself, “I love it when a plan comes together.” 

Okay, so maybe that is a little dramatic, and the offseason definitely has not gone according to at least the first three plans that the Phillies drew up, but you can certainly see some plan starting to take shape. 

The Phillies addressed a pair of their biggest concerns at the winter meetings when they acquired Ben Revere from the Minnesota Twins to play center field (via Todd Zolecki of MLB.com) and laid the groundwork to an eventual deal for former Texas Rangers infielder Michael Young to play third base (via Paul Hagen of MLB.com). 

That left the Phillies with a few more needs to address. They found themselves still in need of a corner outfielder with power, a setup man and a back of the rotation starting pitcher. Now, they have addressed two thirds of those needs, signing pitchers Mike Adams (via Ken Rosenthal on Twitter) and John Lannan to contracts (via Jim Salisbury of CSN Philly on Twitter).

Now, the Phillies can use their remaining funds to find that corner outfielder with some pop, and these are all of the hottest rumors in that pursuit.

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25 Big Moves the Philadelphia Phillies Can Make in the 2013-2014 Offseason

There is a strange fascination with the future in the baseball world. A huge portion of each team’s time and resources are dedicated to how good the team can be at a later date—through prospects, through trades, through potential free-agent signings. 

2014 is going to be a huge offseason for the Philadelphia Phillies. It could very well be the year that the Phillies dismantle their “core,” with both Chase Utley and Carlos Ruiz becoming free agents. Roy Halladay could be finished in Philly.

And while the Phillies still have a number of players under contract, there have been few opportunities over the last couple of seasons to improve that roster like there will be in 2014. 

In this slideshow, I am going to take a look at some of the “big moves” that the Phillies could make next offseason. Is there a player who can be signed as a big free agent? Is there a big trade to be made? Will certain prospects be ready to make the jump to MLB? 

Here are 25 “big moves” the Phillies should consider if they want to contend moving forward.

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Updated Predictions for the Philadelphia Phillies 2013 Opening Day Roster

Coming into the 2013 offseason, we knew that the Philadelphia Phillies‘ Opening Day roster for the upcoming season would look drastically different than it did in 2012, for a number of different reasons. Some players are healthy, and others are no longer with the club. 

The Phillies haven’t even finished adding to their product yet and, already, we get the sense that they are going to be better, stronger and healthier. That should go a long way in erasing the most disappointing season in recent history from memory. 

Pitchers and catchers still won’t report to Clearwater, Florida for more than two months from now, but we already have an idea of what this club will look like. The following slideshow will update what the Phillies could look like on Opening Day in April. 

I will be factoring in players on the roster, recent additions the club has made and predictions for players that I believe the Phillies could still add. 

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