Kuzul

Twelve days ago I wrote about what it would take for the Phillies to make the playoffs.  Since writing that article, here is how the NL Wild Card contenders have fared:

1. St Louis Cardinals: 5-6

2. Los Angeles Dodgers: 4-6

3. Milwaukee Brewers: 9-1

4. Philadelphia Phillies: 8-3

5. Arizona Diamondbacks: 6-3

6. Pittsburgh Pirates: 2-9

For the purpose of this exercise, I am eliminating the Pittsburgh Pirates. They are 5.5 games back with just 12 games to play and leapfrogging five teams with so few games left to play is not going to happen. Nor have they shown any sort of hint that they have a 11-1 or 10-2 run in them to even make it close.

So, for the Phillies to make the playoffs, the above teams would have to finish like this from here on out:

1. Philadelphia Phillies: 9-2 to finish 86-76

2. St Louis Cardinals: 5-6 to finish 85-77

3. Los Angeles Dodgers: 6-5 to finish 84-78

3. Milwaukee Brewers: 6-6)to finish 84-78

5. Arizona Diamondbacks: 7-5 to finish 82-80

It is a tall order for Philadelphia. If the Phillies go 9-2 to close out the season, that means they will have gone 17-5 since my original article and 32-11 in their last 43 games.

Their record since the All-Star break would be 49-26. The 49 wins since the All-Star break would not be unprecedented for this core. In the magical five-year run before this season, this is how the Phillies performed post-All Star break:

2007: 45-29 (.608)

2008: 40-26 (.606)

2009: 45-31 (.592)

2010: 50-25 (.667)

2011: 45-26 (.634)

So a 49-26 mark this year would basically be right in line with the previous five years.

Here is a breakdown of how the contending teams need to fare in order for the Phils to make the playoffs:

Cardinals

 at Chicago (1-1), at Houston (2-1), vs Washington (1-2), vs Cincinnati (1-2)

Dodgers

 at Cincinnati (1-1), at San Diego (2-1), vs Colorado (2-1), at San Francisco (1-2)

Brewers

 at Washington (1-2), at Cincinnati (1-2), vs Houston (2-1), vs San Diego (2-1)

Phillies

 vs Atlanta (2-0), vs Washington (2-1), at Miami (3-0), at Washington (2-1)

Diamondbacks

 at Colorado (2-1), at San Francisco (1-2), vs Chicago (2-1), vs Colorado (2-1)

Realistically, the most difficult scenario to imagine is the Phillies going 9-2.  Sweeping Atlanta and Miami is a lot to ask.

Washington still has the No. 1 seed to play for, so they probably will not be mailing in any games. But they have not been playing great baseball recently, winning just six of their last 13 games. It kind of feels like the Stephen Strasburg situation let some wind out of their sails.

This is not an article saying the Phillies will make the playoffs or will win nine of their last 11 games.  It is merely a snap shot of what must happen in order for the Phillies to travel to Atlanta for the wild-card game.

With how wacky this 2012 season has been for the Phillies, at least it is fun to still be able to talk about the slim possibility of a playoff berth with just 11 games to play.

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Dominic Brown- Untouchable.  Jake Diekman- Off the radar.

As the Phillies try for a sixth consecutive NL Eastern Division crown, it’s obvious this season will be more challenging than the previous divisional crowns.  Injuries and age are taking their toll on this core and the latest blow, a shoulder strain to ace Roy Halladay might be too much to overcome.

The Phillies aren’t the only team to battle injuries this season, and most franchises dip into their minors for help.  Seeing that some of the bigger surprises this season have been Freddy Galvis and Jake Diekman, it makes you wonder if the brass of the Phillies know what they are doing when evaluating talent.

A couple of outfielders were deemed untouchable midway through the 2009 season when the Phils went shopping for a pitcher.  Those two were Dominic Brown and Michael Taylor.

Taylor, 6’5 255 lbs was a 5th round draft pick in 2007.  He eventually was included in the deal after the 2009 season that brought Roy Halladay to the Phillies.  The Blue Jays quickly flipped him to the Oakland A’s where he appears to have turned into a “quadruple-A” type player.  He’s flashed plenty of power and speed at the minor league level but that hasn’t translated to much into a couple of cups of coffee at the major league level and now he’s just another 26-year old in AAA. 

Brown though, was the real prize.  It was thought the Phillies wouldn’t include Brown in any deal.  Not for Halladay, not for Roy Oswalt, not for Hunter Pence.  Brown has done nothing but regress.  He’s actually living up to him being taken in the 20th-round of the 2006 draft. He’ll turn 25 in September and has quickly fallen from a five-tool prospect to a questionable one-tool prospect. In 259 AAA at-bats since the start of the 2011 season, Brown has hit .259 with just three home runs.  Yes, it appears injuries have derailed him but even in his brief call up in 2010 when he appeared to be on top of his game, Brown looked extremely raw, both at the plate, and in right field.

How about Greg Golson?  Golson was traded straight up for John Mayberry following the 2008 season.  After the 2007 season, Golson was listed as the Phillies minor leaguer with the best power, fastest baserunner, best athlete, best defensive outfielder, and best outfield arm.

Check out the Baseball America 2012 Projected Lineup from an article in early 2009:

C- Lou Marson (dealt to Cleveland in the Cliff Lee trade)

1b- Ryan Howard

2b- Chase Utley

SS- Jimmy Rollins

3b- Jason Donald (dealt to Cleveland in the Cliff Lee trade)

LF- Michael Taylor (dealt to Toronto in the Roy Halladay trade)

CF- Shane Victorino

RF- Domonic Brown

SP- Cole Hamels, Carlos Carrasco (Lee), Kyle Drabek (Halladay), Brett Myers, Joe Blanton

CL- Brad Lidge

Yes, these are rankings based from a publication but that is basically from evaluators within the organization.

Freddy Galvis arguably is making a case for “Rookie of the Year” in the National League.  His defense at second has been spectacular, he has held his own offensively, and is progressing nicely.  Why was there any hesitation this spring in making him the guy?

Lefty Jake Diekman was so far off the Phillies radar he didn’t even make the Phillies “Top 10 Prospect” list.  That’s after this 6’4 left struck out 83 hitters in AA last season in 65 innings of work while allowing just 47 hits.  How is a tall lanky lefty who throws 95 dismissed like that?

The answer is simple.  The gang in charge of evaluating young talent within the Phillies’ organization are struggling to evaluate their own, and others for that matter.  The jury is still out on the three they received from Seattle in the Cliff Lee deal.  JC Ramirez, Phillippe Aumont, and Tyson Gillies have not done anything to set the world on fire, and that goes back to the evaluators as well.

Maybe I’m being a little harsh, but the Phillies are nearing a critical stage of the 2012 season.  The time tables on Ryan Howard and Chase Utley’s return are still way up in the air, while Halladay is gone until mid to late July. It’s times like these when other parts of the organization need to show their value. Understanding exactly what they have in the minors can’t be blindfolded “wins” like Diekman or blatant fails like Brown.

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There’s no doubt about it.  The 2012 Philadelphia Phillies are off to a dreadful start at the plate.  If it wasn’t for a terrific pitching staff, there would be no way this team is at .500 after 14 games.  What’s more of a surprise is how fans seem “up in arms” about their sticks as if they haven’t seen anything like this before.  That’s far from the truth.

Through 14 games this season, the Phillies have scored 41 runs for an average of 2.92 runs per game.  Their team batting average is .247 and they have only hit seven home runs.  Even more brutal, they are 0-5 when they give up more than two runs in a game.  They are leaving little margin for error out of the starting rotation.  They probably have the mindset of “If I give up a three-run home run at any point, we will lose.”

This is not a new thing for this franchise, however, as collective slumps and lack of hitting started back in the 2009 season and has had stretches of ineptitude ever since then.  Check this out:

Recent 14-Game Stretches

2009: Games 122-135, scored 37 runs (2.6 per game) for a 6-8 record.

2010: Games 39-52, scored 25 runs (1.8 per game) for a 4-10 record. Six home runs in those games.

2010: Games 115-128, scored 44 runs (3.1 per game) for a 7-7 record. Six home runs in those games.

2010: Postseason vs. Cincinnati and San Francisco, scored 33 runs for 3.7 a game and a 5-4 record.

2011: Games 9-22, scored 39 runs (2.8 per game) for a 9-5 record. Nine home runs in those games.

2011: Games 31-44, scored 35 runs (2.5 per game) for a 6-8 record. Eight home runs in those games.

2011: Games 144-157, scored 33 runs (2.4 per game) for a 4-10 record. Seven home runs in those games.

2011: Postseason vs. St Louis, scored just 10 runs in the last four games (2.5 per game).

So while this lack of offensive prowess has been frustrating for the Phillies and their fans to open the 2012 season it is also nothing new.  The Phils won 97 games in 2010 and went through a stretch that saw them go to New York to take on the Mets and they didn’t score a single run the entire series.  That was with Ryan Howard and Chase Utley in the lineup. For disclosure purposes, Jimmy Rollins was missing for that series.

Just last season, early in the season, the Phils’ bats looked a lot like this.  Here is the breakdown of games nine through 22:

Game nine: Win vs. Atlanta, 3-0

Game 10: L at Washington, 4-7

Game 11: W at Washington, 3-2

Game 12: W at Washington, 4-0

Game 13: L vs. Florida, 3-4

Game 14: W vs. Florida, 3-2

Game 15: L vs. Milwaukee, 3-6

Game 16: L vs. Milwaukee, 0-9

Game 17: W vs. Milwaukee, 4-3

Game 18: W at San Diego, 3-0

Game 19: W at San Diego, 2-0

Game 20: W at San Diego, 4-2

Game 21: W at San Diego, 3-1

Game 22: L at Arizona, 0-4

An entire 14-game stretch where the Phillies never scored more than four runs in a game and they still went 9-5.  Mercy!  Now that was without Utley in the lineup and prior to trading for Hunter Pence.  The moral of all of this is to relax. 

Charlie Manuel’s team can be a maddening bunch and when they struggle at the plate it can take some time to bust out.  Their hitters have shown a history of success and they will get hot.  Hopefully Utley and Howard can return with some sort of resemblance of their old selves and the Phillies heat up in September just in time for a playoff run. 

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The Phillies have seen drastic ups and downs for the past 20 seasons. 

They lost as many as 97 games in 2000 and won as many as 102 in 2011.  They have been to three World Series (1993, 2008, 2009) winning one and have won the division six times (1993, 2007-11).

So who had the best seasons, by position during that stretch to make up the All-Phillies team of the past 20 years?  Who’s the manager and best coach?

Let’s find out.

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Face it, you don’t want to think about it too much. You already are sweating Ryan Howard not being able to start the season, and now being out indefinitely is looking more ominous. There is a little bit of comfort knowing that Jim Thome, John Mayberry, Laynce Nix and Ty Wiggington can all help out at first admirably until Howard returns. 

What you are trying to blow off are negative thoughts about Chase Utley.

No one really cared that Utley didn’t play in the first couple of spring training games. “Better keep him healthy for the regular season” is the consensus thought.

Now we are a full week into games and not only has Utley not played yet, there is no timetable for him to get on the field. You know, this happened in 2011 as well, and Utley ended up starting the season on the disabled list and then missing 50-plus games. Uh oh.

If Utley misses any amount of significant time, who plays second base? Late in the spring last year, the Phillies brought in Luis Castillo for a three-game tryout. That didn’t work out. Super utility man Wilson Valdez was the opening day two-bagger and filled in adequately until Utley returned.

Valdez was shipped to the Cincinnati Reds in the offseason, leaving Michael Martinez as the only remaining utility man. 

The Phils selected Martinez in the Rule-5 draft last season, but he didn’t do a lot to set the world on fire. He hit .196 with three home runs and 24 runs batted in in 234 plate appearances. He carried a microscopic .540 OPS. It’s doubtful the Phillies brass want to hand him significant amounts of playing time if Utley can’t go.

Wiggington can hit Major League pitching. There is not much doubt about that. However, defensively, second base is probably his fourth best position after first, third and left field.

I’m sure manager Charlie Manuel has thought about former gold-glove second baseman Placido Polanco at second, but keep in mind that Polly isn’t a poster child of health either, and second is a much more physically demanding position than third base.

All of this brings us to rookie Freddy Galvis. The 22-year-old native of Venezuela split time between Double-A and Triple-A in 2011. Between those two levels, Galvis his .278 with eight home runs, 43 runs batted in, 78 runs scored and 23 stolen bases. 

Galvis is considered a “plus” fielder but has primarily played shortstop. Expect to see Manuel pencil in Galvis quite a bit at second this spring with Utley out to see if he can A) handle the position defensively and B) do enough at the plate to survive.

Physically, Galvis is a lot like Valdez or Martinez. He’s 5’10”, 170 pounds, so he’s definitely not an intimidating presence. He’s been playing professionally since he was 17 years old, so there is still some upside. While his bat speed is slightly above average, hitting is where he stills needs to develop.  He is considered one of the best defensive shortstops in all of minor league baseball, which should make a transition to second base seamless if he works on the double play pivot.

So to sum it all up, here is to hoping we don’t have to worry about Galvis’ bat in 2012 and the season opens up with the familiar No. 26 trotting out to second base. If Utley can’t go, though, Galvis has an excellent shot to be in the everyday lineup if he shows he can handle big league pitching this spring.

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