This is a bigger series than we, as Phillies fans, would care to admit. It's also one that we will all but ignore, mostly because everyone is so caught up in the all of the trade talk with the deadline being on Sunday.
There are a ton of things I want to talk about for this series, but all of my focus recently has been on the trade deadline, and I've been able to develop plenty of new opinions since my post a few weeks ago on trade possibilities. In that post, I basically said that I wanted Heath Bell and/or Hunter Pence, with Hunter Pence causing much more excitement. Things have drastically changed since then. (WARNING: If you're here just for a preview of the games and actual talk of the Pirates and Phillies, you should just skip down to the bottom.)
For starters, the asking price for Pence is high. Back then, I had seen someone completely make up a majoke of a trade involving only Pence and Jarred Cosart, our top pitching prospect. Get a job, man. That's nowhere close to what's being talked about now. I have heard rumors of Cosart, Jonathan Singleton (our 2nd best prospect, a first baseman), and a third prospect being turned down by the Asstros. I have also heard that they need that third prospect to be Trevor May, our 3rd best pitching prospect, for a deal to work. I have even heard that we've offered Domonic Brown, but the Asstros want younger players. But they also want "sure thing" prospects. Whaaat???
And, now, as I am typing this, I am seeing that the Phillies and Asstros are trying to find a third team to get the deal done. That deal would include us losing Domonic Brown. I have heard the Asstros want to trade with the Braves because they like their prospects more, but I've also heard the Braves are done even trying to get Pence because they're unwilling to give up what Houston wants.
Along with all of that, if we don't get Pence, we are probably looking to strike a deal with the Padres for both outfielder Ryan Ludwick and Mike Adams, their set-up man.
And if the White Sox decide this weekend that they don't want to make the playoffs, we have talked to them about getting Carlos Quentin, more than likely for a price a little lower than Pence. Quentin, however, appears to be our second choice of outfielder behind Pence.
Before I am finished typing this preview, and almost definitely before the game starts tonight, and guaranteed before the series this weekend ends, all of this could change or mean absolutely nothing depending on who gets who and wants to give up what. As of this moment in time (4:25 PM, Friday), Pence and Brown are in the starting lineups for tonight. If either or both of those change, expect big things.
I know you all are dying to know my current thoughts on all of this, so I'll tell you.
What is easiest?
I think the Adams-Ludwick acquisition would be the easiest for us to pull off at this point. That's all relative, though. You may have noticed the misspelling of "Astros" thus far in the post. That's because, with all of this trade malarkey going on, I am changing the spelling of the Astros in this blog to the Asstros. They are being super greedy in all of this, trying to completely strip our farm system to the point where we better hope for some serious advances in medical technologies to allow our players to be this good through their early 40s. Of course, the Asstros have every right to do this; they have the upper hand in all of this. The Asstros don't care if they get better this year. If they have Pence, they have him. If they don't, they don't. They don't need to make a change to get better right this second like we do. So they should absolutely do all of this. But does that mean I should see things their way and NOT start calling them the Asstros? Psh...what kind of Phillies fan would I be if I did THAT? So that deal is proving to be really tough to make, and the White Sox are only 3 games back in the AL Central, so they may not be willing to get rid of a player like Quentin in the midst of that. The Padres, on the other hand, are absolutely getting rid of players, and we haven't hit as many roadblocks with them as we have with the Asstros. At least not that I've heard. I think Adam is awesome and would be a fantastic addition to the team, and Ludwick could hopefully help out a little at the plate. If not, he's sure to be a defensive upgrade from either of our corner outfielders. Yikes.
What do I want to happen?
I honestly want Carlos Quentin. I am borderline hoping the Braves get Hunter Pence today so that we go all out for Quentin this weekend. This might be confusing, considering how excited I was about the thought of Hunter Pence in our lineup less than 3 weeks ago. But Carlos Quentin has more power than Pence, and we are ultimately looking for a right-handed hitter who can get the ball out of the yard. He's only batting .262, but are we honestly looking for someone with a great batting average? We need a 5-hitter. Right now, Quentin has 20 home runs, tied with Ryan Howard for leading current Phillies players. He has 62 RBI, behind only Ryan Howard in terms of Phillies players (and Howard leads the NL). He is tied with Shane Victorino for highest slugging percentage at .510. His OPS is also second only to Victorino. And his batting average actually isn't that bad, especially on the Phillies. For a bunch of these stats, you could argue something similar for Hunter Pence. Except when I think of Hunter Pence, I don't get the same sense of him being a power hitter as I do with Quentin. More than likely, this is because Pence looks like he's trick-or-treating to me. He's generally unathletic-looking, he chokes up on his bat, and all of the accessories he wears (3/4 sleeve baseball shirt underneath, high socks, sweat bands) just make him look like he's always wearing a Halloween costume. Watching him swing a bat is an uncomfortable experience in my opinion. I don't like that we're going to rely on that to start hitting homers. Along with all of that, I don't want to trade with the greedy Asstros. It'll be hilarious when they get nothing out of this deadline.
What do I think will happen?
I think we get Hunter Pence, and I think we end up spending way too much for him. Something I have yet to address is us giving up Domonic Brown, which, according to all of the current reports, we will have to do to get Pence. I don't know how I feel about this. At first, I was very very against even a thought of doing that. I have heard over the years that Brown is the real deal, and I think he has shown flashes of turning into a great player. Pence or Quentin, though, would without a doubt be an upgrade over him right NOW. While he seems to have potential at the plate, and he has great patience as a hitter, I almost feel like he must've gone through an 8-inch growth spurt in the past year with how awkward he looks out in the field. He can't seem to get his bearings defensively. I have no idea how he will develop in the coming years, but his dominance at every level of the minors tells me that he'll eventually come around (at least offensively). It scares me to give him up, but, at the same time, I wouldn't mind it at a time when we keep hearing how much we need to win now. My problem with it, though, is that we're going to give up our starting right fielder and our top 2 prospects (and possibly a 3rd in the top 10) for one player. And he's not Cliff Lee. He's not Roy Halladay. He's not THAT much of a difference-maker. We've made huge deals over the past few years, but they have been for excellent players, not just good players. Pence is definitely a good player, but we are paying too much for him.
As I say all this, though, I have to show some faith in Ruben Amaro, Jr. Has he steered us wrong yet? He's made nothing but great deals since he took over in 2009, and I almost feel bad doubting him this much. I thought the Oswalt deal was bad last year, and said that not winning the World Series would make it a bad deal. While we didn't win the World Series, I do think that ended up being a good deal for us. J.A. Happ, a man I worshiped during his time in Philadelphia, is awful this year for the Asstros. Not that Oswalt has really been around for us this year, but he was awesome for us last year. So my doubts of Amaro last year ended up being totally wrong. Are my doubts this year unwarranted? I don't think so. But Ruben could end up proving me wrong. Again.
Obviously this is a hot topic, so please comment, call me, text me, email me, send me a message on facebook, whatever. I'd love to hear other opinions.
No matter what happens, though, apparently we have to play a series this weekend while it's all going on. The nerve.
Game 1: Charlie Morton (8-5, 3.69 ERA) vs. Roy Halladay (12-4, 2.55 ERA)
In my preview of our first series with the Pirates, I mentioned that Morton copied Halladay in the offseason and now has an identical delivery. It is so awesome that this matchup is occurring simply because we will see Roy Halladay's delivery every half-inning until the bullpens get to work. In that first series, although they didn't face each other, Halladay and Morton had nearly identical statistical lines as well. Seven innings, 6 hits, 2 earned runs, and a difference of just 1 for both walks and strikeouts. At that time, Morton actually had a better ERA than Halladay. So should we look forward to a 1-1 game until extra innings? I don't think so. The big difference between these guys is that Halladay has kept up his success throughout the season. He had a 2.56 ERA going into that first series, and he's at 2.55 now, going 4-1 with a 2.53 ERA and 1.02 WHIP since seeing his doppleganger. Morton was at 2.51 and has since gone up to 3.69, going 2-3 with a 6.40 ERA and 1.86 WHIP in 7 starts. Needless to say (but I'll say it anyway), Morton has been awful since then, and Halladay has been the portrait of consistency. Rollins is 6 for 9 in his career against Morton with 3 doubles, including one in their showdown earlier this season. Halladay has actually gotten hit around a bit by these Pirates in his career, but look for him to "bounce back" strong after going 4 straight starts of giving up more than 1 run. Weird.
Prediction: Phillies 5 Pirates 0
Keep an eye out for: Roy Halladay throwing a complete game shutout. Ugh.
Game 2: James McDonald (7-4, 3.95 ERA) vs. Cliff Lee (9-7, 3.05 ERA)
I remember very well sitting behind home plate in PNC Park, watching James McDonald struggle to throw a strike for what seemed like 15 straight batters. I have a very difficult time believing that he is 7-4 this season and has an ERA under 4. He looked absolutely terrible against us after the first 3 innings. Here is his 4th and 5th inning against us:
Utley walked
Utley to second on wild pitch
Howard walked
Utley to third, Howard to second on passed ball
Ibanez sac fly (1 run scores)
Ruiz hit by pitch
Brown singled
Valdez grounded into double play (end of inning)
Halladay walked
Victorino walked
Polanco walked
McDonald taken out
What a hilariously bad trip through our order. The only person who did anything negative was Wilson "Why Get One Out When You Can Get Two" Valdez grounding into one of his patented double plays. Our batters have just 3 hits against McDonald, but 5 walks. I think patience will be key and will pay off for us. Lee did not face the Pirates the first time around, and, therefore, does not have much experience against them (since they're the Pirates and their team completely changes every 3 months or so). I think that he comes out firing in this game and helps to show Pirates fans why they shouldn't feel bad about not being buyers at the trade deadline.
Prediction: Phillies 7 Pirates 0
Keep an eye out for: Utley staying hot (batting .375 last 9 games) and getting a couple of extra base hits and RBI in this one
Game 3: Jeff Karstens (8-5, 2.41 ERA) vs. Vance Worley (7-1, 2.02 ERA)
Karstens has been great since he dominated us over 7 innings. He's 5-1 in his last 8 starts, including a complete game shutout in which he threw just 83 pitches. If you're not amazed by that there's something seriously wrong with you. That's throwing 9 pitches per inning. And it's not like he threw a perfect game, so he was seeing more than 3 batters per inning. It's truly unbelievable. That tells me that we just need to use the same patience in this game that we hopefully use against McDonald in Saturday's. While Karstens has been good this season, Worley has been all but unhittable in his last 7 starts, giving up just over 3 hits per start. He finally gave up more than 1 earned run since his June call-up, disappointing everyone by giving up 2 earned runs in his last start and only throwing a complete game. Get your act together, Vance.
Prediction: Phillies 2 Pirates 0
Keep an eye out for: Worley throwing 8 shutout innings and the Phils shutting out the Pirates bats, hopes, and dreams over the course of the weekend. VANIMAL!!
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