On the Road Again

In between more trips halfway across the country this week, I thought I would pop in with some general thoughts swirling around my brain while I have some internet downtime courtesy of free airport wireless from Boingo! So what's happened since last I checked in here?

The Tournament. Damn. What an incredible run this time around, quite possibly the best March Madness in history if you're a fan of upsets and of the Little Guy. Everyone said there were no great teams this year, but by the time the tournament actually came around, I think it was pretty clear that Ohio State and Kansas at least were a cut ahead of the rest, with Duke pretty much right on their heels behind them. And yet somehow, the whole "no great teams this year" ended up proving out, as we have an amazing 11-seeded VCU in the Final Four, joined by 8th seeded Butler to accompany #4 Kentucky and #3 UConn. It's the highest sum of the four Final Four seeds in NCAA tournament history, and Saturday afternoon's VCU-Butler matchup will be the highest sum of two teams matching up in the Final Four in tournament history as well. It's the first time we've had no #1 seeds into the Final Four in a decade, and the first time with no #1 or #2 seeds in tournament history. Suffice it to say, these are four teams as befitting of the "there are no great teams this year" mantra as any collection you could find.

This Butler story is simply amazing. There are just no other words to describe a guy out of that tiny school, that unknown basketball program, and that weakass heretofore disrespected conference and make it to the Final Four. Twice. Consecutively. What Brad Stevens has done this year cannot be put into words, but go read my post about him last year if you want to know what I already thought of this guy's coaching skills after last season's run. Stevens' career has been on the upswing for years, and this latest run of back to back Final Fours could be just the beginning for who has got to be thought of at this point as America's best college basketball coach.

And enough with the talk about the Big East. The Committee hopefully learned something this year about parity, as they allowed in 11 teams that beat the crap out of each other for three months in to the big dance from the Big East, surpassing the Big East's own record of 8 teams into the NCAA Tournament back in 2008. I'm all for allowing in all the teams that deserved it, but frankly I did not think Marquette did quite enough to get in, and I though the way Villanova ended the season -- including losing in the first round of the Big East tournament to lowly South Florida to cap a horrible second-half slide to their year -- also made them prime ground to be bumped out for a more worthy squad. I mean, the Big East deserved to break that record this year, but they probably should have had just 9, or at most 10 teams in. Crushing the all-time record like that, and allowing in 11 of 16 teams in a conference as a result, was I think kind of a mistake. But don't be one of those clowns who points to the Big East only getting two teams into the Sweet Sixteen. That's just bogus. Number one, nobody ever said that inviting a team into the Big Dance means they are going to win the tournament, or win four games, or win two games. It is and ever was only a way of rewarding a team for a good season, and in that sense the committee let in who they thought deserved to be let in. They let the Ivy League winner into the Big Dance every year...does that mean they think Princeton has a legitimate shot at taking the whole shebang down? Of course not. So just because a lot of the Big East teams didn't last long, that really is not actually related at all to whether they deserved their bids.

Frankly, I think most of the pretty much bad Big East teams lost early, and that is just the way it should be. I mean, I just said up there that I probably would not have let in Marquette or maybe even Nova, but those decisions are defensible to me, and the fact that Nova, Georgetown and Louisville all got crushed early did not surprise me much. I profited from my expecting that in my pools, in fact. Same thing with Pitt and Notre Dame, who paying close attention to the Big East this year led me to have fairly low expectations for come tournament time. The thing with the Big East this year is that, while quite probably the deepest conference in college basketball history, it really was not in my view the best conference in college basketball history. Not by a longshot, really. I don't even think this year's Big East crop was quite as good overall as a couple of years ago, when Villanova and Pittsburgh had that amazing late-tournament showdown. That year, the Big East had about eight teams ranked in the Top 25 all season long, which was sort of like this year although maybe not quite as deep. But that year, the conference also had arguably three of the top four teams in the country in Nova, Pitt and UConn. We were looking at a conference with legitimately five of the ten best teams in the land all concentrated in it, and three or four tournament-worthy teams to boot as well. That was a crazy strong conference in my view. This year's Big East was crazy, crazy deep -- the conference's 9th place team in UConn is very close to winning the national title right now -- but at the top, the small handful of very best teams in the country at no point included anyone from the Big East, all season long. The closest anyone in the conference has come to being one of the country's best is right now, with UConn, who with Kemba Walker is playing as scary as anyone in the sport, but it's the first time all year. The Big East may have had 8 or 9 ranked teams through most of the 2011 season, but very rarely did we have anyone ranked in the top three or four, and not at all more than one at any point. And with soft Pitt and Notre Dame teams at the top of the conference by the time the seedings for the Big Dance were handed out, I did not pick either of those teams to make a deep run. The deepest I had any Big East team going this year was UConn, based on the way they played and the way Kemba Walker stepped up in the Big East tournament, although I did not pick any Big East teams to make this year's Final Four. Which makes perfect sense to me, and certainly does not mean that these teams did not deserve to be in the Big Dance to begin with, but I never thought the conference had a top-5 team in it all year, albeit having several teams in the 5-25 range on the national rankings.

Getting away from the tournament for a minute, the Phillies are heading into the 2011 season with a major whimper, as second baseman Chase Utley sounds to me like he is going to be sidelined for a good couple of month at least with a still-ailing kneee, Brad Lidge is looking like he will start the season on the DL as well, and even star pitcher Roy Halladay took a beaning line drive off the bat of Manny Ramirez right in the back of the head the other day. To this Phillies fan, it feels like the year has slipped away before it even started, and with the problems this team had scoring runs in 2010 as it is, plus the loss of 100-rbi man Jayson Werth's bat from the starting lineup, and Utley likely not 100% if in there at all for a good half the season, things are not looking good for this team to make it back to the World Series anytime soon, even despite their vaunted pitching staff. You heard it here first -- this Phillies squad isn't going to score enough runs to be as great as everyone thinks they're going to be.

Oh and let's not forget Survivor Poker, which is winding to a close here as we have just three players left: smboatdrinks and veryjosie from the original Team Fish, and muchtim from the original Team Donkeys. Since I last checked in about the goings-on at Donkey Island, the Fish fulfilled their plan of banding together as soon as they had snatched the majority back from the Donkeys shortly after the merge, and summarily eliminated the remaining Donkeys player by player by player, until certain members of Team Fish pissed off their own ringleader with backstabbery and deceipt such that their own elimination became more important than finishing off the Donkeys. Thus, muchtim has managed to squeak his way in as the remaining Fish alliance of josie and boat have eliminated their own would-be mutineers in turtle and xkm over the past couple of games. Now on Wednesday, we all have a chance to really impact the outcome of Survivor Poker, because whoever wins immunity out of josie, boat and muchtim gets an automatic pass into the final two, and they get to pick which of the other two remaining players to bring along with them. I think it's a safe bet to assume at this point that the two surviving fish would vote for each other if either of them wins immunity on the day, but the really interesting thing would be if muchtim manages to pull off that feat. Who will muchtim choose to bring along with him to the final heads-up showdown? The person he has been secretly allied with for weeks? Or the person he has been secretly working against all the while? Or are those one and the same person? Wednesday should be good times at the Dank at 10pm ET on full tilt, and I definitely expect to be there along with a nice crowd of bloggers. Take a big chunk of the stack of any of muchtim, smboatdrinks or veryjosie on Wednesday night, and you will be personally influencing the overall outcome of the series in a meaningful way, so hopefully I will see you there for the festivities.

Assuming I am back home in New York by Wednesday night, that is.

Not Dead Yet

Kudos out to Roy Halladay who gutted his way through a first-inning groin injury -- that he told no one but his manager about and then insisted on going back out to the mound for six tough innings of 2-run baseball -- to nab his first win of the NLCS and an absolutely crucial victory for the Phillies on the brink of elimination in Game 5. To the rabid Phillies fans watching the game, it was very obvious just from the look on Halladay's face while he was out there and even in the dugout in between innings early in the game -- where Halladay was barely able to sit down without significant pain -- that something was wrong, and in a way it was a relief to hear about the groin injury in manager Charlie Manuel's end of game presser, indicating that this is not the new status quo for the Phillies' ace but rather just (hopefully) a temporary physical ailment. But for him to go out there and give the team six quality innings and to pitch through the pain like he did, this is the stuff that Philadelphia is made of, and the fans will not forget.

As big as Halladay was in the Phillies nabbing the win and sending the series back home to Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia, the real story in Game 5 wasn't Halladay, nor Giants ace Tim Lincecum who took the tough loss after another solid pitching performance himself, but rather the Phillies' bullpen, easily thought to be the one glaring weakness on this team. After a scoreless 7th inning from Jose Contreras and J.C. Romero, Ryan Madson came in needing to hold on to a slim 1-run lead while facing the Giants' tough 4-5-6 hitters of Buster Posey, Pat Burrell and Cody Ross in the 8th inning -- the three guys responsible for mostly all of San Francisco's offense in this entire LCS series -- and Madson responded to the pressure by promptly setting down the side in order, throwing fastball after fastball by the heart of the Giants' lineup as he mowed down the most menacing players on the opposition like they were children with pitches that registered around 90-92 on the radar gun but looked more like 150 or 200 to this experienced eye. Honestly I do not recall the last time Ryan Madson (or any Phillies reliever, for that matter) came into a game late and struck out the side like this, but it provided a huge lift to the team and to their fans who I can personally tell you were not ready to pack it in for the season just yet. By the time Jayson Werth added his NL record 11th postseason home run with the Phillies in the top of the 9th inning, the team's spirits were high, and my nemesis Brad Lidge was perfect to close it out in the 9th.

So, the anatomy of each of the 12 historic comebacks from 3-1 down in 7-game series in MLB history begins exactly the same way -- with a win by the down team in Game 5 -- and that's what we're looking at here in the NLCS. And unlike the Yankees, who (1) have to win the last two games of their ALCS series on the road at Texas, and (2) who still have to face their opponent's #1 starter and known Yankee killer in Game 7, the Phillies have a somewhat easier rode ahead of them. No more road games, no more silly west coast time zone, and most of all, no more Tim Lincecum in any meaningful way in this series. Right now it's just about winning Game 6, which will feature Phillies pitcher Roy Oswalt's shot at redemption after taking the loss in giving up a 9th inning run in Game 4, going against Sanchez who the Phillies already touched up but good in Game 2 of this series, the only game where the Phils' lineup was really able to come together and do their thing. Here's hoping we get not just one but two Game 7s this weekend in what could shape up to be an incredible weekend on both the baseball and the football fronts.

team to rally from a 3-1 deficit in a best-of-seven series. The Red Sox were the last to do it, in the 2007 ALCS against Cleveland.

Zombie Alert

I hate to stir up mass hysteria or anything, but I am pretty sure Cliff Lee is undead. I mean, the stony look on his face while he just goes out there and throws strikes by people is unlike anyone I can ever recall. He must be undead, it's the most sensible explanation for how someone could not just get the results Lee gets on the mound but more particularly do it how he does it. I don't ever recall someone with such ice in their veins in a huge spot over and over again -- I know I posted that video of the ridiculously blase basket catch in last year's World Series against the Yankees -- but Monday night's Game 3 of the ALCS in New York was a perfect example of the country's most famous zombie in action.

Do you realize the Yankees had just three baserunners in 8 innings against Cliff Lee last night? That Lee struck out 13 batters out of the 24 guys he mowed down on the night? You do realize this is the all-time all-star Yankees lineup we're talking about here, they of the Derek Jeter / A-Rod / Mark Teixeira / Robinson Cano / Jorge Posada and I could go on and on? Cliff Lee, even with all the spotlight in the world on him and the highest expectations one could have, he still performed.

And the thing that gets me most of all with him is he doesn't make you chase bad pitches. He doesn't set you up with three lowballs and then fire one in way high out of the strike zone to make you swing and miss. He doesn't even necessarily "paint the corners" like a Greg Maddux did so impeccably back in his heyday. Cliff Lee just throws effing strikes. You know he's going to do it. You can't just take the first pitch like so many other pitchers allow a good contact hitter to do. If you do, you'll just be behind in the count every time you get up there, which is not where you want to be against Lee. In two-hitting and shutting out the Yankees on Monday, Lee threw 122 pitches, 82 of them for strikes. I used to point this out all the time here on the blog last year when Lee was pitching for the Phillies, but this guy throws at least 2/3 strikes every time he goes out there. He just challenges every hitter with his perfectly-placed fastball, and he moves on to the cutters and the sliders once he gets ahead in the count, and the guy is deadly accurate. Forget pitching around certain guys, or being sure to avoid the top part of the strike zone against the cleanup hitter, forget all that stuff. Cliff Lee the Undead just goes out there with that same stoic look on his face and the same stoic approach to every hitter he faces: just throw it by them. Cliff Lee gives new meaning to the phrase "mowing 'em down", he really does.

I watched my own team's #1 pitcher throw a frigging no-hitter earlier in these playoffs, and I also watched Tim Lincecum throw a masterful 14-strikeout 3-hit complete game shutout of the Braves in Game 1 of this year's NLDS. But Cliff Lee's performance on Monday night at the Yankees is quite simply the most sensational pitching performance I have witnessed in the last few weeks.

With AJ Burnett slated to pitch tonight for the Yankees in Game 4, there is a very real chance that the Yankees are down 3 games to 1 in the ALCS with two more games still to play in Arlington to end the series. That is a horrible situation for the Yankees, not so much because they have to win three straight games, but because it means that under the best case scenario, they will have to beat Cliff Lee again to go back to the World Series. And this time it will be in Texas.

Nobody has really given this Rangers team a real chance to win the AL pennant (myself included) all season long, until perhaps today. For the first time this morning on the way into work, I found myself speculating about the possibilities. It's actually a pretty amazing story, albeit one I haven't even considered for one second until just today: Cliff Lee pitching against the Phillies in the World Series, the team that traded him after he dominated for us in 2009 and went and got Roy Halladay instead. Halladay vs Lee in Game 1 of the World Series....that one's gonna be even better than Halladay vs. Lincecum twice in the NLDS here.

Speaking of which, Game 3 of the NLCS kicks off at 4pm ET today, and as I mentioned yesterday this is a much bigger game for the Phillies than Game 1 was. Although winning today is certainly not crucial to either team, with Cole Hamels pitching today and Joe Blanton slated for tomorrow, clearly the Phils' best chance is to win with Hamels today and then take the pressure off for Game 4 on Wednesday.

Bring on the Baseball

Contrary to the worst fears of a significant number of Philadelphia Phillies fans, the Phils' 4-3 loss to the Giants in Game 1 of the NLCS did not have me worried. I believe I wrote about this last Friday, but I actually thought coming in (and still do think today) that both the NLCS and the ALCS this year for specific reasons did not feature a Game 1 that it actually mattered all that much to either team involved in either game to win. I mean sure, we've all seen the stats as far as what percentage of Game 1 winners have gone on to win the series, but #1 the numbers are not all that high, and #2 and more importantly, the reason those numbers are not all that meaningful is that the team with homefield advantage is already the better team over a 162-game season in most cases, so they should win Game 1 at home, and they should win the whole series in most cases due to superior skill and talent. In any event, usually I will concede that Game 1 proves to be very important the later into these series you get in the postseason, but I just don't think that's the case this year.

On the Yankees side, the big reason that Game 1 just doesn't matter all that much -- even to the underdog Rangers playing at home -- is Cliff Lee. It's that simple. If Cliff Lee had been pitching in Game 1 in Texas, then the Rangers losing that game would have been in my mind devastating to their chances of winning this series. Because not only did they just lose with their ace, but they have no more Cliff Lee to pitch for the next four games of the series. That's the big loss right there. But here, not only does Texas have homefield advantage in the series, and thus gets four games at home if necessary including the decisive Game 7 if it gets that far, but they've got what everyone in the world is viewing as a gimme win with Cliff Lee going tonight in Game 3. Knowing that Game 3 is theirs regardless of where the game is being played is a huge factor for the Rangers in this series, and it quite simply made winning Game 1 not a huge priority as long as the team was able to secure a split in Texas. Now if all goes as planned tonight and Lee pitches another gem after beating the Yankees twice during the regular season already this year and also twice during the World Series in 2009, the Rangers will be guaranteed at worst to return to Texas with a chance to beat the Yankees as they have flogged them in the first two games of the series at home and to move on to the first World Series appearance (and the first World Series loss) in franchise history.

In the NLCS, it's basically the same story but for a more generalized reason. With the Rangers, it is the specter of Cliff Lee alone that made Game 1 not crucial for them to win the series. With the Phillies, it's the entire starting rotation. I mean, when you've got Halladay, Oswalt and Hamels taking the ball to start 6 of the potentially 7 games of this series, winning Game 1 with Halladay throwing against another of the top two or three pitchers in the league is quite simply not that significant. The Phils are still the far superior team, the Giants' lineup is proving itself to be even more of a joke than I thought minus the ridicky Cody Ross situation, and Game 7 is still in Philly if needed. Halladay pitched ok -- the three home runs and four total runs over 7 innings he gave up were not necessarily all that different from many of Halladay's performances over the second half of the season -- but losing that game is just not something to get all worked up about in my mind given all of the above factors.

And Game 2 in both series proved out exactly what I am talking about here. The Rangers -- who shelled the Yankees Game 1 starter and AL Cy Young winner CC Sabathia for 5 runs in under 5 innings, and then followed that up by equally badly shelling Yankees' Game 2 starter Phil Hughes for another 5 runs in I think 6 innings -- came back and pounded the Yankees once again in Game 2 at home, and like I said, as long as Cliff Lee outduels the tiring Andy Pettite tonight in New York, the Rangers are in as good a shape as they could have reasonably hoped for after three games with a 2-1 lead. And the Phillies did in Game 2 to the Giants what they have done to mostly every team since acquiring Roy Oswalt at the end of July this year, chipping away at the Giants' starter, scoring early and getting the pitch count up, eventually chasing him and then smiting the Giants' bullpen in the middle innings to bust open the game entirely and basically blow out to also get back to 1-1 in the series.

I should also mention that, as predicted, Roy Oswalt did in fact snack on the Giants' silly offensive lineup. He is an awesome pitcher, and anyone who sits and watches him work in and out of a lineup, in and out of counts and pitches, cannot leave with any other conclusion. He is a wonder to watch, for somebody with such seemingly thin arms to whip it in there that hard and with that great of placement. Watching Aubrey Huff in the 8th try to keep up with Roy Oswalt's 104th, 105th and 106th pitches of the night was something truly to behold. Oswalt showed in scattering just four hits over eight full innings that he is in fact a cut (or two) above the quality of the Giants' lineup, and again absent the hot streak that Cody Ross is on right now, the Giants are not doing a damn thing against either of Philly's starting pitchers in the first two games of this series. Now on Tuesday it will be Cole Hamels going against Matt Cain in San Francisco in a game that is probaly kind of up in the air, and which is more important to Philadelphia than Game 1 but which is also not crucial given who the Phils will be putting forth as their starter in games 5, 6 and 7 even if the Phils head into Game 5 down 3-1 in the series.

As I watched the Phillies hitters tee off on three different Giants' pitchers late in Game 2, I once again found myself thinking of something I thought of over the weekend about why I just don't see the Giants winning this series. Of course this is baseball, and you only have to look back basically every two or three years to find a team that won out despite not having the most raw talent in the league in an objective sense, so you certainly can't say that the Giants could not possibly win this series. They could, they can, and they might. But in terms of predicting it, I just can't realistically make that prediction, and in a nutshell here's why: If the Giants' starting rotation of Lincecum, Cain, Sanchez and Bumgartner had to face just the Phillies every day over a 162-game season, can you imagine how much worse off the Giants' starting rotation's season numbers would have been as compared to how they ended up this year after instead playing everyone in the NL, a couple of AL teams and with a focus on the NL West? I am guessing things like individual ERAs would literally probably have been twice as high for the Giants' pitchers, and the win totals, plus things like strikeouts, WHIP, etc. would all have been markedly lower as well. Meanwhile, think about the reverse situation for the Phillies' pitchers. If Halladay, Oswalt, Hamels and Blanton did nothing but face this silly little Giants' lineup for 162 games over and over again for a whole season, can you just imagine those numbers? Obviously we would have four 20-game winners -- probably two 30-gamers and maybe even a 35 thrown in there for good measure -- and I'm thinking Blanton would have what, four no-hitters, Hamels maybe 6, and Halladay and Oswalt would clearly both be in double-figures for no-nos with maybe 3 or 4 perfect games sprinkled in to boot.

Game 3 tonight, the Cliff Lees at the Yankees, and then on Tuesday it's 4pm ET afternoon baseball for the Phillies in San Fran.

MLB -- Championship Series Update

How unfortunate is it that baseball has apparently hired the same money-grubbing monkeys to schedule their postseason who already schedule the NBA playoffs these days? I mean, here we are, all done with the divisional rounds of the playoffs, and we have to wait until Friday night to start up the ALCS, which just ended on Tuesday night, and until Saturday night for the start of the NLCS, which ended on Monday night? I mean, in the end, sure this helps my Phillies this year in that we will have more than enough time to line up our pitching staff just the way we want to for the NLCS, but is it the way the games should be played? Personally, I prefer a system that favors the teams with the incredible 2- or 3-man starting rotation less, by having fewer off days in between series and even during the series themselves, but as I said, there's no doubt that this helps mostly every team still alive by this point in the playoffs and I imagine that is 90% of the reason behind the move (the other 10% being media money, in some form or another), but it totally takes away from the excitement and the momentum of the games to us fans, and I am not specifically a fan of this move one bit.

All that said, it was an entertaining divisional series round of games, with some surprises in the AL but nothing but chalk in the NL. First, in the American League, the Rays and Rangers played a very unusual series in which -- for the first time in divisional round history -- the road team amazingly won all five games in the series, including the Rangers clinching on Tuesday night on the back of yet another stellar postseason performance out of Cliff Lee. I think the owner of the Rays made a major, major screwup by coming out right as the regular season was coming to a close and announcing his intentions to essentially slash the payroll and break up the team after this postseason run was over. His team played tight as hell in the playoffs right from the getgo, they couldn't score runs when they needed them against a very scoreable-against team (other than when Cliff Lee is out there), and in the end their best pitcher (and the Rays' only great pitcher at this point in the season) lost two starts in the series, both at home, and that's your season right there in a nutshell.

On the other side in the AL, I picked the Twins to take down the Yankees finally after years and years of ineptitude against the Bronx Bombers, but instead we were all treated to one of the biggest step-downs I've in the postseason in years, in any sport. I mean, even for the Twins, and even against the Yankees, this was a huge puss-out for the Twins. They did not come to play, they allowed themselves to get rolled over by a pitching staff that has been very assailable by many teams throughout this season, and they continued with their total inability to hold on to any kind of a lead whatsoever, even late in games. The Twins led in two of the three games of the series, one of them late, and they had homefield in both games where they led. The fact that they got bounced this badly by a team with noticeable weaknesses compared to last year's world championship team is a huge black mark on that team and on Rod Gardenhire, who I now can only label as the game's best regular season coach, not best overall coach given his total postseason ineptitude.

Looking forward, the Rays would have been a much, much better matchup with the Yankees I think, other than the one big, fat, huge scary part about the Rangers to every Yankee fan in the world -- Cliff Lee. Recall that as a Phillie in 2009, Lee won both of his starts against the Yankees, including in Game 1 when he came out and absolutely moved down the best lineup in the AL by far. And the sick thing about watching Lee pitch is how incredibly calm and stone-faced he seems out there, even in the biggest spots of his life. Who could forget this catch by Lee in Game 1 of the World Series last year, when it was almost like he was too busy thinking of something else to be bothered really paying attention while making this catch. It is a small, insignificant play but I think speaks volumes about Lee and his ability to shine against the best lineup in the game while under the biggest spotlight in his sport. Unfortunately, even though I never believed the Yankees would make the World Series this year after around the halfway point in this regular season, I just don't see the Rangers as having quite enough on either the offense or the pitching staff to take down this juggernaut Yankees squad. Especially with the way that Andy Pettitte and Phil Hughes pitched against the pussies Twins, the Yankees have got to be a significant favorite in this series, despite the fact that every Yankee fan out there is quaking in their boots about facing Cliff Lee. Not having to face Lee until Game 3 was the Yankees' biggest win of the entire postseason so far, and is a major factor in my thinking the Rangers will not have enough to find their way to their second-ever postseason series win as a franchise.

The National League divisional series had much less excitement and interest, and they went right along with the chalk. The Phillies took the best-hitting, most prolific run-scoring team in the National League in the Reds, and no-hit them in the first game, gave up 3 earned runs in the second, and then 2-hit complete game shut them out again in the third game to nab the easy sweep for the far and away the league's greatest team. Meanwhile, equally prdictably on the other side, the incredible pitching staff of the Giants was as expected far too much for a very ordinary Braves lineup, and they easily disposed of Atlanta in four games with no big offensive outputs throughout out of the overmatched Braves batters.

People are having fun predicting the Giants to take out the Phillies or at least to make a serious run at the best team the National League has seen in some 90 years, but to be perfectly honest I am just not seeing it. I mean, there is no doubt that the Giants are the team I would have wanted the Phillies to face the least, because between Lincecum and Sanchez they have two starters who have previously and I am sure will again shut down the Phils' lineup, and we could easily face those two starters as many as five times in a 7-game series. Plus the Giants' bullpen is excellent, which is the only weakness this Phillies team has here in the 2010 postseason. But in the end, even though I respect the Giants' picthers quite a bit, I am just not seeing this as anything but an awful matchup for them. The Phils have homefield advantage, and even though I could surely see Lincecum outlasting Roy Halladay in a pitchers duel in one of his two starts in Games 1 and 4, the bottom line is that the matchups of Halladay vs. Lincecum -- both in Philadelphia -- and Oswalt vs. Sanchez -- one in Philly and one in San Fran -- plus Cole Hamels pitching Games 3 and 7 against the Giants' #3 starter, and again with the extra game at home in Philly, this one just seems like a mismatch to me for the defending NL champs. This Phillies lineup is the total opposite of the Braves' light-hitting squad, and those games that were 1-0 and 3-2 wins for the Giants in the NLDS are more likely in my mind to be 5-3 and 6-1 losses for the Giants here in the NLCS.

In any event, Friday cannot get here quickly enough for those of us big baseball fans out there. It's been quite a ride so far and it should only get better from here as we march towards the 2010 World Series.

2010 MLB Playoff Predictions

Well, once again I'm not going to be posting these until after some of the Game 1s have already begun in this year's postseason baseball season, but as with my preseason NFL picks, most of this post was written prior to Wednesday's kickoff to the 2010 postseason games.

1. Rays vs Rangers. I'm going with the Rays in this one. They've got home field advantage, they had the most wins in the American League this season, and unlike when they had their unlikely postseason run back in 2008, now this is a team with plenty of experienced players with postseason and even World Series games under their belt. Cliff Lee did not surprise me much in winning Game 1 today or really any time he steps on the mound, but I still have a feeling that the Rays will quickly turn this back into a series again and will likely prevail in the end over what is a very good Texas Rangers team.

2. Yankees vs. Twins. I have turned this one over and over and over in my head, and try as I might I just cannot shake this nagging feeling that the Twins are finally going to break through this year. Secretly I have thought the Twins have been the best team in the AL for the past several months, and all this with star Justin Morneau -- who hit .345 with 18 home runs this year in 82 total games -- missing fully half the season to injury, and with the closer Joe Nathan missing the entire season with Tommy John surgery earlier this year. And the main thing I just can't get past is that the Yankees' rotation is simply not close to what it used to be. Yeah AJ Burnett has kinda sucked balls late this year, but at least with him last year you knew he might bust out with a great start, every once in a while. Now this year, the Yankees are looking at CC Sabathia, who of course is a horse, but after that it's an injured Andy Pettite who has posted an ERA of nearly 7 since returning from something like 6 weeks on the disabled list, and then it's Phil Hughes who didn't really pitch well for the past two months of the season in his own right. And that's it, that's the whole rotation, just those three pitchers for Joe Girardi in the postseason. And I worry that, after losing the division to the Rays on the final day of the regular season and thus having to go on the road to play Minnesota in their brand new stadium in Games 1 and 2, if CC can't get it done early then this could be a quick series for the defending World Champions.

Giants vs. Braves. I'm going to go with the chalk here and take the Giants, whose pitching staff I just see dominating the Braves' faltering lineup, especially with homefield advantage also leaning their way. The Braves really cooled off in the final month or two of the season, and meanwhile the Giants did nothing short of posting the best team ERA in September in the last 40 years since the days when Tom Seaver graced the mound. I was a big Braves guy earlier in the season, but this Giants rotation is going to be very difficult for them to beat in a 5-game series without homefield advantage.

Phillies vs. Reds. Of course this one is very close to home for me, but this Phillies team is going to be a huge task for anyone in the National League. Not only were the Fightin Phils 2010's best team, but they had 54 wins at home and will have homefield advantage all throughout the entire postseason. And when it comes to a starting rotation, this is the best staff that comes to mind since those steroid-fueled Yankees teams of the early 2000s at least. You've got Roy Halladay, the lock NL Cy Young winner, and you've got Roy Oswalt, who led the NL in WHIP with a stunning 1.02, and then there's Cole Hamels, who might have been the NL's best pitcher in the final two months of the season. In a short series like this, this Reds team -- whose whole "World Series" was just returning to the postseason this year after a long absence -- should be no match for the best team in the sport in 2010.

Oh, and Roy Halladay just pitched a mutha fuckin no hitter against them too. What a fucking stallion.

The Tiger, and the Trade

OK ok, enough with the emails and blog comments. Quickly I will give my opinion here on the whole Tiger Woods fiasco, and then on to more important things, this week's trade of Roy Halladay to the Philadelphia Phillies in their attempt to become the first National League team ever to appear in three consecutive World Series.

First -- Tiger. There's a reason that I haven't really mentioned this here before, and that's because, generally speaking, I just don't see what the real story here is. I mean, yeah it's another man in a position of extreme power, influence, fame or riches who it turns out is a raging pig-ass immoral bitch. Tiger isn't anywhere near the first, and he'll be nowhere near the last. Sure it's always a little disappointing to see a guy knocked down from the top of the world like this, but again, I am at this point far beyond the point of surprise when it comes to the illicit sexcapades of anyone with a modicum of recognizable success these days. It's more or less just like baseball players using steroids at this point -- I just assume that any man who again occupies any position of power, influence, fame or riches is in fact cheating on his wife. Repeatedly. And often it's with totally freaky-deaky people like hookers, porn stars, transvestites, minorities or others somehow different from the person involved, etc. It's just the nature of the beast.

Basically, what it comes down to is that men are weak, in particular men who have 18 billion pounds of pussy thrown in their face every single waking hour of every single day. It's real easy for me to sit here with my feet up on my desk and claim that I would never, ever cheat on my wife. And I believe it too. But throw a hundred hot pieces of ass at me every single day I am alive, all of whom would do basically anything I wanted them to do at any time, any position, in any way whatsoever, and have them be not only willing but really begging to get it on with me, and you just can't say in a vacuum what you would actually do in that situation. It's the sad truth about the way men are. And that's not intended to be any kind of an excuse. It's just a realistic observation about what I see in the world today. I doubt that Tiger set out to marry Elin but then immediately fuck as many other bitches as he could find. I bet for a while he believed he would stop womanizing along with his decision to get married. But it's just so much pussy, all the time. It's wrong as hell what Tiger has done, and frankly I cannot believe how reckless he has been with the voicemails, the sexts, etc. he has sent, but in the end this just shows that Tiger is no different from most other mega athletes, famous people or incredibly rich people in the world today.

I should also mention how much more this sort of thing seems to be happening since our own acting president got busted chasing blowies instead of fighting Osama Bin Laden back in the late 90s. I've said this a million times but I'll say it again now -- the worst result of the Clinton presidency was not the breakdown of oversight and regulation of areas that are in need of such oversight and regulation, and it wasn't even the lack of attention placed on very real enemies that were quietly amassing forces to launch attacks against our country. The worst result of the Clintons (and I do mean both of them, because Hillary staying with that pig for her own personal gain is just about as bad and unthinkable as what Bill did in my view) was the loss of morals that that entire regime based on lying, cheating and selling out set as an example for Americans -- really, for humans -- all around the world. When people see the acting leader of the greatest, most properous nation in the history of the earth fingering his fat young interns with cigars, splooging all over the White House, accepting millions of dollars to free outright serial-killing criminals in his last days of office, and going before Congress and before the cameras and outright lying under oath, this has a severe and long-term effect on morals of everyone alive. And I definitely blame the Clintons as a significant factor in the seeming growing habit of the rich and famous acting with absolutely no morals whatsoever, giving no respect whatsoever to the lives of their wives, children, other loved ones or the millions and millions of people who look up to them.

The last point I would make about the whole Tiger rigamarole is just how funny it is that men will cheat on any chick, no matter how hot she is. I mean it's great being a man, really. Elin, the hot, young blond thing that she is, gets cheated on a million times by Tiger Woods. He goes to hookers, porn stars, even Perkins waitresses for crying out loud, just to avoid boinking her one more time. Christie Brinkley has had like four husbands cheat on her hot ass. Frigging Hugh Grant cheated on Elizabeth Hurley with a transvestite hooker for crying out loud! You ever wonder why women paint their fingernails and toenails, have every hair painfully ripped from every nook and cranny of their entire bodies, color their cheeks, their hair, their lips, outline their eyes, extend their eyelashes, and get fake stomachs, fake tits, fake lips, eye jobs, chin jobs, elbow jobs, and I could go on and on and on? Because it's true what they say: for every super smokin hot chick you can show me, I can show you a man who is tired of fucking her. It's just the way we are as men.

Now on the real business of the day, which is the trade of Blue Jays pitcher Roy Halladay to the Phillies. In a nutshell, this looks to be a three-team deal that essentially involves the Phillies sending former Cy Young winner Cliff Lee to Seattle, along with top pitching prospect Kyle Drabek and another top prospect to the Jays, in exchange for the Phils receiving Roy Halladay and the Mariners' two top pitching prospects. There are various reasons for the Jays and the Mariners to do or not do this deal, but I'm only concerned here with the Phillies's motivations, which in this case relate to securing an appropriate long-term commitment from a staff ace. Here, Cliff Lee had indicated that he would be looking for a 5- or 6-year deal similar to the one signed by CC Sabathia with the Yankees before the 2009 season when Lee's current contract is up after the 2010 season, and the Phillies as a franchise prefer to keep starting pitching contracts to fewer than four years -- a strategy which I strongly agree with, as long as you can effectively continue signing good pitchers for shorter agreements over time. Halladay, however, had already indicated an extreme interest in signing a long-term deal with the Phils, among other things due to the team's spring facility's location just a few minutes away from his family's Clearwater, Florida home, and he has since done so, negotiating a 3-year extension with an option all at roughly $20 million a year in connection with this trade.

So what the Phils are getting out of this trade in a nutshell is swapping out Cliff Lee, who was going to pitch in Philly for just one more year and then would have left the team as a free agent since the Phils already knew they were not keen to giving Lee the deal he is looking for to make his millions now, and bringing in Roy Halladay instead, for the next four years instead of Cliff Lee's one year. As I said consistently all through last season, I believe that, even with as great as Cliff Lee pitched in Philadelphia, Halladay is still that much better overall of a pitcher. His career numbers are slightly better, and he is that much more of a workhorse than even Lee has been in his time in Cleveland and Philadelphia. And in contrast to Lee's shaky 8-9 beginning to the 2009 season in Cleveland, Halladay has been one of the most consistent pitchers in the game, finishing in the top five in the AL's Cy Young voting in each of the past five seasons. Halladay throws about 8-10 complete games a year, he goes deep almost every single night when his GM hasn't totally messed with his psyche by promising him a trade to a contender and then not following through with it, and the guy is absolutely awesome at all aspects of pitching in the major leagues. But Cliff Lee has been awesome as well, and ultimately again this is not a deal that says that Halladay is a far better pitcher than Cliff Lee. Instead this deal says that Halladay can be a Phillie at a "reasonable" price for four more years after 2010, whereas Cliff Lee is only staying there for one more year at most and then he will be gone to more lucrative waters (located in the Bronx, New York most likely).

The big question right now I think is how the people of Philadelphia will react to this deal. It does seem that Phillies' GM Ruben Amaro has made a shrewd long-term decision for his team, locking up one of the greatest pitchers in the game today for the next five seasons instead of retaining a slightly lesser pitcher for only one more season. But that's not necessarily how the Philly fans are going to react to it. Cliff Lee, even in his short time in the City of Brotherly Love, was beloved by the hometown fans. He came in at the midpoint this season and immediately took over the mantle that had been held by Cole Hamels in the Phils' run to the championship back in 2008. He pitched so good for his first several starts as a Phillie that he was the absolute talk of the town, and that only magnified with Lee's incredible shutdown performances in the 2009 postseason. The Phanatics love this guy, and now he's gone, seemingly swapped for a roughly equal talent in Halladay, but not someone who has done anything yet for this city like Lee already had. Shipping Lee off unceremoniously like this as part of this three-team deal is not necessarily going to make Ruben Amaro a beloved figure in the city, at least not until Halladay goes nine innings in his first three starts for the Phils in 2010.

And then there is the small aspect of Amaro giving up top pitching prospect Kyle Drabek to Toronto as part of this deal. You may recall that talks for the Phillies to acquire Halladay before the trading deadline last season eventually stalled out because of the Phillies' refusal to include Drabek in the deal. So, back in June Amaro turned down trading Drabek for Halladay, acquired Cliff Lee and kept Drabek instead. And now here we are some six months later, and Amaro is giving up Cliff Lee, getting Roy Halladay and giving up Kyle Drabek to the Jays after all. This, in addition to giving away the other top prospects the Phils traded away to Cleveland to acquire Cliff Lee last season when the Halladay deal eventually broke down. So to all those out there who say this deal is a slam dunk, I think that is a silly position. It seems like Amaro made a short-term decision in acquiring Cliff Lee last season without really thinking through (or knowing about) Lee's future contract plans, and now Amaro is trying to undo that trade and go back to the deal he had wanted all along for Halladay, except that now he has to give up Kyle Drabek as well to get himself back to where he preferred to have been last summer anyways. Only time will tell how good this deal really is, although my suspicions are that the Phillies would not be giving up Drabek to make this deal happen if they truly thought as highly of Drabek as they have led others to believe over the past season or two in Philadelphia.

Catchup

Whoa. A week sure flew by in a hurry. I meant to say something about this in advance, but I have been pretty much out of pocket and not even online much for the past couple of weeks. There are a lot of reasons for this, but the biggest one pretty much includes Hammer Wife and I having another baby a couple of days ago. So I haven't really been working, and I really haven't even been on the grid at all for the most part.

But I've still been keeping in touch with what's going on in the world, and frankly I would've probably had a ton to write about if this had been a normal past week for me. So with that I will leave you today with some random thoughts on the things that have happened in the world of sports since last we spoke. As always, in no particular order.

For starters, Plaxico Burress has got to have the worst big-time lawyer in the world. This guy somehow managed to get two years in real-life prison, out in 20 months for good behavior (fat chance), simply for carrying a weapon into a New York nightclub without it having been registered in New York. Now, the gun was registered in the state Plax purchased it in, mind you, and he had been through the interview process and answered all the questions associated with registration of such a gun, but the law in New York says that all concealed handguns must be registered in the State of New York in order to be possessed in the state.

Now don't get me wrong -- what Plaxico did was bad, and more importantly, it was clearly a crime under the laws of the State of New York. All that law requires is possession of a gun, and that gun not to be registered in New York, and you are guilty of violating the law. Period. And Plax clearly satisfied both elements of this relatively clear crime. Yet Plax's "lawyer to the stars", Ben Brathman, first decided to take the unusual step of Plax testifying as part of the grand jury hearing to determine whether or not Plaxico would be indicted for illegal possession of a handgun. Normally a defendant is not at all involved in the grand jury process, but I guess Ben Brathman thought he might be able to win some leniency from the grand jury in some form by presenting the mitigating circumstances of Plaxico's situation. Unfortunately, all the mitigation in the world doesn't change the fact that Plax carried a gun not registered in New York into a nightclub in New York, and the grand jury quickly voted to indict as seemed obvious to everyone but Plax's big-money lawyer. Brathman's follow-up strategy of talking tough on beating the charges and in plea negotiations with the Manhattan DA also totally failed, as Brathman again tried to deny the fact that violation of New York's unregistered gun law carries a mandatory statutory prison term of 3 1/2 years. So why is the DA going to agree to Plax doing no jail time when it is clear as a bell that Plax violated a state law, and that law clearly stipulates a 3 1/2 year minimum jail term for any violation?

In the end, Plax will serve two years in NY state prison. All because he bought a gun, registered it in the state of purchase, and then carried it with him into a nightclub in New York City one night. He never intended to use the gun and certainly had not intent to harm or injure anyone in any way, and again he had registered the gun he was charged for. And yet he's getting two years in jail.

I certainly hope he didn't pay Benjamin Brathman too much up front for his "expertise". If I'm rich and famous and I'm charged with a crime in the future, I wouldn't even consider talking to Brathman about my case.

Staying in the NFL for a minute, there's always Brett Favre. What can you even say at this point? I mean, clearly he is a selfish, self-centered individual who cannot see what others can see about him. Favre hasn't been a good quarterback for years, literally, and the havoc he has caused for three or four different NFL teams over the past several seasons with his complete unwillingness to decide on his future by any deadlines he or potential suitor teams have set is nearing legendary levels at this point. But you know what? At this point I am through being pissed about Favre and his magical ego tour. I'm actually interested and excited to watch how he plays this year, especially on a team that I consider to be pretty mediocre overall in Minnesota. They're not bad by any means, but Favre has really made his bed at this point, and now the whole country is going to be watching him weekly, with most of them probably rooting for him to fall flat on his pretty face.

And speaking of people who fans will love to hate this year, my Eagles' acquisition of Mike Vick is still in the forefront of my mind. In the end, I think I have a similar feeling to the Vick situation as I do about the whole Favre debacle -- as I have discussed previously, what Vick did is reprehensible to be sure. And I'm still embarrassed as all getout that it's going to be my team -- my Eagles -- who Vick will be suiting up for all through this season. But as I wrote about previously, I don't really have any problem with Vick getting signed by somebody, and in my heart I know Vick deserves the second chance after 23 months in prison and 32+ games suspended if an NFL team is willing to put up with all the shit that will surely go along with employing him. And, as with the Favre situation, at this point I am more excited than anything else about seeing just what the crazy mind of Andy Reid comes up with as far as where and how to play someone of Mike Vick's athletic caliber. Will McNabb and Vick both line up behind the line and make defenders guess who will get the snap from center? Will Vick line up as a wide receiver or tight end as has been rumored of late? Will Vick even have set plays run for him to come out of the backfield with the potential to bust through some holes? There are just a whole lot of ways Vick can be integrated into this offense, and I can foresee people tuning in just to see what the Eagles do next with him on the roster.

Before I go today, I would be remiss if I did not mention Your World Champion Philadelphia Phillies, who have continued trucking along and at this moment sit at a season-high 22 games over .500, thanks in no small part to what has become at this point an indisputably strong starting pitching rotation. The first nice surprise has been Pedro Martinez, although if you've followed P-Mart's career along then I suppose his performance thus far for the Champs hasn't been that out of character. Basically, just as I've been saying here for over a month now, P-Mart has become a decently solid 5- or 6-inning starter. He will probably never sniff the 7th inning again in his major league pitching career, but he's usually good for 5 or 6 innings, getting himself into trouble maybe twice and giving up 2-4 earned runs. But he seems to have sufficient stuff to avoid the big meltdown innings and getting rocked early most of the time, which has been helpful for the Phillies at the bottom of the rotation and hopefully will continue to do so.

But the real story with the Phillies success this year, and in particular in the second half, lies in two other pitchers, both of whom were tangentially involved in the possible trade talks for Roy Halladay just before the trading deadline. First, you've got J.A. Happ, the 26-year-old phenom making his first attempt at being a starter in this, the third season where he made at least one appearance for the major league club. Happ is you recall was required by the Blue Jays as part of any trade for their ace Roy Halladay, and Phillies' GM Ruben Amaro had even offered up Happ as part of a 4-player proposal, which Blue Jays' GM J.P. Ricciardi rejected because it did not also include #1 Phillies pitching prospect Kyle Drabek. Well, the rest is GM legend history as Amaro then opted to keep both Drabek and Happ, and to trade a few other lesser prospects for Indians' starter Cliff Lee instead. More on Lee in a minute, but Happ has continued on being just tremendous since narrowly missing being traded thanks to the Jays' GM being outmaneuvered by Amaro. Since the Phillies kept Happ and acquired Cliff Lee on July 29, J. Happ is 4-0 for the Phils, three of those wins on the road including wins at wildcard-fighting Atlanta and Chicago plus a 7-0 shutout win at home against the wildcard-leading Rockies. In those four starts, Happ has pitched 29.2 innings, or well into the 8th inning on average per start. And in those 29.2 innings? Just one home run and four total runs allowed, for an awesome 1.26 ERA this month. Simply put, the guy has been a total pimp for us and this is why myself and so many other Phillies fans were thrilled with Amaro's move keeping Happ and not giving in to the Blue Jays' ludicrous demands for Halladay instead.

Meanwhile, Cliff Lee's performance since he came to Philly instead of Roy Halladay on July 29 makes J. Happ seem like Mitch "Wild Thing" Williams in the 1993 World Series. If there was any doubt about Ruben Amaro's genius in this, just his first year as a General Manager of a major league baseball team, after letting Pat Burrell and his 12 home runs so far in 2009 go to the Rays and picking up Raul Ibanez in the offseason, picking up an effective Pedro Martinez for peanuts a couple of months back, and then managing to keep both J. Happ and Kyle Drabek in making a big trade before the trading deadline, then what Cliff Lee has done in Philly has got to ice it. Now in five starts for the World Champions, Cliff Lee is 5-0 with a 0.68 ERA. No that's not a typo. Lee has pitched 7, 7, 8, 9 and 9 innings in his five starts so far for the Phils, giving up a total of 26 hits in those 40 innings -- none of them home runs -- and a grand total of three earned runs. In 40 innings. He's also pitched 39 strikeouts compared to just six walks during that time period, so this is a guy with the total package of impeccable control and awesome power across the board. And you know what the best part is? During this same time period (since July 29), Roy Hallday has gone 2-4 with an ERA of 4.40, giving up 8 home runs and allowing opposing batters to hit .324 against him. I knew this whole thing was going to blow up in Ricciardi's face, toying with his ace's emotions like he did by publicly broadcasting his desire to trade the starter to a contender, and then turning down some very powerful offers including top prospects plus guys like J. Happ and leaving Halladay high and dry with a losing team for the second half of the season, but it's good to see someone's ineptitude come home to roost once in a while. But hey I'm not complaining -- Ricciardi's big gaffe was Ruben Amaro's gain, and I have to admit as a Philly sports fan it feels good for once in a long while to be the team that took advantage of someone else's ineptitude instead of the team getting taken advantage of.

OK that's all for now. I may have some more this week but next week on Monday I should be back and better than ever on my regular posting schedule as things begin to return a little bit back to normal in my home and in my life.

J.P. Licked

It's official -- barring some miracle deal just before the 4pm ET Friday trading deadline in Major League Baseball, Blue Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi officially effed up.

Big time.

And in this case, it's basically 100% all his doing. Nobody made Ricciardi come out a few weeks ago and declare publicly that the team was entertaining trade offers for ace Roy Halladay. That could have been left more on the DL, as is usually the case. But for whatever reason, Ricciardi decided earlier this month to depart from the usual practice that has teams always taking steps to hide their real interests (in this case, to trade Halladay for maximum value) so as not to hamstring themselves in their negotiations in getting done what they need to get done.

So announcing so publicly to other teams his desire to trade Halladay was I think mistake #1 made by the Jays' GM this month. This definitely appears to have set the wrong tone for the offers that were made to him, with interested teams perhaps not putting their very best foot forward early given their foreknowledge of the Blue Jays' interests. Mistake #2, or maybe this is more like #1a, was telling Roy Halladay of this desire, which I think was at least as bad as telling all of his potential suitors of his desire to make a trade. Why is it bad to have told Halladay about this? Because it's just about the most distracting thing you can do to a guy -- tell him that he, and his family, are likely to be moving cities (in his case countries even) and that he could be pitching anywhere, in either league, in just a few weeks' time. This makes it very, very difficult for anybody to perform to his potential, and even the nearly infallible Halladay has shown the signs, going 0-2 in his last two starts as the trade talks have really heated up heading into Friday's trading deadline. Not that Halladay has been horrible or anything, but the bottom line is, not only has he not pitched his best over the past couple of starts, but now Ricciardi is left with an emotionally deflated Halladay for the rest of the 2009 season. Halladay will know already that he is pitching on a dead-end team with no shot of making the playoffs, and he also now knows that he is basically a lame duck with the team, since the GM has already made public his desire to trade away the superstar pitcher, and the likelihood is probably significant that he gets dealt away in the offseason after the Phillies go back to back in October for the first time in their illustrious franchise history.

Another thing Ricciardi did wrong with this whole Halladay business is his insistence right from the getgo that he only wants cheapo prospects in return. Now don't get me wrong -- it's not lost on me that money is the only reason the Jays would even consider dumping a pitcher of Roy Halladay's caliber in the first place. So I understand they are looking to make a big salary dump in moving the AL's best workhorse of a pitcher. But you know what? Ricciardi should have considered that some players -- especially those at the top of their games at a position like starting pitcher -- cannot effectively be replaced in terms of getting "fair value" back by only receiving prospects and other young, minor league talents. I mean, how many 21-year old Tommy-John-surgery-having pitchers, 18-year-old fireballers and 22 year old outfielders can really be piled up to equal one Roy Halladay? It's a difficult thing to really imagine equaling what the Blue Jays would lose by trading away Roy Halladay, but that's exactly the corner that Ricciardi backed himself into at the beginning of this whole ordeal by announcing that he was looking for prospects.

After making what I view as several mistakes in the conception of trying to trade away Roy Halladay for prospects this month, Ricciardi then compounded his error by turning down what was far and away the best offer he received from any team, which was a 4-prospect deal from the Phillies than included the World Champs' young pitching phenom J.A. Happ, our #2 pitching prospect Carlos Carrasco as well as the #1and #3 position player prospects in our league-best farm system. Ricciardi immediately balked at this offer, insisting instead on the Phils including #1 pitching prospect Kyle Drabek in addition to Happ and the other big names in the Phillies' proposed trade, and the Phils were able within one day of those talks dying down to nab the reigning AL Cy Young winner -- beating out Halladay in the process btw -- Cliff Lee from the Cleveland Indians without giving up Happ, Drabek or Taylor in the outfield. Although the Phillies obviously did a great job getting tremendous value out of the four prospects included in the Cliff Lee trade, the fact that the Indians accepted such an offer just shows how much Ricciardi was overvaluing Roy Halladay's worth on the trading block.

And the end result of the Blue Jays' GM's missteps this month? J.P. Ricciardi is now left with Halladay, pitching awesomely for a hopelessly non-playoff-bound losing team, with no prospects for improving in the entire second half of this season. Halladay knows full well that the team tried to trade him, and he has spent the past few weeks preparing himself and his family for a move across-country(ies) -- mentally and physically -- and now he must resign himself to staying in Toronto to pitch out the rest of the hopeless 2009 season. And he knows he will likely be moved anyways after this season is over with, but with much less likelihood of actually ending up on a contending team. And, Ricciardi also had to eat some serious crow this week, declaring late on Thursday night that trade talks surrounding arguably the best pitcher in baseball are "dead".

It's amazing, really, if you think about it. With all the teams still alive in the playoff hunt at this point in the season, here we are with deals going on all around us with less than 24 hours to go before the trading deadline, and the guy who owns the best pitcher in the entire sport has literally zero offers for his guy. No players on the table, no prospective deals, no talks going on at all. He has alienated his star player -- the only true star left on the Blue Jays' squad -- and he has managed to turn down some very attractive offers, only to see clearly worse ones coming in from other teams, and eventually just no interest at all. The bottom line is that, truth be told, it probably would have been difficult for Ricciardi to have played this whole Halladay thing any worse than he has, and I predict that his team will be paying the price for Ricciardi's obvious misstep for the rest of the 2009 season. Ricciardi may have been Billy Beane's protege back in Oakland at the beginning of this decade, but as we have seen after this whole Halladay mess this month, Ricciardi is no Billy Beane.

More on the Halladay Deal

According to ESPN's Jayson Stark -- a Philadelphia native -- Toronto Blue Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi is looking for talks regarding a possible trade of staff ace Roy Halladay to pick up next week, as the team is still currently scouting the minor league prospects of the other involved teams, including sending scouts to the Wednesday night start of Your World Champion Philadelphia Phillies' star prospect Kyle Drabek in Altoona, PA. This despite word that thus far Phils' GM Reuben Amaro has been unwilling to include the son of former Pirates pitcher Doug Drabek in any deal to acquire Halladay.

In posting about a potential Halladay deal yesterday, I mentioned my feeling that I would be willing to give up the top two pitching prospects plus the top non-pitching prospect in our entire league-best farm system, but that I would not also want to include third-year starter J.A. Happ in the deal. That position got some support in the comments, but then I got one comment from a fellow Philly guy in Riggs who stated plainly that he would give up any combination of our prospects and Happ if it meant we could acquire Roy Halladay free and clear with two seasons to go on his latest contract.

So I started thinking about what that would really mean for the Phillies' starting rotation. You guys tell me:

If we went ahead with what I will call the "Riggs Deal" for lack of a better term, the Phillies' starting rotation would become Roy Halladay, Cole Hamels, Joe Blanton, Jamie Moyer and whoever else we can plug in as a fifth starter. We would have no more J.A. Happ, no more Drabek and no more #2 pitching prospect in the minor leagues either, so other than more free agency signings -- never a big item in Philadelphia -- these are our pitchers for the near future. Moreover, keep in mind that Jamie Moyer turns 137 during the 2009 regular season, so he can't have much more than this season left in him as a useful part of any major league starting rotation. Looking elsewhere on the Phillies' current roster, let's also not forget recent free agent signing Pedro Martinez, who might be useful for the first half of games over the rest of this season, but who also shares a 137th birthday this year with Jamie Moyer and whom I also cannot reasonably count on as contributing to our starting staff beyond this season. Among a few other stiffs like Kyle Kendrick, I also should mention Chan Ho Park, who these days works out of our bullpen but who gave us two solid innings in extra's on Tuesday night on the Phils' way to their 10th consecutive victory after a 13th-inning walkoff home run from Jayson Werth.

We all know at this point that Kyle Kendrick sucks balls. Just like we know that Chan Ho Park sucks 'em too, in addition to Pedro Martinez who anyone with a brain in their head should recognize will be eating testicles within a few innings of his first start at Citizen's Bank Park when the other team's hitters start bouncing his pitches off of every wall in the Phillies' beautiful new stadium. Jamie Moyer has somehow continued befuddling opposing batters with his roaring 80-mph fastball, but you gotta know that can't possibly last. Which, in my mind, leaves the 4th / 5th spot in the Phils' rotation under the Riggs Deal squarely resting on the shoulders of one man:

28-year-old Brett Myers.

Brett Myers is on the 60-day DL following surgery to repair an injury to his left hip, and as recently as today, the Phillies' GM stated that the team is not planning on getting a significant contribution from Myers during the balance of the 2009 season. Myers has been inconsistent over his eight-year career with the Phillies, showing flashes of brilliance followed by periods of ineffectiveness and an inability to find home plate. That said, Myers also reports that the rehab on his injured hip is progressing better than planned, and he recently stated his intent to return to the Phillies' bullpen as soon as late August.

Can Brett Myers successfully battle back from this injury and return to his previous form? Can Myers generate the consistent production needed out of a spot on the starting rotation befitting of the World Champions of baseball? How comfortable are you Phillies fans out there with Brett Myers being our fifth, fourth or possibly our third starter to go along with Hamels, Halladay and Blanton for the near future?

Personally, I am inclined to believe the point raised at the bottom of the article I linked above:

"There has been speculation from other teams that the Blue Jays would try to trade Halladay before he makes his next start, on Friday against Tampa Bay. But Ricciardi said he doesn't expect any deal to be completed before that start.

However, he wants this matter resolved, one way or the other, before Halladay's final scheduled start before the trade deadline, which would be Wednesday, July 29 in Seattle. And based on where trade talks now stand, Ricciardi said he expects Halladay to make that start for the Blue Jays.

'That's just my gut,' the GM said. 'My gut is telling me this [deal] won't happen.'"

I agree. Much ado about nothing is my guess for Roy Halladay coming to the National League in the end.

Why Not Halladay?

Man, as a fan of Your World Champion Philadelphia Phillies, this story is really driving me crazy today. Word out of Sports Illustrated is that the Phils' unwillingness to include top pitching prospect Kyle Drabek (son of former Pirates pitching great Doug Drabek) appears to be the stumbling block to getting the trade deal done to bring Roy Halladay to Chilladelphia. The relevant portions of the article are as follows:

"'If Philly agrees to surrender Drabek', one competing executive said, 'they might get [Halladay] real quick'....Beyond that, a package of outfielding prospect Michael Taylor (recently promoted to Triple A in what looks like an obvious showcase), shortstop Jason Donald and pitcher Carlos Carrasco is, according to another AL executive, woefully short....Phillies GM Ruben Amaro suggested 10 days ago Drabek may be untouchable, though more recently he's tempered that remark slightly to say he won't publicly disclose which prospects they might consider trading."

Nowhere in the article is the name of third-year Phillies pitcher J.A. Happ even mentioned, Happ of the 7-0 record, 2.68 ERA and 1.15 WHIP in his 11 starts and 94 total innings this season. And Happ's complete lack of mention in the article by SI leads me to believe that the Phils are not being pushed to include both him and Drabek in a deal with the Jays. Which begs the question: Why the funk are the Phillies not doing this deal?

Think about it. This is Roy Halladay here. This isn't Livan Hernandez or Pedro frickin Martinez. It's Roy Halladay, who just the other night pitched his 39th complete game since 2003, Halladay who has a 2.73 ERA and a WHIP of 1.07 in 18 starts this year. This is, more or less, the best a pitcher can be in the major leagues. I mean, he's doing it all -- striking guys out, keeping guys from scoring, keeping runners off the bases, not giving up home runs, winning, pitching deep into games, you name it and Roy Halladay does it. Essentially, the best we could ever hope for from Doug Drabek's kid would be for him to somehow, some day, by some incredible miracle, be as good as Roy Halladay has been for even just one or two seasons. Am I not right about that?

So we're going to turn down the chance to have Cole Hamels, J.A. Happ and Roy Halladay anchor this staff for the next several years, all because of some prospect who might someday be able in the most optimistic possible outcome to be as good as Halladay already currently is? Sorry but I just do not follow that logic.

Now, if it turns out that Happ is an essential part of the deal along with mini-Drabek, then that changes everything. And I'm not inside those discussions so I don't know what's actually been offered and promised. Giving up Happ to get Halladay certainly represents better aggregate skill overall, but we're also taking on a 15-mill-a-year guy -- soon to be 20-25 million I am sure -- in exchange for someone making the $405,00 salary Happ is making here in 2009 and beyond, and whose best years should still be well ahead of him. And we would have to throw in our top young pitching prospect as well? That changes the balance significantly, and in fact with how well Happ has been throwing the ball just now, I'm not sure I would do that deal. But if we get to keep Happ in the deal, then how do we possibly justify not giving up our top pitching prospect (I would even give up our top two pitching prospects in the deal, for sure) in exchange for getting Roy Halladay? Think again of the triumvirate of Roy Halladay, Cole Hamels and J.A. Happ. Those guys could be good, and be good together, for another five years at least. Those three and me would probably be a good enough rotation to win most playoff series. With the couple key young spots we already have at starting pitcher, how could we possibly justify not giving up our best one or two pitching prospects to nab the biggest trade booty in years?

I mean seriously, you tell me, you Phillies fans out there: doesn't Roy Halladay sound like an absolute lock for back to back world championship parades down Broad Street?

Why Pedro?

So Your World Champion Philadelphia Phillies acquired aging veteran pitcher Pedro Martinez this week, agreeing to pay him just double the league minimum or $1 million for the less than half a season he is slated to pitch for the Phils. There are a number of talking heads out there who have stated their opinion that this is a top quality acquisition for the champs, but I have to disagree. For a couple of key reasons.

First and foremost, Pedro kind of sucks these days. For so many different reasons. I mean, for starters, he isn't just 37. He's an old 37. The guy has spent long portions of the season on the DL over the past several years since the hapless Mets signed him to an ill-advised four-year contract back in 2005. Pedro hasn't pitched more than 132 innings in a full season since back in 2005, the first year of that Mets deal, and he's even starting this season on the 15-day DL with the Phillies due to shoulder issues, so we should expect more of the same. Especially given that Pedro has been out of baseball for most of the past year, he is going to take some time to get back into shape, and who knows how good that shape will be at this point for him even if he makes a real effort.

But it's not just Pedro's longevity that sucks. Pedro went 5-6 for the Mets in 2008, which marks his worst winning percentage since, well, ever. In 1992 Pedro pitched a total of 8 innings and finished 0-1 for the Los Angeles Dodgers, but since the next year when he became a real starter, he's never finished with a losing record, period. Never, until last year. Pedro's WHIP in 2008 was 1.57, his highest WHIP since that rookie year in LA as well some 18 years ago. Pedro's 2008 ERA was 5.61, nearly double his lifetime average of 2.91, and more than a full run higher than his previous worst season ERA (back in 2006), prior to which he never finished a full season above 3.90 earned runs per 9 innings. So this is a guy who is well beyond "past his prime". He is fully "in his twilight years" in baseball terms at this point, and that's just not something that I think fills the hole the Phillies need to fill right now. And especially pitching half his games in that band-box of a stadium, I am simply not looking to Pedro to provide much actual spark to the Phillies' ailing pitching staff this year.

But there's another related drawback to signing Pedro to the Phillies' staff: the effect on our bullpen. Even in his last few years in New York, Pedro had already ceased being a true power guy, having lost his 95-mph fastball in his old age, and the result showed in his numbers. Way more pitches thrown in way fewer innings pitched. This guy simply cannot go deep into any ball games anymore, because even when he has pitched well in the past year or two, he's still pushing 100 pitches after just five innings or so. And that's on the good days. Pedro has not pitched a single complete game since 2005. He lasted a fairly dismal 5.45 innings per start in 2008, 5.6 innings per start over just five starts in 2007, and just over 5.75 innings per start in 2006. Basically, the Phillies can't realistically expect more than five innings out of Pedro on any night these days, and that is going to have a marked effect on our already dubious bullpen, which is only going to put even more pressure on the other starters on this team to do well and last later into their own games. Unlike 2008, when the Phillies put out the undisputed best bullpen in baseball and ended up winning the World Series on the heels of in many ways a "perfect" season from a pitching perspective, the 2009 incarnation of the Phillies does would never be accused of having such traits. Out of 15 teams in the National League, the Phils' team ERA is 4.56 (13th in the NL), with opponents hitting at a .268 clip (14th) and an OPS of .768 (15th) against them. Our team WHIP is 1.40 (9th), and our 43 quality starts as a team leave us in 10th place in just the National League.

And this doesn't even get into the problems the team has had at the closer position in 2009. After going a truly miraculous 47-for-47 in save opportunities in 2008's magical year, Brad Lidge has been atrocious in 2009, personally losing more than a handful of games that the team had otherwise won, and posting an 0-4 record with 6 blown saves in just 35 appearances, some of which were not even save opportunities for the former league-best reliever. When the team claimed Lidge was injured to give his some time to clear his head recently, setup man Ryan Madsen stepped in and also blew a couple of late leads, providing further evidence of the shaky state of the Phils' late-game pitching as compared to 2008. Adding in Pedro Martinez and his five innings per start to this rotation does not sound like something that is going to be beneficial to the bullpen I just described. Try as I might, I just can't see this as the move that Phillies' GM Rueben Amaro, Jr. wants to make.

Which gets me to my third and final point about why I don't love the Pedro Martinez signing for the World Champions: I think the signing makes it that much less likely that we trade for Blue Jays ace Roy Halladay. And that's the guy we really need for this team to dominate for another couple years in the major leagues. Unlike Pedro, Halladay is an absolute horse, having pitched 19 complete games over just the past three seasons, and 28 over the last five. Halladay's ERA so far in 2009 is right near where it was in 2008, which itself was better than any other year in Halladay's 12-year career except for 2005. This is a guy who pitches great, is right in the thick of his prime as a baseball player at this very moment, and who chews up a ton of innigs, having pitched well over 200 in each of the last three seasons. That's what the Phillies need to take the load off of Lidge and Madsen late in the games, as well as our depleted middle relief staff so far this year. With Halladay and Cole Hamels lining up as the 1 and 2 starters every four games for this team, everything changes and we easily become the team to beat again in 2009 for the world championship. Along with the acquisition of Roy Halladay, taking a little $1 million chance on a hungry Pedro Martinez doesn't look so bad. But, if Martinez is going to become what we got instead of Roy Halladay, then I am predicting the Phillies just don't have the pitching to make it back to the promised land for a repeat here in 2009.