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by J. Gambino on May 15, 2006 11:02 AM EDT in News Comment 12 comments

I'm going to try this for a week and see where it leads. The idea is to save the readers valuable minutes in their surfing time at work by doing some of the searches for you. We'll skip the game stories for now, because our research shows that if you're at this site, you probably know who won the Phillies game that ended more than 18 hours ago. If you like it let me know.

Here's one of the many notes columns from the Phillies beat writers. I'm just giving you the Inquirer's because it is handy, but trust me, it's all the same whether Todd Zolecki, Randy Miller, or Marcus Hayes wrote it: Geary happy, Abreu back Tuesday, Lieby back later than expected, etc.
Notes columns are great space fillers

No smart ass comments here, I'm genuinely impressed that Philadelphia has a columnist writing about the Phillies that could write something like this. Abreu no Rowand, and that's OK

The Sunday sports section of a New York paper is always good for a laugh because the writers assume every team is just dying to trade its star player for the Yanks AA 28 year-old left fielder currently hitting .227 with 1 homer. There is some interesting information about the Phillies and the availability of some of their outfielders and the interest in other outfielders.
Phils interested in Jeff Conine for 17th season in a row.

The boys at Baseball Prospectus have a gig writing for the New York Sun which usually has some good info. This article talks about how we shouldn't count out the Braves just yet and brings up the troubling idea that the Phils have vastly outperformed their true performance thus far (a la the Nationals last year).
Why won't you just die already?!!

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Comments

Heyman

I sorta like his stuff, but it defies logic to think the Yankees could outbid anyone for a prize chip like Willis. They just don't have the prospects--and Florida probably would be looking for bats, not arms. (This is also why the Phillies might have trouble in the D-Train sweepstakes.)

Perhaps if the Mets and Yankees combined to create a package, they could get Willis on some kind of time-sharing agreement: one week in Shea, the next in the Bronx. Then again, I wouldn't want to give Roger Clemens any ideas...

by dajafi on May 15, 2006 11:28 AM EDT reply actions

Radano

I may have to start checking out the Courier-Post more often. That piece on Abreu would never appear in the Inqy or DN. Kudos to him.

by Alex Falzone on May 15, 2006 12:08 PM EDT reply actions

Agreed

That was an excellent piece for the mainstream media. We should bombard that author with praise.

by David S. Cohen on May 15, 2006 12:12 PM EDT up reply actions

agreed and done

I also invited him over here, to maybe run a little Q&A session if he's interested.

by Alex Falzone on May 15, 2006 12:19 PM EDT up reply actions

re

that's really the best column I've seen in MONTHS. How have I never heard this guy? Get him on WIP, maybe I'll listen :)

http://hugetinymistake.blogspot.com/

by pacino on May 15, 2006 2:08 PM EDT up reply actions

Phils get some national love - what's interesting in this is the following line: "Runs/game: 5.4; Scored two runs in three of last four games, won all four", emphasis mine. The entire pitching staff, save for Julio Santana and the one Mets game, has really turned things around.

And now for a non-Phillies link, but a must-read nonetheless: How far they've fallen when this doesn't seem that far-fetched.

by Alex Falzone on May 15, 2006 12:30 PM EDT reply actions

Thoughts:

Glad to read the article on Abreu which actually mentions his OBP. "The engine that drives the Phillis" is a good line. I wonder if the fact that the Phils have scored only 4 runs in the past 2 games has anything to do with the fact that Abreu sat both games. Naaaaahhh.
While the Phils are outperforming their Pythag so far, ala the Nats last year, the White Sox also outperformed their Pythag and that turned out ok. One shouldn't be a slave to their preconceptions. I won't dispute the Phils have gotten lucky in their close games. I do dispute that the blowout losses they have been involved with are a better indication of their abilities than their successes. I am of the opinion that their defense will improve and thus their pitching will, and with both their pythag record will improve as well.

by pawnking on May 15, 2006 2:20 PM EDT reply actions

#2

I am in agreement there. The blowout losses are skewing their Pythagorean record thus far. While their success in close games may (2005 Nats) or may not (2005 ChiSox) regress, their RS and RA should fall into better agreement soon.

by Alex Falzone on May 15, 2006 3:47 PM EDT up reply actions

Pythag

I'm not at all worried about this right now. The most likely scenario, I think, is that they'll start winning a few blowouts.

I was about to add that they'll also probably start losing more close ones... but, somewhat to my surprise, the Phils are just 7-4 in one-run games. IOW, they're 15-11 in every other contest. Through the first half of 2005, I'm pretty sure the Nationals had a losing record in games where the margin was anything other than a run.

by dajafi on May 15, 2006 3:53 PM EDT up reply actions

1 run games

As I recall, the Nats were, at the all-star break, something like 10 or 15 and 0 in 1 run games. There was a lot of 'Anti-Moneyball' hype on this fact, saying that they had figured out how to win 1 run games. Then of course, they lost something like 10 consecutive 1 run games.

My point with the Phillies can be summarized like this:

Games 1-7: 1-6

Games 7-37: 21-9

I'm inclined to believe the last 30 games are more indicative of the true team ability than the first 7.

by pawnking on May 15, 2006 4:23 PM EDT up reply actions

Blowout losses

LEt's not forget that we are switching Madson's infinity ERA with Hamel's -infinity ERA in the rotation. Beyond the small sample size concept, we have made a move that could, legitimately, take at least .5 runs off of the team ERA. That is huge and is not factored in.

by jonk on May 16, 2006 2:35 PM EDT reply actions