Oswalt to Phils? ... The trade-deadline thread

OOP, if it makes you feel any better, Huntington says he accepts all blame.

Please continue ignoring the cheap-ass publisher pulling the purse strings.

 

Don't get this logic. I'm a Mets fan and I thought the Phillies and Amaro did a miserable disservice to their fans by ditching Lee for what turned out to be three B-grade prospects. There was absolutely no reason the Phillies, a team built to win now and win big, a team with it's entire core in it's prime or heading out of it, could not have kept Lee for this season.
Philadelphia is the 4th largest TV market in the country. The Phils are drawing 45,000 a game at their nice new park. They could have made a pitch to ink Lee long-term and if not, ride him for a season and enjoy the championship (division, NL, maybe World Series) banner he leaves behind. I don't believe in recklessly mortgaging the future to chase feint postseason hopes (the Mets should not be buyers, for example), but the Phillies should have been thinking, 'How can we win a World Series this season, because we are extremely good?'

Lee and Halladay, even with all Philly's other injuries, might have had Phils in first right now. Instead, they have to trade to get a lesser version of what they had. Oswalt is good but Lee is better. Not that they gave up all that much for Weir, Mississippi's favorite son. JA Happ might grow up to be Jim Deshaies, which is not a terrible thing.

Where do you think Phils will deal Oswalt after this season, because clearly a small market team like the Phils can't afford to have two pitchers making tens of millions per season. And got to restock that farm system.

I thought Amaro blew it when he dealt Lee and the way the season has gone confirms it. And if I were a Phillies fan I would be furious.

 

I totally hear what you're saying and I highly doubt there were any Phillies fans doing handstands when Lee was traded, but the fact is he was. Should he have been? Probably not. The guy was unreal last year, especially in the playoffs, but it came to something simple really: money. And I agree with everything you said as far as the Phillies making tons of money with Comcast basically televising 3/4 of their games, selling out CBP every night and making boatloads of cash off merchandise, but ownership wasn't going to allow the payroll to go above $145 million or so and keeping Lee would have done that. The Phillies simply don't give pitchers more than 4-year deals and Lee would have wanted 5, 6 or who knows how many so him staying was highly unlikely. Justified or not, the Phillies felt they'd rather get prospects (while I wouldn't call them sure things I also would say they're all B-level either) to offset the 7 they gave up for Lee and Halladay than watch Lee walk at the end of the year and get a couple draft picks for him. Right or wrong, that's the way it went. It's always easy to sit back and say Amaro blew it, but the fact is it's doubtful he wanted to trade Lee. It came from someone with a higher pay grade then him and probably came from a higher pay grade than that person and so on and so on.

 

Al of this hand-wringing over the Phillies trading Lee is totally misguided.
The simple fact, according to one basbeall writer I know, is Charlie Manuel did not like Cliff Lee, thought he was bad in the clubhouse and wanted him out of there.

 

Another thing I heard from an MLB exec is that the Phillies take it very personally when they offer someone a multiyear deal and he rejects it.

"You don't wanna be here? See ya."

 

Then Manuel and the Phillies fucked up. Manuel's job is to handle shit like that, to find a way to make guys who can help the team fit. They made the World Series with Lee last year, so he couldn't have done too much damage.

And if being pissed off that he insists on testing the free agent market was a factor, that is even more stupid. Pride is nice. Just don't let it get in the way of winning.

 

BYH, it really doesn't bother me that much. Just makes me think that things really haven't improved as much as the front office there would like Pirates fans to believe.

Was that a Wizard of Oz reference or do I just have that on the brain since my kid was in the camp play?

 

There is some truth to that spnited. But I don't think that was the overriding facftor in the decision. I applaud Amaro for straightening out a mistake. In the past, they would've traded for a ham and egger and hoped for the best.
I'm not sold on Lidge as the closer. He's scarier that Mitch Williams but the Phils will have to ride with him.

 

More than the Gopher?

 

I don't know about that. They're trying to win games, but they're also running a modified kind of office. Maybe you run a hospital. And you have a chance to hire the world's pre-eminent cardiac surgeon. But the downside is that the guy is a raging asshole who will make life miserable for everyone else showing up every day. It's not an easy decision, and work quality of life is a factor in any hire, including baseball, as much as they may seem to be, as Bill Simmons put it in a great column, "Strat-O-Matic cards with arms and legs."

I wasn't aware that Lee had the clubhouse cancer reputation. Has that trailed him for a while? I thought baseball's reigning pitcher penises were Bedard and Brett Myers.

 

Nothing compares to The Mighty Gopher!

Edit: Last night I wasn't very happy with the deal so I did the 'Fear' thing.

Today I'm still not convinced it's a good deal. The Twins needed a closer but they may have given up too much.

I would have liked to see them get a starter.

 

Carlos Zambrano is available.