Brett Myers made no secret of his desire to remain in the role of closer for the Phillies but once Brad Lidge came to town it was back to the rotation. His recent demotion to the minor leagues tells you how well that's worked out and Lidge's contract extension means that he won't close in Philadelphia any time in the near future. Naturally, that's given rise to discussion about Myers's future with the team.
According to Ricky Bottalico, television analyst for the Phillies AAA affiliate, Myers told him that he wants to be traded somewhere he can close.
"He's banking on getting outta there. You know it as well as I do that he doesn't want to be with the Phillies anymore. He's made that perfectly clear."
That would be understandable. Beyond the desire to relieve, Myers might also feel a change of scenery would help him recover what's been missing in 2008. Thing is, he denies saying anything of the sort.
"I never asked for a trade. I've got a house and everything in Philly. Why would I want to leave?"
You hear that Bottalico, he's got a house! A man doesn't just walk away from roots like that. Myers could have refused to go to the minors but did it without issue and is even dropping to AA to make another start this weekend while the AAA is on All-Star break. That doesn't sound like someone who is looking to blaze a trail out of Philadelphia.
All of the turmoil surrounding the Mets in June cost Willie Randolph his job but it didn't cost them a chance at winning the NL East. After beating the Phillies 10-9 yesterday, they are just two and a half games out of first. The Marlins, no one's idea of a contender at the season's start, are a game closer to the Phillies. All that means there's a lot of pressure on Pat Gillick to make a move to shore up the questionable rotation.
He's trying. The Phillies were in the CC Sabathia bidding until the very end but didn't have a hitting prospect to equal Matt LaPorta. There probably won't be another pitcher of that ilk on the market, but that's okay. The Phillies don't need Sabathia, they just need someone better than Adam Eaton. Eaton, via this clip from the 700 Level, says all that needs to be said about yesterday's miserable shelling.
Hindsight is 20/20 but the Phillies look pretty silly for not making more of an effort at signing Kyle Lohse during the offseason. No one may have predicted how well he'd pitch for St. Louis but it didn't take a crystal ball to see him outperform Eaton.
First of all, hooray to phonetic title semi-puns. Secondly, this video has everything you would expect out of the scene at the CBP for a Phillies game. You have to fast forward a little ways to see the fat man dance (2:20 to be exact), but if you do that, you'll miss Philly fans booing (1:00 and nooooo, you don't say) and a quick camera glance at a ballgirl which gets awkward (1:50-ish).
What a perfectly generic baseball fan: fat, mustached and willing to skin up in about 3/4 of a second.
I'm guessing a lot of you are like me in that as soon as you hear the name Brad Lidge, you immediately think about Albert Pujols hitting a ball about 750 feet off of him in the 2005 NLCS. Of course, I also think about the walk-off that Scott Podsednik hit off of him in game two of the World Series about a week after that as well. The Pujols one sticks out more though because it's not often that we get to see a man's spirit crushed on national television.
After that home run, Brad just wasn't the same for the Astros, he'd been ruined. So when the Astros sent him to Philadelphia this offseason, I thought it would be a nice change for Brad. I had no idea the change in scenery would affect him as much as it has though. A 2-0 record with a 0.77 ERA and 19 saves in 19 chances, yeah, the Phillies will take that. In fact, they'll take three more years of it.
Philadelphia Phillies closer Brad Lidge has signed a three-year, 37.5 million-dollar, contract extension.
Lidge is 2-and-0 with 47 strikeouts in 35 innings and set a club record by converting his first 19 save opportunities this season. He didn't allow an earned run through his first 17 appearances (17 innings), which was the second-longest by a Phillies pitcher to start his career with the team.
Lidge would have been a free agent at the end of the year, but considering how things have been working for him in the City of Brotherly Love, you kind of figured a deal would be worked out sooner rather than later.
On Deck is FanHouse's look at the day's most intriguing baseball matchups.
Florida Marlins (44-43) at Colorado Rockies (37-51) - 3:05 PM ET
As if 18-17 wasn't enough, the Rockies and Marlins played a 12-6 game proving once and for all that the humidor is dead Coors Field can still play host to some Nintendo games ... and that the Marlins pitching staff needs to step it up if they're going to hope to remain in contention for the N.L. East. The Marlins turn to Mark Hendrickson, who started out the season pitching like their ace but has been positively awful his last seven starts (37 earned runs in his last 34 innings). Not the guy you would expect to bounce you back from giving up 30 runs in two games. As for the Rockies, hey ... if they have another run in them, they're only six games back in the N.L. West so that division can still be had. Speaking of which ...
For Billy Joel, Allentown is a metaphor for the hard-working, patriotic Americans of a bygone era. For a major leaguer with 209 games of experience, like Brett Myers for example, it represents the nadir of a season in which very little has gone right.
Myers got sent to Allentown, home of the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs by the Phillies today in an effort to straighten out his pitching. His removal from the rotation isn't that big a surprise. The Phillies were openly contemplating such a move after the shortest start of his major league career on Friday but it was expected that Myers would return to his 2007 home in the bullpen. This is a much longer trip.
Because of his experience, Myers could have refused the assignment to AAA. His acceptance means he'll remain a starter, which isn't something that's always appealed to him, and his attitude received compliments from GM Pat Gillick.
"I can't say enough about Brett's willingness to accept this assignment. He understood and is eager to get back on track again. He is struggling right now, but he is a quality major league pitcher who we are going to need in the second half of the season."
It's not yet known who will replace Myers in the rotation but this is sure to amp up their quest to land a quality starter on the trade market. With three teams within four games of them in the East, they can't afford to stick with their current starters.
Charles Barkley appeared on NBC's Philly affiliate last night to talk with the sporting dudes and waxed Barkley-esque on the Sixers and Phils. He spent the first portion discussing the Sixers need to be frugal this off-season and then turned to talking about the treatment of Ryan Howard v. Chase Utley, to which he pointed out that "they always tougher on black guys here."
Barkley also went on talk about the Phillies' need to acquire a #1 "Josh Beckett" type of pitcher that would put them over the top. Aside from insulting Cole Hamels, who is a number one, I don't think Charles understands how this whole "acquiring-a-team" thing works. The Sox had to give up arguably one of the best players in baseball -- Hanley Ramirez -- in order to pull Beckett. These number one starters just don't fall out of trees (also see: Haren, Dan to the Diamondbacks).
Additionally, as one 700 level commenter pointed out, Pat Burrell has gotten far worse treatment than Howard and he's of the Caucasian persuasion, so maybe he's stretching a bit by calling the entire city of Philadelphia "biased". Or whatever he would inherently be saying with this quote.
A case of deja vu is overtaking Philadelphia. Brett Myers is struggling to get the job done in the rotation and a trip to the bullpen looms as the next step in trying to get his season back on track. It worked in 2007 but that was before Brad Lidge was in town. Now Myers would be a very well-paid middle reliever on a team that's already shopping for help in the rotation.
Myers only lasted two innings in Texas on Friday night, the shortest start of his career and the 11th Phillies loss in his last 12 starts. Myers didn't seem thrilled when the Phillies moved him back to the rotation this season and even his pitching coach admits he's at a loss about how to deal with him going forward.
"He's a hard read," pitching coach Rich Dubee said. "What do we do with him in the bullpen? I don't know. If it happens, we'll see. We saw a different animal last year in the bullpen."
The problem isn't the short term, Myers is killing the Phillies right now, but the long term for a guy who can't seem to get his head right while making $20.5 million through the end of 2009. The Phillies can't afford to play psychiatrist for Myers while simultaneously trying to win the East. A change of scenery, beyond the view from the bullpen, may be the best thing for all involved.
The era of the medication endorsing athlete, while still early, has been pretty good to us. No one will every forget when Rafael Palmeiro came out with the Viagra ads or those fascinating Nolan Ryan Advil collaborations.
Okay, so those are a little clownish (or suspicious in Raffy's case) and certainly, Mike Schmidt's willingness to tackle BPH and the issues that surround an enlarged prostate are much more worthwhile. Granted, the subject is ready available humor for those without any sense of decorum and a heavily juvenilized mind, but there's nothing funny about dudes getting older and having to pee a lot.
"These bathroom breaks got in the way of life's normal moments," explains Schmidt. "When my doctor diagnosed me with BPH, I was relieved to learn that it was a common condition. I was also relieved to know BPH is not cancer. Together, we developed a game plan to manage my symptoms with Uroxatral(R) (alfuzosin HCl 10 mg extended-release tablets)."
On Deck is FanHouse's look at the day's most intriguing baseball matchups.
Cincinnati Reds (35-41) at New York Yankees (40-35) - 1:05 PM ET
A friend of mine ... a Yankee fan no less ... said to me on Friday afternoon that he fully expected the Reds to win two out of three in this series in the Bronx against his Yankees. A pretty amazing statement from a fan of a team who had just won seven in a row. That's how impressed he was of the young pitching the Reds had. Although I think he expected the two wins to be against Edinson Vólquez on Friday, and Johnny Cueto today, and not against minor league call-up Daryl Thompson on Saturday. Instead, the Reds have a chance to sweep the Yankees in the Bronx (just like the Series in '76), ensuring that the Yankees last win over the Reds at Yankee Stadium will forever be Game 1 of the 1961 World Series, before The House That Ruth Built (and The House That Griffey Hates) comes down for good.
Brett Myers made no secret of his desire to remain in the role of closer for the Phillies but once Brad Lidge came to town it was back to the rotation. His recent demotion to the minor leagues tells you how well that's worked out and Lidge's contract extension means that he won't close in Philadelphia any time in the near future. Naturally, that's given rise to discussion about Myers's future with the team. 
I'm guessing a lot of you are like me in that as soon as you hear the name 
For Billy Joel, Allentown is a metaphor for the hard-working, patriotic Americans of a bygone era. For a major leaguer with 209 games of experience, like 
A case of deja vu is overtaking Philadelphia. 
