Bill Simmons, of whom you may have heard, does a podcast every few days in which he interviews amusing folks on various topics. Sometimes they’re national sports figures (usually media personalities), but often they’re just his old college buddies; for example, every week he calls his buddy JackO for a segment he calls “Johnny, Are You Worried?” in which they establish, on a scale of 1-10, how worried JackO is about his beloved Yankees.
Seeing as how the baseball season has just started, and the Phillies bullpen fell all over themselves to give up 5 late-inning runs to the Nationals and lose 11-6, I figured I’d establish how worried I am about the Phils chances this year. Right now, I’m hovering at about, oh, an 8. The problems are manifold and detailed, but in as few words as possible: inconsistent offense, and horrible, horrible pitching.
In spring training (which of course has as much bearing on the regular season as monsoons in Burma do with rainfall in Kevlavik, but still), the lineup seemed equally likely to get shut out as it did to score eleven runs. They scored nearly as many runs against Toronto on 3/23 (15) as they did in the following 5 games (a total of 17). Hopefully they can smooth things out and score between 4 and 7 runs a game consistently, but until they do, they’re gonna lose a lot of games because the pitching staff isn’t likely to keep many opposing offenses under 5 runs.
The pitching staff consists of: Brett Myers, Cole Hamels, and 8-10 guys who may or may not be able to throw a baseball through a barn door from 60.5 feet on any given day. They keep saying Brad Lidge will be back, and then he kneels to tie his shoe and they have to carve more shrapnel out of his knee. If I see 20 saves out of him this year I’ll consider it a remarkable feat. Gordon, meanwhile, looked shaky in Spring Training and has a 2008 ERA of 135.00 (allowed 5 runs in 1/3 inning on Monday). Myers looked fantastic in preseason action (ERA of 1.13), but only went 5 innings on Monday and allowed three.
Hamels is, well, Hamels. He’ll be fine. People are praising him for being a more vocal leader, but frankly most of the time he sounds to me like he’s whining. Whining about his contract, whining about not having an on-staff chiropractor, etc. Being a leader is about saying positive things to the media, and dealing with the negative stuff behind the scenes. All of this will be forgotten, of course, if he strikes out 240 guys this year with an era of 3.20, wins 18+ games, and gets the team to the playoffs. Then he earns a permanent spot on “Hearn’s List Of Dudes He Would Go Gay For” (which includes Chase Utley and Justin Timberlake, amongst others).
The rest of the rotation? Kyle Kendrick had a spring training ERA of 9.68. The Artist Formerly Known As Adam Eaton posted one of 7.41 and didn’t win a single game. Jamie Moyer is 45 years old and has over 3500 innings in his arm, but he’s failed to start at least 30 games a season only once in the past decade. He’ll win at least 12 games, but he’ll probably also lose at least 12 games.
The best guy in the bullpen? Probably Ryan Madsen, who I once watched give up 10 earned runs in 1+ inning. On the other hand, I’ve also seen him come in in the 7th and get three quick outs, two of them Ks. So his appearances will always be interesting, in that it’s always interesting that my left arm goes numb when he enters the game.
So how do I foresee the season shaping up? I foresee another slow start in April, with the team fighting to play catchup the rest of the year. I foresee Utley, Rollins, and Howard making the all-star team. I foresee Pat Burrell playing reasonably well, but spending time on the DL. I foresee a bullpen ERA in the mid-5s. And worst of all, I see Johan Santana winning the NL Cy Young and the Mets winning 94 games.
