Comments on: Rays, Burrell Agree To 2Y/$16M Contract

By: Don M

Don M — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 21:59:25 +0000

Dubee gets a lot of credit from those within the organization.. so lets not sell him short, and give all the praise to Moyer as a pitching coach. Its just that he is a guy with lots of know-how, and not only can he talk the talk, but he walks the walk..(without walking many…)

So I think guys tend to talk to Moyer so much because he’s a PEER instead of sittng with the coaches all game long… I think Moyer will be a pitching coach.. and I’d like to see if Maddux becomes a pitching coach in the big leagues because I really admire the way he outsmarted hitters instead of overpowered them.. its a great game, this baseball

By: Georgie

Georgie — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 21:53:32 +0000

Yeah Richie, I agree, the Moyer signing doesn’t bother me one bit, he is invaluable for his pitching knowledge alone, especially with young pitchers coming up. I can’t count the times I saw Cole, Kendrick, even Myers, talking in depth to Jamie in the dugout. I think he is also very grounded and mentally stable, which helps with the likes of Myers.

BTW, I’m watching the2nd game of the ws on MLB, Joe Buck could call his bowel movements with more enthusiasm!

By: RichieAllen

RichieAllen — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 18:27:34 +0000

Yesterday Way up in the blog I meant maybe we could have signed LOWE not LOWELL with the savings of Burrell (at 2 yrs 8 mil per yr)over Ibanez .Sorry for the confusion.My alzheimers kicking in..some of you read my mind anyway,and knew what I meant.(what a great blog ).

But today I think maybe we are ok in what we did…just remember Lowe is 36 not 26 and wants quite a bit more than Moyer got.And I think Ibanez deserves a chance.
Moyer not only is a good 5-6 inning pitcher with our infield defence,but he’s a great mentor to our young guys.

Its the Moyer mentoring that is the key here.Dont discount this .I remember Hamels and Myers and other guys would always go to Moyer at the end of an inning pitched..not Dubee.It had to have made a difference last year.

By: Don M

Don M — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 17:44:27 +0000

Ibanez would be gone if we didn’t sign him when we did.. Garret Anderson has been banged up the past few seasons.. I think bad knees?? So he’s a DH-type.

I think that Madson has established himself as the 8th inning guy.. you hopefully get 6 from your starters… which leaves you with Scott Eyre- Chad Durbin… or maybe Chan Ho Park, etc.. instead of Romero.. who is really only a situational LHP anyway… Eyre can do that job

Happ is a starter.. they only had him in the bullpen so that he was on the roster in case someone got ROCKED, or hurt.. or something so they needed a pitcher to throw 4-5 innings

By: Mike B.

Mike B. — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 17:35:54 +0000

At the same time though, I don’t know if the Phillies could have afforded to wait for Ibanez. I remember Tim reporting here that the Mets and Cubs were pursuing Ibanez. That would have been crushing enough if the Mets had signed him; the whole Romero mess makes it worse because then we only have one proven (Happ is an unknown quantity in Romero’s late-innings role) LHP in the bullpen. Which makes me wonder whether Amaro considered the possibility that Romero would be suspended. Remember how he told that crowd that 36-year-old Garrett Anderson was “too old” to sign? Ibanez is the same age, folks (although he’s been in a lot better shape than Anderson *knocks wood*).

More likely the Utley injury changed everything. Think about it – Chase normally spends the offseason bulking up to gain back the 15-20 pounds that he loses over the course of the season due to his tense play. Because he’s rehabbing his hip, he probably can’t get into his normal routine for gaining this weight; instead he has to rehab his hip. Chances are he won’t be swinging the bat as well this season; he might come in out of shape – I see a ghastly .260 15 HR 67 RBI campaign because of this.

Basically, if Chase doesn’t come back swinging the bat well, Charlie almost definitely won’t bat him 3-4-5 unless everyone else sucks so badly that we’ve no choice, because Charlie won’t put a struggling lefthander amidst two other lefthanders (one of whom may also be struggling if we see the 2007-08 Ryan Howard) in the lineup.

Maybe Moyer happened too soon, but Ibanez needed to happen. I could be wrong about Utley and Romero factoring into the signing, but I’m reasonably sure about Utley being a factor. I don’t trust Ibanez, probably because I’ve never seen him play, but he was cheaper than Burrell was at the time. I’ll miss Pat, but he wasn’t going to cut it versus K-Rod and Putz.

I can tell you this – either Jenkins or Stairs will go. Both had huge moments in the postseason…but I fear that Stairs will be the one to go because of Jenkins’ salary making him so hard to move. Still, one of them needs to be traded to make room for a right-handed bat off the bench.

By: Geoff

Geoff — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 16:11:26 +0000

Minaya is a huge joke…now I read theyre backing off of Lowe and pursuing Randy Wolf! The Mets are trying to sign Randy Wolf! HAHAHAHAH. Rnady Wolf sucks…Minaya is worse than I thought…

Ibanez, like I said, is ao good signing even if its a little over what they couldnt gotten him for. moyer…again, valuable to the team, but they did it too early…i feel they couldve waited until mid-january with moyer and still signed him. way too early. but oh well..they still have to bring in another pitcher, starting or relief, to fill the roster spot vacated by romero.

maybe you can move happ to left-handed relief and bring in a starter…gotta look at the left handed relievers out there..

By: Don M

Don M — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 16:00:20 +0000

The thing is that you never know what other teams are going to do.. Did anyone honestly think that this 5 weeks from Spring Training, Lowe, Manny, Abreu, Dunn, etc.. would all still be available????

Teams were waiting to see who would do what, and the Phillies decided to go get the player they wanted in Ibanez.. who is BETTER than Pat Burrell… maybe that 3rd year won’t be great, but hoepfully one of the young prospects will be ready by then, if not, we’ll be glad we have a 3rd year of Ibanez..

WHY THE FUKC … do I have to read comments from METS fans ON HERE… saying that they are sick of Phillies fans complaining and talking smack about them???? Seriously..

Any baseball fan knows that Omar Minaya is a JOKE, and instead of signing puzzle-pieces that compliment what he already has… he just tries to start new puzzles.. BOTH GMs in NY suck… With $150 M in payroll, I could do a better job than they do

By: Geoff

Geoff — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 15:01:02 +0000

Just because they moved a little early and overpaid a bit doesnt make it a bad signing….its still a good signing, Ibanez, at least…the moyer signing might be too early though.

By: Phil

Phil — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 14:47:32 +0000

To all of those people freaking out about this and throwing Ibanez and Amaro under the bus I say this to you: When Ibanez hits 25 homers bats around .300 and hits 120 RBIs you won’t be crying anymore. He will be worth every penny, and he won’t have to come out in the 7th inning. Burrell came out so often because of his bad feet, not defense. Yes, I’d rather have Burrell for 2 years and $16 million over Ibanez’s 3 years 31.5 million, but Amaro jumped the gun to get the guy he wanted, and I don’t blame him for that. Several teams sought after Ibanez, and Amaro made sure he got him, and I’m okay with that. The Angels would have paid more than 3 years $31.5 million if they knew they were going to lose out on Tex, so this works out fine for us.

By: Pat

Pat — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 11:02:53 +0000

Yo guys, just want to point something out. It happens more so in the NBA but a lot of players give a discount to Florida teams because of the tax implications. 2 years 16 mil to the rays doesn’t necessarily equal 2 years 16 mil for the Phils. Of course I’d rather have Pat over Ibanez @ the 2 years 22 mil but there’s no way we’d have done that. I know we’re the champs but don’t ever forget we’re still the Phillies.