Hypocritical pitching rant

Among the universal gushing of all things Roy Halladay, one story stuck out for me today: Paul Hagen: Will workload catch up to Halladay?

I have no problem with someone questioning the Phillies committing so much to a pitcher who will soon be 33 and has more than 2,000 innings on his tires, but the Doc has shown no signs of injury or slowdown. He has averaged 32 starts a year for the past four seasons.

I just question the timing of this story. It would have been totally appropriate at the time the deal was announced or if he has a prolonged slump during the season, but why write it the day after his first spring training start?

Although, Hagen, who presumably has better sources than I do, did report:

He turns 33 in May. That's not ancient, but he clearly has a lot of mileage on his arm and shoulder. According to baseball sources, at least one team that was interested in trading for him backed off because of red flags raised by its medical staff.

So that's it. Cancel the SoxandPhils World Series. Halladay will break down, and the Red Sox will have to settle for a rematch of the 1975 World Series against the Reds this October.

Incidentally, I just noticed that Roy Halladay, the grizzled veteran with "a lot of mileage on his arm," is two weeks younger than me. I promised Christine I wouldn't harp on my own age, so I'll get to the hypocritical part of this post.

After ripping Hagen for prematurely worrying about a Phillies pitcher, I'm going to prematurely worry about a Phillies pitcher whose turnaround from last spring training has been the story of the Phillies camp so far.

Cole Hamels made his first start today, mixing in six cutters and four curveballs among his 32 pitches. I started worrying about him the other day. Everyone knocked him for lacking a third pitch, but what if he is going too far and has too many pitches for his own good? He is copying Jon Lester's cutter, but what if he doesn't stop there and picks up the knuckleball from Tim Wakefield or the gyroball from Daisuke Matsuzaka? I sense trouble.

(By the way, did Todd Zolecki purposely pick the picture in his post?)

Similarly, young Cole was knocked for being unprepared last spring. He made sure that wasn't repeated this year, but what if he went too far and is overly prepared?

I sense disaster. Neither of the vaunted Halladay-Hamels duo will pitch in April, and the rotation is going to be topped by Jamie Moyer and Jose Contreras.

I apologize for this post - sometimes I wander. I'll finish this off and watch some of this thrilling Cactus League game between the Reds and Indians.