Quick update

So the Phillies did pull off a win today. Jayson Werth, I think, continues to be the unsung hero of this 2008 team. I'm glad to have him around. Today he drove in four runs and hit two homers in a 5-2 win over the Cubs.

The stupid Mets are winning again. Come on Marlins, no more choking until this series is over. We need to pick up a game sometime.

The Phils released Kris Benson. I'm sure the Daily News is sorry that Anna never made it to town.

Fabio Castro seems to be the player to be named later in the Matt Stairs deal. Incidentally, Greg has been so busy working, he forgot that Stairs was on the Red Sox in 1995.

Red Sox: Won yesterday, winning again tonight against the White Sox. Top prospect Michael Bowden made the start and gave up two runs on seven hits in his five-inning major league debut. What a surprise, the Rays won as well. Wild Card lead is still at 2.5 games.

[Photo credit: Associated Press]

Somehow, the bullpen didn't blow it

I'm hoping that the Phillies have one of their patented offensive explosions on Wednesday because the back end of this bullpen is getting a little beat. Tom Gordon and Brad Lidge made it interesting in the 8th and 9th innings tonight, but they managed to get out of their respective innings with minimal damage, giving the team a 3-2 victory over the Reds.

Neither Gordon nor Lidge was sharp tonight. Gordon allowed a lead-off triple, which scored on a sacrifice fly, before facing pinch-hitter Ken Griffey Jr. Griffey came out to a nice ovation from the fans but didn't hit No. 600, as he walked on four pitches. Flash then managed to get out the next two batters. Lidge also faced only five batters, but it felt like a lot more - maybe because of his 20 pitches, only nine were strikes.

Adam Eaton pitched well again, his third good start in a row. Good thing too, considering that Kris Benson can't stay healthy.

Chase Utley continued his hot streak by going 2-for-3 with a walk, a RBI and a run. Baseball's infatuation with the second baseman is reaching new levels every day; I've run out of adjectives to describe his play right now. He continues to lead the NL in all-star voting and is second in baseball behind only David Ortiz. (Theo Epstein swears that Ortiz will be OK, but he'll still be out for at least two to three weeks and won't be playing in the Philadelphia series.)

[I hadn't considered that aspect of his injury.]

But come on, Phillies fans, where's the ballot-box stuffing for Pat Burrell? He added another two RBIs tonight with his 6th inning home run. He continues to rank sixth in outfield voting, trailing undeserving players like Griffey and his lofty .255 batting average, non-home-plate-touching cheater Matt Holliday, and whiny, unoriginal Met Carlos Beltran. Show Pat the Bat some love (eww, not like that) and throw some votes his way. (Josh Hamilton, too. I'm a sucker for a good comeback story like his.)

The Phillies lead in the division is now 2.5 games, after the Braves came back to beat the Marlins.

Meanwhile, the Red Sox also staged a comeback tonight to beat the Rays 7-4. The Sox now trail in the division by only half a game and are 22-5 at home this year. Which means they're 14-20 on the road. So two weeks from now, there might be some pretty spirited conversations and blogging going on around here. We counted out to the possible starting pitchers - Moyer, Kendrick and Eaton vs. Lester, Colon and Wakefield. Well, it's not as bad as some past pitching match-ups that we've been witness to. Check back later in the week as we reminisce over the last 10 years of Phillies-Red Sox interleague games.

A season begins

By the time you read this on Tuesday, the Red Sox, favored by many to repeat as World Champions, will have begun their title defense in Japan. Still seems odd to be opening a week before everyone else in a game that requires an early alarm clock to watch.

As part of another cheesy ESPN feature - comparing the impending season to the presidential campaign - Jayson Stark has a good read on how the Red Sox have gone from cursed to powerhouse.

"The thing about this team is, we don't just want to win one," Youkilis says with a laugh. "We want to try to catch Yogi."

Of more immediate concern, however, is a feud brewing between Phillies pitchers Brad Lidge and Kris Benson and the cast of The Andy Griffith Show. The Phils injured pitchers (I told you Lidge wouldn't be ready for Opening Day) are blaming a mound for their troubles. That caused Phillies Florida operations groundskeeper Ron Cheek, and his boss, older brother Opie Cheek, to let loose on complaining Phillies over the years.

They even throw Curt Schilling under the bus. It's a very funny story - I can't believe it didn't get any attention last week. But I don't like the tenor of Benson and Lidge; they're starting to sound like whiners.

Boycott over, on with the picks

I thought I'd have to boycott posting as a sort of sympathy strike for the Red Sox, but the coaches will be paid, the team is headed to Japan and everyone is as happy as the monkeys Kris and Anna Benson just bought.

So, on with the picks. Today it's Joe Wolf's Vertical Jump, the creator of Only Time Will Tell. {Joe Wolf's Vertical Jump is still in denial that his team is now called the Nationals}:

NL East: Expos
NL Central: Cubs
NL West: D'backs
NL Wild Card: Mets

AL East: Red Sox
AL Central: Tigers
AL West: M's
AL Wild Card: Yankees

World Series: Tigers over D'backs 4-2

AL MVP: Grady Sizemore, Indians
AL Cy Young: Justin Verlander, Tigers
AL ROY: Joba Chamberlain, Yankees

NL MVP: Jose Reyes, Mets
NL Cy Young: Dan Haren, D'backs
NL ROY: Clayton Kershaw , Dodgers

First manager fired: Willie Randolph, Mets start the season 4-11 and Willie is looking for a job.
First team with a player suspended for drugs: "I'm not here to talk about the past."
Next team to be rumored to sign Bonds or Clemens: Newark Bears

My NL East prediction is correct because: Youppi endorses the hard hitting lineup of Milledge, Dukes and Young. They will do a lot of damage both on and off the field.

Tomorrow: We'll change back to the Phillies perspective with Brian.

The season has begun

Well, the roller coaster emotions that accompany it have started, anyway. Especially when it comes to ace Josh Beckett.

First, the Globe reports he is feeling better (back and crankiness) than yesterday:

"Better today than I was yesterday. I got a good night's sleep."

But then Terry Francona tells ESPN's Jayson Stark there's no telling whether Beckett will be on the mound in Tokyo:

"I don't think we know [for sure] yet. But we're certainly not going to rush him back to pitch a game March 24 if he's not ready."

Beckett had a day of good treatment today, Francona told Stark. Still, the manager was cautious. “The idea is just to give Beckett the respect to get better when he gets better," Francona told ESPN.

I guess I've pretty much resigned myself that he won't pitch until the Red Sox play the A's on American soil. Argh.

(And if you think I'm bad already, Christine will be more emotional during the season. Promise.)

The news has been better out of Phillies camp, where the headlines lately say: Brad Lidge should be ready by Opening Day, Kris Benson has a shot to open the season in the majors and Brett Myers leads the rotation.


Not without a prescription: For hours the Globe promised interesting comments from Mike Greenwell, who visited camp today. I guess they were interesting, but I think they were oversold. They involve steroids:

The truth? My wife's a nurse and basically told me she'd kill me if she caught me doing it. Really. Reality.

She was a nurse. I looked into it. I studied it. I know a lot about steroids, to be honest with you. Because I was very, very tempted as a player to do it and I think there's many, many players out there that were tempted to do it. Probably if I didn't have my wife I would have done it to try to perform at that level. Another little slight reason I retired when I retired. I just didn't feel like it was quite even anymore.

Uh-oh

I woke up cranky enough because I overslept. To make things worse, I then read Josh Beckett left a spring training game because of back spasms. I don't have to say that losing Beckett for any major stretch would be catastrophic.

He came to Boston with a reputation for not being able to hold up for a full season. But in his two seasons with the Red Sox, he has averaged more than 30 starts and 200 innings - marks he never reached with Florida.

Hopefully, he will be ready to go in Japan in little more than two weeks. Terry Francona is optimistic but vague:

Sox manager Terry Francona had a good report on Josh Beckett who left Saturday's game with back spasms after throwing six warm-up pitches. The manager said Beckett "looked way better than we expected,'' but would not commit as to whether Beckett would be ready for the opener in Japan.

More bad news on the pitching front: Clay Buchholz continues to impersonate Adam Eaton this spring, but there is hope it's just a mechanical problem. Speaking of the $24 million dollar man, the candidates to replace him haven't exactly been jumping at the opportunity, but Kris Benson threw all of his four pitches in a minor league game, topping out at 88 mph, giving himself a shot of opening the season in Philadelphia.

Meanwhile, opening day starter Brett Myers continues to exhibit class with a new T-shirt that reads: "You mess with me, you mess with the whole trailer park."

Real class: Thanks to punks such as Cole Hamels and Jonathan Papelbon, it is a story when athletes such as Beckett or Jimmy Rollins care more about winning than money. Rollins took a gamble in 2005 with a five-year, $40 million contract. At the time it was debatable whether the Phillies overpaid. After an MVP season, they have underpaid, but J-Roll doesn't gripe:

I knew there was a chance I would play better and the Phillies would be getting a little bit of a bargain. But there was also a chance I wouldn't produce as much. I knew the market could change after I signed it. I knew all that when I signed.

That column reads like a text the new wave of players should read to learn how to portray themselves and their pay in the press.

Baseball Mogul update: Despite another 90+ win season, I won't be making the playoffs for the first time. I don't know what happened, other than the Braves, D-Backs and Dodgers had better years. I need better starting pitching - it would help if Cole Hamels stopped pining to be a Royal.

Baby shower update: We had a good time yesterday. I learned that it's harder than it looks to drink out of a sippy cup. Don't ask.

Now one of them can shut up

As I recommended, Jonathan Papelbon signed a contract in between the $550,000 Bobby Jenks signed for, but not quite the $900,000 Ryan Howard got a year ago. There seems to be no squawking from Paps tonight - hopefully a sign that he's clamming up to focus on getting ready for the repeat.

It's kind of interesting the hierarchy the Sox placed on their pre-arbitration players (especially since Delcarmen's been around longer than any of them):

Papelbon - $775,000 plus $25,000 All-Star bonus
ROY Dustin Pedroia - $457,000
Jon Lester - $421,500
Manny Delcarmen - $421,000
Jacoby Ellsbury $406,000
Clay Buchholz - $396,000

Scary lede:

Look at Chuck LaMar, and what do you see?

The man who traded Bobby Abreu for Kevin Stocker? The man who gave Greg Vaughn $34 million? The man who captained a ship in Tampa Bay that took on water as quickly as he could bail it out?

Also: The Inquirer has a good piece dispelling the notion that strikeouts kill offense. It's nice when a sportswriter doesn't blindly adhere to old school principles and keeps an open mind to sabermetrics. I have a healthy respect for statheads; I just wish I understood them better.

Spring training update: Adam Eaton still stinks. Get healthy soon Kris Benson!

(s)He's coming ...

Camps for the Sox and Phils have been relatively quiet save for Curt's injury and the speculation over Ryan Howard's contract.

We could, however, see a shakeup soon as Kris Bensen is supposed to arrive today. Todd Zolecki has no word whether Anna is coming with him.

The big stories of the day include a puff piece on Tim Wakefield, noting how his two selfless acts - sacrificing an ALCS start to save the bullpen in '04 and giving up a spot on the World Series roster in '07 because of uncertain health - helped win championships. We also get a brief Phils connection with former Sox manager and current Phillies bench coach Jimy Williams.

I've always felt like the team came first. I remember Jimy Williams telling me one time, 'Wake, when you finally leave this game, the only thing you're going to take with you is your reputation.' It makes a lot of sense. The numbers aren't going to mean anything.

The thing that I want to take away from this game when I do leave, whenever that may be, is, was I a good teammate? I think that's the most important thing to me. Was I a good teammate? Was I helpful to the young kids? Was I a leader as a veteran? Things like that. Those are important to me.

Over in Clearwater, Ryan Howard didn't get to host his press conference, but he still spoke, saying all the right things.

I'm focused on trying to come out here and get better and get ready for the season. All the other stuff, all the outside stuff, that's outside. I'm here. I'm working. I'm going to try to be the best I can for the team.

It's nice that our players don't have to be answering for the actions of their teammates.

Oops: The little Benson blurb notes how Ryan Howard and Prince Fielder are bad fielders. In my Baseball Mogul game (haven't played much lately) I did sign Fielder to bring some youth and right-hand balance to the Utley-Howard heart of the order. But Fielder's a lefty - guess I have the picture of his dad engrained in my memory. Oh well, we'll roll with the three stud lefties, then see if we can get a good righty for Howard next year.

Pitchers: Good, bad & ugly

So the battle to be the caboose of the Phils starting rotation is starting to shape up. It looks like the bane of last year's pitching staff, Adam Eaton, the $7 million man, will get the first shot.

He's not exactly instilling confidence that he'll be better or that he understands how bad last year was for him.

"I think we're all pitching for a job to some degree. I think they're making the pitching staff as strong as they can. Last year, we had six starters, and it turned out we had injuries. They learned. We all learned. Pitching depth is a factor in getting to the postseason. I think I'm a part of that factor. I'm going to go out and do my job."

Yeah, he's going to be a factor. One of six. Hopefully we've seen his worst.

"Last year was my worst year as a baseball player, so I'd like to forget it and move on. But obviously, you need to learn from your failures and need to correct some things and move forward."

If he falters again, the newest Phil, Kris Benson, should be ready to replace him midseason, which means, assuming he's fully healed from that little rotator cuff surgery, we'll see a league-average pitcher replacing a poor one.

Let's hope Cole Hamels can stay healthy (he promises he will) so these two dregs aren't called upon to be anything more than the fifth starter.

Benson's arrival, with his wife Anna, will be interesting. Among the other traits she brings to Philly, Anna doesn't like PETA. It'll be fun to see how she fits in with a decidedly pro-animal environment. Consider:

-- Mrs. Utley volunteers with the SPCA and rescues abused and maimed animals.
-- Pat Burrell has a bull dog named Elvis. Every year he dresses Elvis in a jersey and trots him out on the field for father-child day.
-- J-Roll has a couple of dogs too.

So if Jen Utley runs the Bensons out of town and Adam Eaton remains Adam Eaton, the Phils could need another starter.

I hear that Roidger Clemens could be available - he's sworn to Congress he didn't do roids so that should settle that. Jeez, give the guy a break, he wore "USA" across his chest for the country. That little conversation Andy Pettitte "misremembered" was really a show Clemens watched about some old guys taking HGH.

MSNBC's post-game summed it up well. Actually, all the pregame this week also said the same thing: "We learned nothing new. Clearly, one of these men is lying."

Baseball's back

Lots of baseball to ponder while I try to order tickets for the champs' June invasion of Philadelphia.

Johan's officially a Met. Santana, usually dominant in the second half of the season, actually started preparing in 2007 for his new team, which had a historic collapse last year:

"Santana, a two-time AL Cy Young Award winner, was just 15-13 last year and lost seven of his last 11 decisions as his ERA rose from 2.60 to 3.33 ERA, his highest since 2001. He allowed a career-high 33 homers , the most in the AL."

His new teammate, David Wright, isn't saying anything stupid, but it seems '07 will linger a bit in the Queens.

"Somewhat it allows us to officially, kind of completely shut the book on '07. It kind of takes away from, I guess, kind of the aura of what happened at the end of last year. We can kind of put that behind us. And when your superstars have a fresh attitude, looking ahead rather than behind, I think that that rubs off on the rest of the team."

Meanwhile, the Phillies won't let the Santana signing go unanswered. They're interested in Kris Benson. When did Chuck LaMar become a scout for the Phillies? With Allan Baird working for the Red Sox, why are our teams stockpiling former small market GMs?

Looks like Pat the Bat's making the Hall of Fame. More interesting is that joining him will be the punter of the Super Bowl champs, Jeff Feagles, who might be my favorite football player right now. He's been fun to watch and listen to as he's enjoyed his first Super Bowl trip and victory after spending 20 years in the NFL.

But I'll always remember the old Nintendo classic Tecmo Super Bowl. The game didn't have license to use a few of the players' names, so there would be a random player called "LB 49ers" or something like that. I'd always get confused whether Feagles (then an Eagle) was real or fake.

Finally, this is disgusting. Baseball cards are supposed to be historical documents. Blech.