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5th spot, Wall, Old timers, Links

The race for the Phillies' fifth starter spot is still on. While it's not fully fair to compare Grapefruit League stats, when some of the pitchers have had "B game" and scrimmage outings mixed in, Kyle Kendrick and Carlos Carrasco look to be falling behind Chan Ho Park and "Jay" Happ. Happ added to his solid Grapefruit League stats (2.45 ERA, 1.09 WHIP in 4 games) today against the Rays. Pitching coach Rich Dubee had been displeased with Kendrick even before he surrendered 8 earned runs in 3 innings of work yesterday against the Braves.

Park has been working on improving his change up, with (Coach) Jamie Moyer. Park noticed Moyer's location control on his change, so he sought out Moyer to teach him the grip and positioning of the ball. Moyer, of course, feels good about helping anyone on the Phils' staff. Park has been coached by greats like Nolan Ryan with the Rangers and Sandy Koufax with the Dodgers, so Moyer is in great company. Park is working hard, and skipped the World Baseball Classic to focus on earning a spot in the rotation.

Park explained to Scott Palmer of Phillies.com, this week, the importance to South Korea for Chan Ho to earn that starting spot. He described hard financial times in his country, much like we have here in the US, and stated that fans there would feel a big boost in excitement if one of their countrymen were to be scheduled to start a Major League Baseball game every 5 days.

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The Phillies have begun voting for this year's Phillies Wall of Fame inductee. Voting began today on Phillies.com and runs through March 26th. The top five vote getters from the following list will make the final ballot, form which the Wall of Fame selection committee will choose this year's entrant. Here are the choices...


  • Jack Baldschun
  • Ricky Bottalico
  • Larry Christensen
  • Darren Daulton
  • Lenny Dykstra
  • Gene Garber
  • Doug Glanville
  • Greg Gross
  • Jim Fregosi
  • Von Hayes
  • Jim Konstanty
  • John Kruk
  • Fred Luderus
  • Roy Thomas
  • Rick Wise

In an effort to answer that question you were just thinking, here is exactly who the heck Jack Baldschun is- Baldschun was a relief pitcher in the early 1960's. In 333 games with our Phillies, he had 59 saves and a 3.18 ERA, over 5 seasons.

Oh, that other question- Fred Luderus played first base for our Phillies for over 9 years and played for the 1915 NL Pennant winning team. Luderus was a rookie for the Cubs in 1909, joined the Phils in 1910, and manned first base until 1920. In his career, Luderus had over 1,300 hits. His best season was 1911, when he had 16 HR, 99 RBI and a .301 batting avg.

And that 3rd question you all had- Roy Thomas was a Phillie from 1899-1908, then again from 1910-1911. Thomas was mainly an outfielder, although he did play a little first base and pitched in a ML game once. He was a .290 career hitter with over 1500 hits in 13 seasons. Thomas had only 7 career homers.

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Scott Lauber and Chuck Gormley have a touching story of Marcus Giles getting tattoos, this week, to honor some lost loved ones. Check out the link.

More on Kendrick, Park, plus walk rates and the bullpen today, over at PhilliesFlow. Take a look.

"The Howard" may be the most note worthy non-news I've seen in a while. Perhaps those guys should be GM's.

Comments

Jersey Hardball said…
I think the Phils would be best suited to use Park out of the pen, i think he's reached the point where he's only effective maybe one time through the batting order.
IRONPIGPEN said…
I think its a two horse race between Park and Happ now.

I wonder how important Happ's left arm is to bullpen...

Nice bit about importance to Koreans. Lady who owns corner store down the street from work is Korean and she likes baseball.

She is pleased they dumped Japan for the Pool A title 1-0
Jersey Hardball said…
I like what Chan Ho has been doing this spring.
GM-Carson said…
We like to think "we should be gm's". Glad to know at least one other person thinks it.
GM-Carson said…
More Hardball wants to know who has the hottest fans in baseball. We've be running a set of posts over the past month or so featuring images of each teams' hotties, with a voting poll to crown a champion. Each division in each league has been decided so now it's time for the playoffs. In both the American and National League we have Los Angeles versus Chicago...cat fight! Also featured is a good old fashioned ho-down between Beantown and Oakland. Lets not forget about the City of Brother Love against "Houston we have a problem"...let the games begin!

Link: http://morehardball.blogspot.com/2009/03/hottest-fan-in-mlb-divisional-series.html

We'd appreciate the plug if you're so inclined.

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