PhoulBallz.com

Washington Nationals, you just had two consecutive 100+ loss seasons...what are you gonna do now? We're going to Beard-o World! On Monday, the Nationals signed Eric Bruntlett to a minor league contract with an invitation to spring training. Bruntlett batted .172 with a .462 OPS in 72 games for the Phillies in 2009. I hope Santa brought you something good, Nats fans, because your team sure as heck isn't going to. --------------------------------- Looking for a good way to spend those AmEx and Visa gift cards that you got for the holidays? Make sure you check out Chris Jaffe's book Evaluating Baseball's Managers, A History and Analysis of Performance in the Major Leagues, 1876–2008. Jaffe is a writer for HardballTimes.com . The book, just made available to the public, is a remarkable study of Major League managers throughout the history of the sport and applies a sabremetric approach to reviewing the performances of such great skippers as Connie Mack and Tommy Lasorda. ...

There was plenty of news in Phillies land on Monday. "Jay" Happ finished 2nd in NL Rookie of the Year voting, Eric Bruntlett will officially not return to the team next year and the Phils are reportedly a possibility for Pedro Martinez to return to next year. MLB announced that Chris Coghlan of the Marlins was the 2009 National League Rookie of the Year. Phillies pitcher "Jay" Happ finished second and was the only candidate who appear on all 32 submitted ballots. Coghlan, in fact, did not appear on seven ballots. Coghlan led NL rookies in batting avg. (.321), runs (84), hits (162), on base percentage (.390) and total bases (232). Happ had a 12-4 record and a 2.93 ERA for the National League Champions. Utility player Eric Bruntlett refused a minor league assignment from the Phillies and became a free agent on Monday. Bruntlett will forever have two claims to fame for the Phillies...1- scoring the winning run in the 2008 World Series...2- the unassisted game ending tr...

There were a couple surprises with the announcement of the Phillies' NLDS 25 man roster. Miguel Cairo is in, Eric Bruntlett is out. Based on Cairo's recent success and Bruntlett's season-long offensive struggles I feel it's the right call, but I didn't think Charlie Manuel would choose to advance without Bruntlett. Charlie always seemed to hold Bruntlett in high regard and many people thought Bruntlett's positional versatility and supposed speed would keep him there. That's not the case, and I was surprised. Also on the Phillies NLDS roster is Antonio Bastardo. The young lefty with less than 24 innings pitched in the majors made the roster over guys with years of experience like Clay Condrey, Tyler Walker and Jack Taschner. Bastardo is a hard throwing lefty, and that's what Manuel wanted for the bullpen. Kyle Kendrick also made the cut and will be in the Phils' bullpen. Kendrick earned a spot, posting a 3.00 ERA in his 5 September/October outings (2...

Eric Bruntlett, you've just gotten more hits than you've had in over a month and made history by executing a game ending unassisted triple play! What are you going to do next? I'm goin' to Beard-o World! Mr. Bruntlett, I am awarding you a one day pass. For Sunday's moment in time, I agree that for the next 24 hours you will not be deserving of what has become daily Bruntlett-Bashing online, on the radio, on television, in the news and at my office. You are still undeserving of being a Major League player, Eric Bruntlett, but for one day, I will not speak of it. ---------------------- Follow PhoulBallz.com on Twitter HERE !

There's a whole lot going on in Phillies land today! Pedro Martinez got his first win as a Phillie last night, over the Cubs. Pedro looked solid through his first 4 innings, but gave up 2 earned runs in the 5th inning. Pedro's complete line, after 99 pitches- 5 innings, 7 hits, 3 runs all earned, 1 walk, 5 k's. TheFightins has a review of the Victorino/Cubs fan/beer incident. NQTC offers some thoughts on Wrigley bleacher fans, last night's mishap and if the Cubs had anything to do with it. TricoSuave has a look at Shane's beer shower fun as well. The double A Reading Phillies' locker room reaction to the beer tossed into Shane's face: "Nice timing." Cubs manager Lou Piniella was disappointed that it happened, stating, "It’s not good sportsmanship. … We apologize to Victorino and the Phillies for that." Brett Myers threw two more simulated innings yesterday in Clearwater, FL. Myers is hoping to pitch a rehab assignment soon. Phillies o...

Everyone's least favorite Phillie is back at it again. This time the "I've got a sweet beard, so who cares about hitting?" ball player looks even worse after Marlins pitcher Josh Johnson hit his third homerun of the season on Tuesday. Johnson in 2009- 7-for-44, .159 avg, 3 HR, 9 RBI, .577 OPS Bruntlett in 2009- 11-for-83, .133 avg, 0 HR, 6 RBI, .407 OPS In fact, I counted at least a dozen starting ML pitchers who currently have a higher OPS than Eric Bruntlett, this year. The Phillies have to possess at least one minor leaguer who could back up the infield positions and hit for a batting average higher than .133. If nothing is done, it would be as if the team is not trying. --------------------- Congratulations go out to Anthony Gose who set the Lakewood BlueClaws single season stolen base record on Tuesday night by stealing his 59th and 60th bases of the season. The previous record was 59, set by Chris Roberson in 2003. Gose is 60-for-77 in stolen base attempts (78%)...

Links for today from around my bloggerhood... Amanda talks about Ruben Amaro's top 10 moves as Phillies GM, over on PhilliesNation . Late Night with Jimmy Fallon's got a good blog. Here they review funny names in the sport of baseball. Minor league media head Mike Ashmore covered two double headers yesterday in NJ. Read his live blog from the quadruple header right here . Not sure if it's streaming all day, but PhoulBallz.com is fully in the mix on Slugtrail Radio's podcast that was recorded last night. If you like prank calls, random discussion and sports talk...check that out here . SI has a photo list of most recent MLB no hitters by team. Check that out here . Lakewood coach Bob Milacki was part of the Orioles' most recent no-no. David Murphy's got some quotes from Jason Donald on being traded. The Indians' triple A team, the Columbus Clippers, are visiting Lehigh's Coca Cola Park, so the trio of Donald, Lou Marson and Carlos Carrasco had a fast in...

While the Phillies are on a hot streak this month, one player on the team is not. Eric Bruntlett is 1-for-12 in July. Since the start of May, Bruntlett's apex in batting average has been .167 on June 14th. Bruntlett's ineptitude can be tolerated no longer. Get rid of this guy NOW! Eric B. is the 2009 Endy Chavez. Remember Endy...the guy who in 2005 managed just 2 hits in his final 42 games played as a Phillie? That is about the sort of output the Phillies are getting from Bruntlett, and it's time to fix this void. Julio Lugo was designated for assignment last week by the Red Sox and is expected to become a free agent. The Metropolitans are rumored to be interested. Why wouldn't the Phillies be interested in a guy who could surely outhit Bruntlett? Lugo was hitting .284 through 37 games played this season with Boston. Suspended Lehigh Valley IronPig Pablo Ozuna is eligible to return next Wednesday. Ozuna is batting .294 through 51 games at triple A. Miguel Cairo is also...

The Phillies followed up their 22 run explosion on Monday night with a Will-Ferrell-TV-adaptation-like dud in game 2 of the series against the Reds. Plenty of hits in the game, by our Phils, but failure to hit with runners in scoring position left the team short in the end, and they lost 4-3. The Phillies were 1-for-12 with runners in scoring position, including 0-for-5 with a runner on 3rd base with less than 2 outs, and they left 12 runners on base. Brad Lidge continued to resemble the exact opposite of the 2008 version of himself. His 7.12 ERA has him sitting as the second worst reliever in MLB this season. Only former National and current Pirate Joel Hanrahan has pitched over 20 relief innings and has worse statistics than Lidge. Hanrahan's ERA is 7.97. Oh, and hey...Michael Taylor, what do you think of Eric Bruntlett's contributions this season (.141 batting avg. in 45 games played)? ----- Don't forget that Fox Sports 1310AM's web feed is active world wide. You sho...

Pedro Feliz fell asleep on the bases last night...again. During a potential Phillies rally in the 6th inning, a mental lapse by Feliz prevented the Phillies from scoring on a fly out to centerfield by Eric Bruntlett. Feliz, was on first base, while Matt Stairs was on third base, forgot there was only one out, got too far off first and was doubled off, on a throw by BJ Upton, before Stairs could score on a sacrfice fly. Did you notice the part earlier when I mentioned "again"? Yeah, well Feliz pulled this same pile of horse crap in the first game of a double header with the wild card leading Brewers last September. The Phillies won that game, and swept the series, so Feliz's mental slacking never made the impact it would have if it had killed a rally or cost the team a run, like last night. The game on September 14th was a similar enough situation, with Feliz on first base, in the midst of a rally. A routine fly out to Milwaukee right fielder Cory Hart turned into an embar...

Join PhoulBallz.com at the On-deck Series this Saturday, at Citizens Bank Park. You'll get a super sweet schedule magnet, see Pat Burrell in an opposing uniform and you'll get to check out Cole Hamels in his last spring start. Charlie Manuel announced today that Colbert is definitely out as opening night starter against the Braves. He also announced that Jamie Moyer will start game 2, at home Tuesday night, 4/7. Two key details about the pitching rotation have yet to be made known to the public. 1- Who will start opening night, Brett Myers or Joe Blanton? 2- Who will be the 5th starter, Chan Ho Park or "Jay" Happ? Park made his final start of the spring today. Happ will pitch Thursday. Considering our Phils have 3 days off in the first 10 days of the season, they wouldn't need to use a fifth starter till Monday, April 20th, or so. Among today's roster moves, Marcus Giles was released. Giles told reporters, "I got every chance in the world. It's not th...

Game WON of the 2008 World Series is in the books. On this night, the Phillies won their 100th game of the year and lead the series, 1-0. There's nothing much better than Cole Hamels putting all the silly cowbell chimers on the HUSH setting, down in Tropicana Field. Hamels now has 5 earned runs allowed in 29 post season innings this year. That is a 1.55 ERA. I really can't think of anything more phun to watch than Cole Hamels these days. Our Phillies got off to a hot start in the 1st inning when, following a Jayson Werth walk, Chase Utley (AKA- Chutley) hit a blast to deep right field for a homerun. This gave Philadelphia a lead which they would not let up. Utley went on to add another base hit and two steals in his World Series debut. It just wouldn't be the Phoul Ballz if I didn't toss some negativity at you all. I need to take the time to critique the non-move in the top of the 9th inning where, against a right handed pitcher and with 2 runners on, Charl...

Your statement of the week is not really to ponder. It's an assertion that should just be printed out and shoved in the face of Charlie Manual. The Phillies' right handed bats off the bench are lacking, and the team needs help. Eric Bruntlett, who somehow gets starts at 3rd base, for the injured Pedro Feliz, against right handed pitchers instead of Greg Dobbs, is hitting a juicy .218 (41 for 188) this year. Bruntlett has 7 doubles, 2 homers and 13 RBI this season with a .601 OPS. Bruntlett has only 1 RBI since May 8th. Yes, ONE run batted in, in more than 3 months. Bruntlett has a .205 batting average vs. righties. By comparison, Dobbs, a lefty, has already set the Phillies' single season record for pinch hits in a season, with 21. Dobbs against righties is hitting .311. Another righty off the bench is So Taguchi. In 73 games, this year, So is batting .221 (17 for 77) with 5 doubles, no homers, 6 RBI and a .571 OPS. Taguchi has 1 extra base hit since May 26th. ...