Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to participate in the excellent Phillies roundtable preview over at Crashburn Alley, but Bill Baer has encouraged the Phillies blogosphere to post their answers. Better late than never, right? Check ‘em out after the jump.

1. How concerned are you about Cole Hamels going into 2010?

Not even remotely. A look at Hamels’ peripherals tells you all you need to know. His strikeouts, walks, homers, GB/FB, FIP, xFIP, tERA…pick any of ‘em. They all stayed roughly the same or got better. The panic button was pressed way too early and way too often on Hamels. The only thing that annoys me is that when – not if – he bounces back, the lion’s share of the fans and media will attribute it to Halladay.

2. Give the Roy Halladay/Cliff Lee mega-trade between the Phillies, Blue Jays, and Mariners a letter grade and explain your grading process.

Do I think we could have gotten more for Cliff Lee? Yes, but I can’t know for sure. I do know we got a good deal for Doc, as much as it hurt to let Drabek and Taylor go. Bottom line, Lee was gone after the season, and Amaro rightly felt the need to restock the farm. I actually look at both Cliff Lee trades in my overall assessment. Effectively, we got half a season of Lee at a bargain rate, one season of Halladay at a bargain rate and 3-4 at roughly market value, and four years of control on Francisco for Drabek, Taylor, D’Arnaud, Knapp, Carrasco, Marson, and Donald. Ultimately, that should work out in our favor, especially if the package we sent to Cleveland ends up worthless, which I think it will.

3. What should the Phillies do about Jayson Werth and his impending free agency?

I love Jayson Werth. I love everything about him. I love his patience, his power, his defense, his attitude, his sunglasses, and yes, his glorious beard. If and when I ever actually have spare cash again, I am buying a Werth jersey, and I don’t care that he may be gone next season. I’ll still root for him wherever he goes, except maybe the Yankees. (I mean, beyond the obvious: First Giambi, then Damon, now Werth? When will the facial hair tyranny end?!) All that said, I know there are logical reasons to let him go. In a perfect world, we could sign him, trade Ibanez/Howard and figure things out from there. In a really perfect world, we wouldn’t have given Ibanez a third year or no-trade protection. Amaro could keep Werth by getting creative, but something tells me this is what’s going to go down: Brown will tear the minors apart while Werth puts up another monster season, and Amaro will take the easy way out, let him walk, and extend Howard. All I know for sure is I’m going to enjoy the hell out of having my favorite player on my favorite team as much as possible, because odds are I won’t have that luxury in nine months.

4. Jimmy Rollins says he wants to hit .300, accrue 200 hits, score 150 runs, steal 50 bases, and commit 3 or fewer errors. Give us your AVG, H, R, SB, and E predictions for Rollins in 2010.

.270, 179 hits, 118 runs, 38 steals, eight errors. The 200 hits is a realistic goal, but I don’t think he can attain any of those other figures. Know how many players have scored 150 runs in the past 60 years? Jeff Bagwell. That’s how many. Three errors? Maybe if he only plays half the season.

5. Is the duo of Ryan Madson and Danys Baez reliable back-up for ailing closer Brad Lidge?

Madson is. I was in the vast minority of people who hated the Lidge deal the minute it was signed. Paying closers eight figures is a bad idea, and we got a harsh lesson in that reality in 2009. That’s $12 million we could be giving to Werth next year. The whole idea of a closer irritates me, honestly. Use your best reliever in the highest-leveraged situations, not automatically with a three-run lead and the bases empty in the ninth. The save is the worst statistic in the history of baseball, and I will not argue about this. I understand the benefit of defined roles – though I’ve been meaning to look into whether or not that has any quantifiable effect – but you can have defined roles without being totally rigid.

6. Which team in the NL East worries you the most?

The Braves, and it isn’t particularly close. They lost Vazquez, but I expect Lowe and Hudson to come back strong. Wagner and Saito may be old, but they’re still effective, and if they get hurt, well, that’s business as usual at the back end of the Braves bullpen. I’m no Jason Heyward fanboy, but the kid looks like a stud. I think Chipper Jones has another big year left in him. I like Martin Prado and love Yunel Escobar. Troy Glaus could be dangerous. There are plenty of question marks about the Braves, but enough right answers could make them a serious threat to our East crown defense.

Teams have been approaching Ryan Howard with a steady diet of left-handed pitching and breaking balls and by employing the shift on the right side of the field. Will this trend continue in 2010, or will Howard make the appropriate adjustments?

Of course it will. Howard’s been in the league for almost five full seasons, and he’s yet to prove anything but feeble against lefties. In the article Tom Verducci wrote about how often he gets breaking pitches, Howard rightfully pointed out that he needs to get better at laying off those pitches out of the zone. I’d be thrilled if Howard could crack the century mark in walks again. I don’t know if it’d be a good idea for him to change his approach against the shift; he already has stretches where he looks lost at the plate. Messing with his swing is asking for trouble.

8. Placido Polanco is making the switch from second base to third base. How good will he be defensively?

He’s looked good there so far, and I expect him to be a plus defender. What I’m more concerned about how good he’ll be offensively. Hard to ignore the decline in his bat recently, and as much as I’d like to believe he’ll get a boost from coming back to CBP, hitting in our lineup, and a BABIP regression, I’m still wary.

9. Who should win the #5 spot, Jamie Moyer or Kyle Kendrick?

I think the job is still Moyer’s to lose, and it should be. Kendrick may end up taking it from him, but for all the people who are saying Moyer is done: That’s been said plenty of times before, and he’s made the people who said it look like fools each and every time. Yeah, he can’t keep pulling that off forever, but his peripherals last year weren’t that different from ’08, aside from a huge spike in homers. I touched on the anti-Moyer sentiment in my post yesterday, and I stand by my conclusions there.

10. The bench was great in 2008 but disappointing last year. Will the additions of Brian Schneider, Ross Gload, and Ramon Castro help?

I like Schneider’s skills behind the plate, but he’s not much of an improvement standing next to it over Paul Bako at this point. I hated the Gload signing, and I still do, but he’s probably a lateral move from Stairs. Castro is all glove, but considering Eric Bruntlett was all beard, it’s an upgrade. The bench will be better, but mostly because of the other guys – Ben Francisco and Greg Dobbs. Francisco’s a damned good fourth outfielder with pop and speed, and Dobbs suffered from really poor luck on balls in play last year.

11. Will J.A. Happ come close to his 2.93 ERA from 2009?

I’ve been a Happ fan since before it was cool, but no. Saying Happ was lucky, or that he overachieved, doesn’t mean he didn’t pitch well. It just means he’s not as good a pitcher as that ERA would suggest. I think an ERA around 4 is a reasonable expectation, and that makes for great value from a cost-controlled fourth starter.

12. The Phillies essentially swapped Chan Ho Park for Jose Contreras. Thumbs up or thumbs down and why?

Thumbs up. I liked Park (once we got him out of the rotation, anyway) and I don’t understand why we didn’t offer him arbitration, but his home run rate is a likely bet for some harsh regression. With him pitching in the AL and Yankee Stadium, the stage is set for the Yanks to release him in June and us to pick him up for nothing. So, that’s awesome. But really, what I like about Contreras is that he’s posted a career 4.37 FIP as a starter in the American League. Unlike Park, he could still start if necessary, and I think he’d do well. Also, I know it was a small sample, but he looked great last year in relief for Colorado. I think he’s going to be huge for us this year.

13. Which Phillie(s) are we most likely to see dealt by the July 31 trading deadline?

I don’t expect to see any big pieces going elsewhere this year, be they major-leaguers or notable prospects. After the last couple deadlines and the Halladay deal this winter, it’s probably a wise decision to cool it a little on the big trades. What we might see, depending on the health of the pitching staff, is a Matt Maloney for Kyle Lohse type of deal, where we give up somebody like Vance Worley for a middling vet like Doug Davis.

14. The Phillies have had one of baseball’s best defenses for several years running according to most metrics. Does this trend continue?

There’s no reason to think otherwise, even if Ibanez’s likely regression happens. Victorino isn’t likely to be a negative defender according to UZR again, and that means we’re as strong up the middle as ever, with Chooch, Rollins and Utley. Polanco is a potential concern, but I think he’ll be fine. Howard’s improved. Werth’s awesome. We should be golden.

15. What will the team get from Domonic Brown this season?

Other than an excuse to let Werth walk, nothing. He may well be ready to break into the bigs in 2011 (I hope we have the good sense to wait a while and manipulate his service clock), and a platoon of him and Francisco would probably be pretty solid. I doubt he gets a call-up in September, though.

Predictions: 94-68, lose WS to Rays. MVP: Utley. Cy Young: Doc. Rookie: Bastardo. Breakout: Madson. Under Radar: Blanton.