Posts Tagged ‘Position Battles’

Just wanted to give some updates.  There’s a couple things worth noting before we jump in.  Full spring training stats aren’t available.  The numbers on the team pages are from Grapefruit league action only.  Please please please keep in mind that spring training performance only affects position battles.  If Ben Francisco hits .400/.550/.800 he’s not going to take Jayson Werth’s job.  As we move toward the end of spring, we’ll look at the numbers.  For now it’s just news…

-JC Romero and Rich Dubee are both pessimistic about an opening day return for the lefty.  I’m ready to break out the permanent marker for Antonio Bastardo.  He will make the opening day roster barring injury.  The 7th spot is now a battle between sentimental favorite Scott Mathieson and an army of minor leaguers and NRIs.  As of today, that pack is headed by Drew Carpenter and the loser of the battle for the 5th spot between Kendrick and Moyer.  Speaking of which…

-Rich Dubee has restated that Kyle Kendrick must steal the job from Moyer.  He cited some concerns over Moyer’s endurance but otherwise indicated that he’s pretty locked in as the #5 at this early stage of spring training.  For what it’s worth, both pitchers have been fine thus far.  It remains to be seen if they’ll consider wandering north with Kendrick in the pen or if they want to keep him stretched out in extended spring training/AAA.  I’d bet on the latter.

As with a couple of my early articles here, this is adapted from a post on Pro Sports Daily. Since a lot of my followers at this young stage of the blog are probably PSD users, this is nothing new for you.  We will be following the position battles in camp (such that there are) and providing updates as we see fit.

The Phillies enter camp this year with an unusual amount of knowns.  All the starting position players are sorted out.  Even the bench is squared away.  Brian Schneider is our back up catcher.  Greg Dobbs and Ross Gload will accompany him as left handed PH threats.  Ben Francisco is the primary outfield reserve and RH PH and Juan Castro rounds out the bench as the utility infielder.  The pitching staff is similarly well settled.  Halladay, Hamels, Blanton, and Happ are set to be handed starting jobs.  Even the 5th starter, Jamie Moyer, has been named, although that position is undoubtedly less secure.  In the pen, Lidge and Romero look as though they will be getting late starts to spring training, potentially opening a week of time for some youngsters or retreads to wield their craft at the ML level. Accompanying those two in the pen will be Jose Contreras, Ryan Madson, Danys Baez, and Chad Durbin.  Count up all the names I just dropped and the number we get is 24.  There are 24 guys with high job security on the current roster.

This is not to say there are no position battles at camp this year.  Indeed there are many battles that will shape decision making as the season goes on, particularly with the pitching staff.  On the position side, 6th OF has yet to be determined.  Here are the looming position battles as I see them.

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