Davey Lopes' incredibly important impact on the Phillies

If you were ever going to approach Davey Lopes with a question about something, be ready. Actually, there are a couple reasons for the heightened level of alertness, the first one has to do with Lopes himself.

See, Davey Lopes isn’t at the ballpark to hang out and shoot the breeze, so if he deems what you are asking him idle chatter or small talk, he wants nothing to do with it. He might even size you up to see if you are going to waste his time and then he’ll act accordingly.

But if what you have to offer is something Lopes thinks is an interesting topic, get ready because he’ll fill up your notebook and/or recorder. Lopes loves baseball and he enjoys talking about it in-depth just as much. That makes sense figuring that he has given his life to the game, first as a great player (mostly) for the Dodgers and then as a coach and a manager for the Milwaukee Brewers. Lopes’ passion for the game has an intensity that even the most ardent of the baseball lifers do not possess.

Mostly that gruff exterior is just for show and some of the players love to get the now-former Phillies’ first-base coach worked up over something. A great example of this would be to bring up the pivotal game in the 1977 NLCS known in these parts as “Black Friday.”

“Black Friday,” for those who were not around for the 1977 NLCS between the Dodgers and the Phillies, or for those historically challenged on baseball lore, remembers the game as the one where the Phillies missed their best chance to get to the World Series to date. If you thought watching the Phillies lose to the Giants in the 2010 NLCS was difficult, the ’77 NLCS would cause lesser souls to swear off baseball forever. Indeed, it was that difficult to see unfold.

The game in question was where Greg Luzinski famously misplayed a fly ball against the wall at the Vet during a stage in the game where he had been subbed out in favor of the better defender, Jerry Martin. It’s kind of like the Philadelphia version of Bill Buckner in that a move that is made in most circumstances was ignored for some inexplicable reason. For instance, manager Danny Ozark put Martin in for Luzinski the way Red Sox manager John McNamara replaced Buckner for Dave Stapleton. Only when he decided not to make the routine move for whatever reason is exactly the time everything will go wrong.

But that’s not all there was to “Black Friday.” It is also the game where shortstop Larry Bowa made that terrific play to make a throw to first in attempt to nail Lopes on a ball that caromed off third baseman Mike Schmidt. Only first-base ump Bruce Froemming called Lopes safe at first, which paved the way for more miscues as the Phillies blew a two-run lead with two outs in the ninth.

It also opened the door for Lopes and the Dodgers to knock the Phillies out of the playoffs and march on to the World Series and a date with the Yankees.

Nevertheless, when Bowa returned with the Dodgers for the 2008 NLCS—the team’s first meeting in the playoffs since the 1978 NLCS—both protagonists, then on different sides, were marched into the interview room for a formal chat. This is where the normally prickly Bowa played the part of the nice guy in reliving a memorable moment in Phillies’ history.

“They were good series,” Bowa said, clad in his Dodger uniform and that traditional “LA” cap, during the media conference. “We grew up playing them in the Coast League—they were in Spokane and we were in Eugene, Oregon. We had a rivalry going then. They seemed to get the best of us in those games.

“We always made a mistake late. It cost us, but they’re very competitive. You remember when Burt Hooton was pitching and the crowd got into it, he couldn’t throw a strike. Then the rain game with Tommy John. The play in left field where Bull (Greg Luzinski) was still in the game and Jerry Martin had been replacing him and he wasn’t in and it led to a run.

“Davey Lopes. I know Davey says, ‘Let it go.’ But he was out. He knows he was out and he can go look at that all day. A hundred thousand times he was out. But those were good games. They were good games and they seemed to bring out the best in us. I think Garry Maddox dropped a ball which he never dropped. It was just one of those things.”

Lopes, dressed in his Phillies home whites, followed Bowa and put an end to the Philly hand-wringing over the never-forgotten defeat.

“It was 31 years ago. Quit crying and move on,” Lopes said.

Certainly Lopes had a fantastic seat for a lot of great moments in baseball history. He was, of course, at second base the night Hank Aaron hit home run No.715 to break Babe Ruth’s all-time record and was the first person to reach out and shake the hand of the new home run king. Actually, it was a prideful moment for Lopes, who as a man with Cape Verdean descent, was often caught in between two worlds growing up in Providence, R.I. Lopes is not African-American, but is a person of color coming from a small island off the western coast of Africa. As such, he took even more pride in playing the same position for the same team that Jackie Robinson and Junior Gilliam once played.

Howard Bryant, in his new biography about Hank Aaron, recounts a conversation he had with Lopes about why he shook Aaron’s hand after the historic homer.

"I remember when I first came up. We’d be in spring training and Junior would tell me to come with him. I’d say, ‘Where we going?’ and he would just tell me to come on. We’d be in St. Petersburg and he’d point out the majestic hotels. He’d say, ‘That’s where the Dodgers used to stay,’ and I was in awe. Then we’d go farther into a neighborhood and he’d show me some average-looking house and say, ‘And that’s where ­we had to stay.’ And it blew my mind, because it wasn’t long ago. I thought about those things, about where we’d come as people of color, and that’s why I shook Henry Aaron’s hand. It felt like something I had to do.”

It was never as easy as just focusing on baseball, either. Lopes missed time at the beginning of the 2008 season after undergoing surgery for prostate cancer that was discovered during a preseason, routine physical. Then, in April, three days before the Phillies’ season opener in 2010, Lopes’ brother, Michael, died in a house fire in Rhode Island.

He says those events did not figure into his decision to turn down an offer from the Phillies, though. Baseball, after all, is Lopes' life. He just turns 66 in May and doesn't plan on giving up baseball just because the Phillies didn't make him a proper offer.

Lopes played in the World Series in 1974, 1977 and 1978 before finally winning it all in 1981. Later he got to the playoffs with the Cubs as a teammate with Bowa in 1984 and again with the Astros in 1986 where he was teammates with Larry Andersen and Charley Kerfeld. It was in the ’77 World Series where Lopes stood at second base when Reggie Jackson belted three homers in Game 6 to tie Babe Ruth’s record and clinch the Yankees’ victory.

In 1978, Lopes hit three homers, including two in the Game 1 victory, before the Dodgers fell again to the Yanks. Finally, Lopes and the famous Dodgers’ infield of Steve Garvey, Bill Russell and Ron Cey, beat the Yankees in 1981. Lopes contributed to the Dodgers’ World Series victory with four stolen bases against the Yanks, which was his forte.

Better yet, stealing bases and teaching others how to steal bases will be Lopes’ legacy. In 16 seasons in the majors, Lopes swiped 557 bases and led the league twice. In 1975 Lopes set the record with 38 straight successful stolen bases and led the league with 77 steals. In 1985 when Lopes was 40 he stole 47 bases and followed that up with 25 when he was 41. Not even Rickey Henderson stole as many bases as Lopes at that age. Then again, Lopes had a knack for doing things at an older age than most. He made his major league debut when he was 27 and after his 34^th birthday he was as good as any second baseman ever to play aside from Joe Morgan, Eddie Collins or Napoleon Lajoie.

But it wasn’t so much about the amount of stolen bases Lopes racked up as it was his ability to steal bases and not get caught. When he swiped 77 bags in ’75 he was caught just 12 times and that number dipped to 10 times caught in ’76 when he got 63 stolen bases. When Lopes stole 47 when he was 40, he got caught just four times.

Lopes’ 83 percent success rate dwarfs that of Henderson (81 percent) and Lou Brock (75 percent). Ty Cobb’s stolen base rate is incomplete, but even from what information that is available, Lopes is better than him, too.

So with Lopes coaching at first base with a stop watch in his right hand and his eagle eyes watching every move, spasm and twinge by the pitcher, it’s no wonder that the Phillies led the league in stolen base percentage in four straight seasons. In fact, the 87.9 percent rate the team posted in 2007 is still a big-league record.

Want to get Davey talking? Ask him about statistics and stolen bases. Though the art of the stolen base is not popular in some sabermetric neighborhoods, Lopes says stealing bases is the best bet in baseball.

“The Red Sox are a team that uses the computer as well as any team, but Jacoby Ellsbury adds another dimension to them. You utilize that and it changes a philosophy,” Lopes said during a discussion about stealing bases in May of 2009. “Dave Roberts probably had as much to do with them winning the World Series [in 2004] and what did he do? He stole a base at the right opportunity. But when you think about the Red Sox you think about them banging the ball out of the ballpark.”

Besides, Lopes said, stealing a base is less of a risk than sending a hitter to the plate. Even the worst base stealers are a better bet than the best hitters, he says.

“If you do a statistical format, if you have a guy on first base in the eighth or ninth inning and he has a success rate of 68 percent, that’s still better than any hitter getting a hit,” Lopes said. “I don’t give a [bleep] who it is, he’s still not hitting .700. He has a better chance of stealing a base than the best hitter has to get a hit.”

When he came aboard after the 2006 season, Charlie Manuel pretty much turned the running game over to Lopes keeping only the power to put up a stop sign whenever he wanted. Nevertheless, Lopes’ base-running theories pretty much took over unabated and with such an important aspect of the game resting in his hands, Lopes used it to make things happen.

“The running game puts a lot of pressure on teams,” Lopes said last. “It causes teams to make mistakes, not only with stealing, but with the aggressiveness in which you play. If you run the bases aggressively, you can capitalize on a mistake if it’s made by an infielder or outfielder. If you don’t, you can’t. It’s an after effect—‘Oh, I should have ran.’ Too late.”

Too late appears to be the issue between Lopes and the Phillies, too. Lopes told CSNPhilly.com’s Jim Salisbury that he wanted to come back for a fifth season with the team, but negotiations fell apart. Lopes says he wasn’t asking for a lot of money, just more than the regular first-base coach who isn’t entrusted with so much responsibility to the team’s success.

Perhaps general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. and the Phils’ brass didn’t value those talents too much?

“We just had a difference of opinion on what I felt my worth was,” Lopes told Salisbury. “That’s all. It was a really tough decision because I loved my time in Philadelphia, I loved working for Charlie Manuel, and I have the utmost respect for everyone in that organization.
 
“I got more enjoyment out of winning that World Series in 2008 than I did the one I won with the Dodgers as a player. I can’t say enough about how much I enjoyed my time in Philadelphia. I am really going to miss the atmosphere and the passion. The fans were great to me. I went from being a bad guy, a Dodger, to someone they really embraced. I really appreciate that.”

Though the announcement came on Monday, a report surfaced out of Los Angeles that the Dodgers could attempt to woo back their old All-Star. Just think of the ways a guy like Lopes could transform the talents of a player like Matt Kemp. Just think what he did for players like Shane Victorino, Jimmy Rollins and Jayson Werth. Hell, big slugger Ryan Howard even swiped eight bases in 2009 and went from just one attempt to 15 attempts since Lopes’ arrival.

If Lopes can make a base stealer out of Ryan Howard, what can’t he do?

Now think about Lopes doing that for another team in the National League…

Picking on the wrong guy

The message was relayed quickly. It had to be since it was about life and death… or at least about whether or not I would be picked up and stuffed into a trash can. Considering that I am 6-foot-1 and heavier than I have ever been in my life—far heavier than the comfortable 160 pounds I prefer to carry—the fact that the trash-can stuff wasn’t hyperbole was a bit worrisome.

“You tell him the next time I see him I’m going to kick his ass,” was the message Scott Rolen sent through Mike Radano to give to me.

OK, it was a joke (I hope!), but after zinging Rolen the day before about his recent health history only to hear how back spasms kept him out of the lineup, yeah, the ass-kicking retort was the play right there.

“Tell him I’m ready whenever he is,” was my reply. Hey, why not? Since we’re just joking around (I hope!), might as well return the volley. C’mon, like Scott Rolen is really going to beat me up. Why would he waste his time? Sure, I zinged him pretty good—all in good fun—but would he really go through with a pretend threat?

Yeah, I probably should have kept my mouth shut.

That was never more evident than Tuesday night when Rolen turned into a human bowling ball before turning his former Cardinals’ teammate Chris Carpenter into a human ragdoll. Knowing the brotherhood and comradery that goes on inside of a baseball clubhouse and the fact Rolen and Carpenter were teammates for a long time with the Cardinals, I got scared. If Rolen can pick up a 6-for-6, 250-pound dude like Carpenter and heave him against the backstop with a crush of ballplayers all jostling and grabbing one another around him, I realized I was going to become intimate with the inside of a trashcan whether we were joking around or not.

This is especially true after it was revealed that Rolen was trying to be the peacemaker. Reports say Rolen rushed at Carpenter after the pitcher exacerbated the situation by yelling at Reds’ manager Dusty Baker. “We're not going to let this happen,” Rolen reportedly shouted at Carpenter before grabbing a hold of him shoving him against the backstop. “We're not going to let this happen.”

Not sure of the context there, but it makes Rolen sound like a “peacemaker” much like Clint Eastwood in Fistful of Dollars.

“It was two teams defending their own people, and standing up for their own players and managers and coaches, so ... that got ugly and obviously it was heated when it started,” Rolen said.

OK, by now most baseball fans saw the donnybrook that occurred in Cincinnati last night spurred on by Reds’ second baseman Brandon Phillips calling the Cardinals, “whiny bitches.” Maybe Phillips’ words were not the most diplomatic of things to say, but harmless nonetheless. The paradox, of course, was when relayed of what Phillips said, Cardinals’ manager Tony La Russa acted like a little whiny bitch. Truth be told, La Russa has been called a lot worse than a whiny bitch, but as they say, “The truth hurts.”

The only people upset by being called “whiny bitches” are little whiny bitches. At least that’s my theory.

For those who didn’t see it, take a look.

Anyway, whiny bitches aside, the Reds-Cards brawl was a pretty good one by baseball standards. It was almost like one of those classic old-timey fights from the 1970s where someone like Spaceman Bill Lee would get body slammed by Carlton Fisk or Don Zimmer… and yes, they were on the same team. Besides, when is the last time a baseball fight was sparked by a silly quote in a newspaper? Maybe that’s the underlying theme in all of this not being discussed? If not for the written word, would anyone gotten worked up over Phillips’ comment? Would Scott Rolen have had to choke a whiny bitch?

The short answer? No.

Which brings us back to the main point… why would anyone start a fight with Rolen hovering around the area? To start with, the dude has the widest shoulders I’ve ever seen. Coat racks? Not even close—they are more like the size of a walk-in closet. At 6-foot-4, Rolen has to walk sideways through a standard doorway because his shoulders are so wide. Plus, when he shakes your hand, your hand and part of the wrist disappears. He just swallows it up.

Here’s how intimidating Rolen is… when ex-Phillies manager Larry Bowa was talking trash about him in the Daily News in June of 2001, Rolen burst into the manager’s office in St. Petersburg before a game against the Devil Rays and said, “I came in here with the intent to kick your ass.”

Now as far as great quotes reported in a newspaper go, Rolen telling Bowa he was going to be turned into a hand puppet is almost up there with Phillips calling the Cardinals “whiny bitches.” The difference, of course, was Phillips’ words are very comical. They were so funny that you can go back and re-read them a second after the first read and they would still be funny. And, if they are being read aloud, the right interpretation could be a one-man act.

Imagine a dramatic reading of Brandon Phillips by Christopher Walken. It works on so many different levels.

But with Rolen telling Bowa to get ready to get his ass kicked, that was serious. If Bowa would have left a little puddle on the ground next to his shoes it would have been completely understandable. Most times Rolen is a really funny dude with that dry wit typical of his fellow Indianans, David Letterman, John Cougar Mellencamp or Larry Bird.

Yet for some reason certain folks from Indiana seem to react to every slight or insult. When he was in playing in Philly, Rolen looked like he played baseball because he wanted revenge for something. It was something to see. Sure, guys with his sensibilities have traits that can be a bit alienating, but whatever. We appreciate iconoclastic tendencies here. In fact, it’s the preferred style we like from our athletes here at The Food. Better yet, there are no hidden meanings when Rolen plays third base or circles the bases. It’s all effort and power with some finesse sprinkled in around third base with some glove work that even forced Mike Schmidt to admit that Rolen was the best he’d ever seen. There also is no searching for nuance, which somehow makes his game appealing. Rolen really doesn't have any style when he plays and anyone with a sense of fashion will tell you, sometimes no style is style.

Or something.

The point is, the next time we cross paths I’m just going to throw myself onto the ground like someone about to be mauled by a grizzly or a jaguar.

Think it will work?

These are the good old days

Just last Saturday Jim Bunning, the baseball Hall-of-Famer turned soon-to-be-former U.S. Senator, talked about being one of two Phillies pitchers to throw a perfect games during the Phillies annual alumni weekend where the highlight was Darren Daulton’s induction into the club’s Wall of Fame.

Otherwise, when the Phillies host a reunion the public events always seem to come off rather tame. After all, aside from honoring Freddy Schmidt because he just so happened to play 29 games for the Phillies in 1947 and has remained alive long enough to be the fourth-oldest living Phillie.

Hey, maybe if we’re lucky we’ll all get to be old someday, too. Just like Freddy Schmidt.

Nevertheless, the alumni weekend only reinforced the notion that we are in the midst of one of the two golden ages of Phillies baseball. There were the years from 1976 to 1983 when the Phillies went to the playoffs six times and the World Series twice, and now. So no matter how popular Dutch and John Kruk were, or how often we get to hear from Mitch Williams and Ricky Bottalico, it’s not as if we’re celebrating some transcendent victory that will never be forgotten. In fact, it’s just the opposite.

‘Personality clashes’

No, apparently it’s when ex-Phillies get together as members of the coaching staff for another team where true chaos ensues. At least that’s the way it looked in Pittsburgh last weekend with ex-Phillies coaches Joe Kerrigan and Gary Varsho. While the Phillies trotted out the oddest trio of Hall-of Famers out there in Bunning, Steve Carlton and Mike Schmidt [1](they were not introduced in order of craziness, but then again that’s debatable), Kerrigan and Varsho were being relieved of their duties on the coaching staff with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Even though the Pirates will finish with a losing season for the 18^th year in a row, ex-Phillies catcher and Pirates manager John Russell could no longer work with Kerrigan or Varsho with published reports coming out of Pittsburgh indicated there were “personality clashes and differences of philosophy.”

According to a report from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

According to multiple accounts Sunday, Russell's call was motivated by a perceived lack of loyalty, though Russell declined to discuss any specifics. Several players and others inside the team described scenes on recent road trips to Texas, Oakland and St. Louis where Kerrigan and Varsho either were openly critical of Russell or having mini-meetings with some coaches or players away from Russell.

Russell tends to be the patient, unmoved type, but that apparently changed in St. Louis. Management began discussing the firings as early as Wednesday, and action was taken early Sunday morning.

“It was a very gut-wrenching decision,” Russell said, seated in his office with Huntington standing at his side. “There are some issues I've been working through for quite some time now that could not be resolved in a way I felt would be for the betterment of this organization. I respect both men greatly. I lost two friends today. That's tough to deal with. But my main focus is this team, and I felt moving forward that this was the time to do this. With two months left in the season, I wanted to accomplish something this year moving into next year.”

Now if this were an isolated incident maybe it would be a surprise, but, well… you know.

Both Kerrigan and Varsho worked together on the Phillies staff under manager Larry Bowa, who, incidentally, is in Philadelphia on Tuesday night working as the third-base coach of the Los Angeles Dodgers. Should it come as a surprise that two of Bowa’s coaches were fired for being, “backstabbers?”

Where there is smoke…

Varsho was Bowa’s bench coach from 2001 to 2004 and even managed the last two games of the ’04 season after Bowa was fired. Along with Mick Billmeyer, Varsho was the lone holdover from the underachieving Bowa Era to the wildly successful Charlie Manuel regime. However, Varsho lasted just a season with Manuel before being let go for similar circumstances that occurred in Pittsburgh. The whispers indicate that Varsho was maneuvering behind the scenes to take credit for the Phillies success and undermining Manuel in the process.

Meanwhile, there have been few instances where Kerrigan did not leave under cloudy circumstances. In 2004 he announced he would resign from his job as the team’s pitching coach rather than have the indignity of not having his contract renewed. It certainly was no surprise that even Kerrigan saw the writing on the wall following a tumultuous two-year run where he nearly came to blows with pitcher Brett Myers in 2003 and was punched in the face by reliever Tim Worrell hours before a game in 2004.

Funny story: during a spring training game between the Phillies and Pirates in Clearwater in 2009, Kerrigan went to the mound to talk to a pitcher only to be heckled from the dugout by Myers who shouted, “Don’t listen to him, you won’t learn [bleep]!”

Even in one of his first press conferences as a Phillie, Pedro Martinez took a shot at Kerrigan for no other reason than to do it. Why not? For years Kerrigan claimed to have taught Pedro his hall-of-fame changeup from his days with the Expos and Red Sox though according to the pitcher, he didn’t so much as speak to the coach for years.

“I was never part of any back-and-forth with anybody. I never have,” Pedro said last summer. “The person who I probably got into an argument with one time was Joe Kerrigan and that was in the best year I ever had.”

Imagine that… a guy on the way to a Hall-of-Fame career with three Cy Young Awards who went 41-10 with a 1.90 ERA in his two best seasons in Boston got into a tiff with Kerrigan? Say it isn’t so. Hey, the guy really knows pitching and as far as analysts go, he's baseball geek to the highest order. That's a compliment. But knowing that Pedro argued with him and knowing this years after the fact and it’s no wonder there was nearly a fight with Myers. After all, if Pedro Martinez wasn’t good enough during his days in Boston, it would take a pitching coach with riot gear or a strong jaw to preside over the 2003 and 2004 Phillies.

Bowa the mentor?

No one only ever accused Bowa of being the nurturing type. However, Jimmy Rollins is quick to give the former irascible manager some credit for helping his development, and Alex Rodriguez worked closely with Bowa when they were both with the Mariners and the Yankees.

A guy can do a lot worse than J-Roll and A-Rod.

And maybe that’s where Bowa’s post-playing legacy lays? The fact is there are very few people on the planet who know as much about baseball as Bowa, and he very well could be the finest third-base coach in the game.

But in two relatively short stints as a manager, Bowa was a failure partially because of the atmosphere of chaos he fostered. Say what you will about the chemistry in the clubhouse and how it relates to winning. No, the players don’t need to like each other, but they should trust and respect one another. Since a particular pitching coach nearly got his lights knocked out by two different pitchers, it’s safe to assume that chaos reigned under Bowa.

He has been in a good role working in the shadows cast by manager Joe Torre and bench coach Don Mattingly since their days together with the Yankees. Bowa can work with infielders, coach third and be the bad cop in certain situations. For instance, in a recent interview with T.J. Simers of the LA Times, Bowa tried to light a fire under underachieving outfielder Matt Kemp and the struggling Dodgers.

Oh yes, Bowa still wants to win. Nothing has changed there. But at the same time, Torre doesn’t have to look over his shoulder and wonder if Bowa is selling him out. The thing that appears to make Bowa different from Kerrigan and Varsho is that he just wants to win the World Series every year and doesn’t care who gets the credit.

Check out this bit from Simers’ story:

On Friday night after Andre Ethier had been thrown out at home plate by a few feet, Bowa returned to the dugout screaming and throwing things.

"No one said anything, but it was like they were all looking at me and saying, 'What's Bowa mad at?'

"It cost us a run," snapped Bowa...

There is the reason why Bowa has had a job in baseball every year going back to the 1960s. The guy loves the game more than anyone else. Loves it so much it’s downright painful.

No tickets left

It used to be that Bowa’s old teammates from the first golden age used to be needed in order to get a big crowd for a ballgame in Philly. Winning has a way of making the sideshows unimportant.

Still, the Phillies alumni weekends are always good for some unintentional comedy. For instance, amidst guys like Schmidt, Carlton and Bunning, a player like Doug Clemens or Keith Hughes trots out onto the field to be introduced before the game. Looking back at the records, Hughes played in exactly 37 games for the Phillies – 93 over the course of four seasons with Baltimore, New York and Cincinnati.

No one needs to see old ballplayers like Keith Hughes or even Jim Bunning to trot out onto the field from a historically moribund franchise to realize that these are the good ol’ days. Right here, right now.

That’s the thing isn’t it? By winning the World Series the Phillies have made alumni weekends useless. Sure, it’s neat to see Mike Lieberthal and Dick Allen around the ballpark again, but really, if there is anything that the Phils prove with their old players is that they weren’t very good for a long, long, long time.

Besides, it used to be that the team needed to summon Schmidt from the golf course in Florida and Carlton from his underground bunker near the Four Corners region of Colorado in order to get folks to come out to the ballpark. That little glimpse at members of the team’s only championship used to put fannies in the seats before folks realized that a contending ballclub was far more interesting than a trip down amnesia lane.

Hey, there’s Greg Luzinski! Didn’t I just see him out in right field eating ribs?

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[1] Apropos of nothing, is there another franchise that has a weirder collection of Hall of Famers than the Phillies? Now that Robin Roberts has passed on and one of the true gentleman is no longer walking the earth, the Phillies players enshrined in Cooperstown are a couple of sandwiches short of a picnic. This has nothing to do with politics or the “elders of Zion,” but really, what gives with those guys?

Plus, why is Jim Bunning in the Hall of Fame to begin with? He never pitched in the World Series and was the ace pitcher on a team responsible for one of the greatest late-season collapses in sports history… hey, winning matters. That’s why they keep score. If Bunning is a Hall of Famer, then so too are Jim Kaat, Tommy John, Jack Morris, Luis Tiant and Bert Blyleven.

That's just the way it happened

In her book about the human brain called, The Secret Life of the Grown-up Brain: TheSurprising Talents of the Middle-Aged Mind, author Barbara Strauch writes that most folks actually “get smarter”[1] as they age.

“As we age, certain parts of our memory remain robust. For instance, our autobiographical stuff ... stays with us,” Strauch told Terry Gross during a recent episode of NPR’s Fresh Air. “Other things, like how to ride a bike, how to swing a tennis racket — habits — do not go away.”

However, Strauch wrote, short-term memory tends to wane. For instance, if one puts something in the oven before going off to work on the computer, it’s probably a good idea to set an alarm or write a reminder. That’s the natural part of aging, Strauch wrote.

If Strauch were to hang around the Phillies with the managers over the past decade, the findings in her book might have turned out differently. After all, both Larry Bowa and Charlie Manuel have had the uncanny ability to remember sequences of ballgames as if they were happening directly in front of them. But for actual events that happened to them during their careers as players and managers, well, let’s just say they could get misquoted in their autobiographies.

That’s no knock on either Bowa or Charlie. In fact, the way those guys remember their playing days is kind of humorous. Better yet, it seems as if neither of the managers quite understands that there is this thing called the Internet where information can be retrieved in seconds. Moreover, a short little trip over to Baseball-Reference.com can unfold nearly every single pitch those guys saw in their careers.

In his first big-league plate appearance on April 7, 1970 at Connie Mack Stadium, Bowa popped up to Don Kessinger at short against Fergie Jenkins. On April 8, 1969 in Kansas City, Charlie made his debut as a pinch hitter for Ron Perranoski in the 12^th inning. Moe Drabowsky got him to ground out to Jerry Adair at second base in a game where the Royals beat the Twins, 4-3.

See how detailed and easy to find that was?

Oh, but that doesn’t even begin to tell the story because sometimes it seems that old, wizened baseball men remember things just a little bit differently than the way it actually occurred. Take Bowa (yes, please take him)… listening to the way he talked about the game one would think that if he wasn’t bouncing Baltimore chop singles into the hard and unforgiving Veterans Stadium fake turf, he was fouling off pitches and getting on base with incredible patience. The truth is much different from the way it was remembered since Bowa posted a career on-base percentage of .300 and never walked more than 39 times in a season once in his 16 seasons.

Perhaps Bowa’s few critiques of Jimmy Rollins’ acumen as a leadoff man was based on experience since the old-time Phillie got on base at a .287 clip during his career when leading off and .299 when hitting second. Both figures are so far below the league norm that it’s as if they were dropped down into a well.

The best non-memory from Bowa, though, was not from the way he played. It was whom he played with. A favorite came during a series against the Orioles when Gary Matthews Jr. was tearing up the Phillies with big hit after a big hit. So when questions about Matthews led to the inevitable one about Big Sarge and whether or not Bowa played with the Phillies’ fun-time broadcaster, the answer was, “No, I never played with him.”

That seemed like a curious thing so we went and looked it up to find that not only did Bowa play on the same team with Gary Matthews Sr. in Philadelphia, but also they played together for the Cubs, too.

Any one that has ever met Sarge knows he’s hard to forget. Shoot, Sarge even knows the President!

Charlie’s mis-memories aren’t as obvious as the Bowa-Sarge one, but there are many more of them. The reason for that isn’t so much that Charlie has a bad memory, it’s that he just likes to tell stories and talk baseball. He’s great at it and anyone who has ever spent just a little bit of time with ol’ Charlie comes away with a great story or memory.  

Some call Charlie the Casey Stengel of the modern era, which given his perceived nervousness in front of large audiences and TV cameras, is a good comparison. Take away the cameras and put Charlie on the dugout bench three hours before the first pitch and he’s more like Mark Twain of the Shenandoah Valley. And like Mark Twain, once Charlie gets going he doesn’t stop.

The stories from his days playing in Japan, playing for Billy Martin, growing up in Virginia and mingling with Presidents are the best. So too are the stories about his travels across the world. Just like with Chico Esquela, baseball has been very, very good to Chuck. As a result, it’s been pretty good for some of us, too. It doesn’t really matter if the stories are 100 percent accurate because they are so good.

And aren’t the stories the best part of it?

Anyway, Charlie’s latest mis-memory came earlier this year when he was asked about Raul Ibanez’s rough spring and early slump. The manager said he wasn’t worried about Ibanez finding his stroke because he remembered the time his old teammate Harmon Killebrew couldn’t buy a hit during spring training but went out and hit three home runs on opening day on his way to clubbing 49 during the season to get the AL MVP Award.

Sure, Killebrew hit 49 homers in 1969 and was the MVP. However, he didn’t hit three homers on opening day. Instead, Killebrew had one three-homer game in his entire career and that came four years before Chuck even cracked a big league roster.

Another good one was when he told us about the time he broke up a no-hitter against Catfish Hunter, which isn’t completely inaccurate. The thing is, no one was on no-hitter watch because Manuel’s hit came when he led off the fifth with a single in a game in Oakland on April 16, 1972. Technically, yes, Chuck broke up the no-hitter. He might have been the only one to notice it.

Regardless, the brain is mysterious thing and the way one person remembers an event can be completely different from the next guy. Everyone is like Bowa and Charlie to some degree, because if you get some time and distance away from even a little league game, the circumstances may have played out more dramatically.

Hell, we all probably broke up a few no-hitters…though if we played on two different teams with Sarge we’d easily remember it.

---

[1] My term, not hers.

Poll numbers strike out

One of the funniest moments from writing about thePhillies for all those years came back in 2002 in the midst of Larry Bowa’s reign of error. It had just come out in one of those ubiquitous Sports Illustrated polls in which the players voted the then-Phillies skipper as the worst in the big leagues.

Sure, it was an ambiguous poll to say the least, but the point was players from around the league saw what was going on inside the Phillies dugout during games and wanted no parts of it. Hell, the team even asked that shots of the manager in the dugout during games be limited. No sense putting the dysfunction out there on the airwaves.

Anyway, Bowa said he didn’t care about what the Sports Illustrated poll indicated when asked before a game at the Vet during the 2003 season. In fact, he didn’t care so much that he spent a good portion of the pre-game meeting with the writers talking about how much he didn’t care and how dumb the players were for not seeing his brilliance. OK, he didn’t say it like that in so many words, but he clearly was bothered by his status in the poll.

The funny part wasn’t Bowa’s reaction to his No. 1 status, but the reaction by the players in the Phillies’ clubhouse. When asked about it, most of the players treated the question as if it were a flaming bag of dog crap on the front porch. Rather than jump on the bag to put out the fire, and thus getting soiled shoes, most of the players just let it smolder itself out. They said all the right things, peppering the writers with a steady barrage of jock-speak clichés.

That is except for Mike Lieberthal, another Bowa foil, who gave the best answer of all.

“If I played on another team I’d hate him, too,” Lieberthal said, before explaining how it must look in the Phillies’ dugout to a bystander. Gotta love Lieby… he had trouble figuring out how to use those clichés knowing that his true thoughts were much more fun.

So what’s the point? Who cares about that cantankerous era of Phillies baseball where one never knew what type of land mine rested just around any corner? How about this… maybe there’s something to those polls Sports Illustrated conducts?  After all, in a recent issue, the Sixers’ Andre Iguodala was voted to be amongst the NBA’s most overrated players and the Phillies’ Ruben Amaro Jr. was rated as a middle-of-the-pack general manager in Major League Baseball. Make that, second-division, actually. Ruben came in 19^th while ex-Phillies GM Ed Wade was 29^th out of 30.

Those ratings seem to be a bit off… at least for Wade. Taking his full body of work into account Ed Wade might be a vastly underrated as a big league general manager.

Really? How so? And why does it appear as if I’m talking to myself?

Here’s why Wade is underrated:

·         Hilarity

Don’t sleep on this factor. In a business where hubris and self-absorption are the norm (see: Amaro, R.) and a sense of humor is viewed as a determent, Wade’s unintentional comedy is nothing to sneeze at. Really, do you have to ask? Wade was the guy who parachuted out of a plane—a ballsy act in itself—only to get all tangled up in a tree in South Jersey. You can’t make that up, folks. Wade just hung there in a tree with a parachute strapped to his back. That’s hilarious on so many different levels. If comedians told jokes about big league GMs, Ed Wade would be like George W. Bush.

Plus, Wade has some sort of fetish (yes, it’s a fetish) with former Phillies players/employees. Now that he’s with the Houston Astros, Wade was signed and hired countless dudes he had in Philadelphia. For instance, not only did Wade trade/sign Randy Wolf, Tomas Perez, Jason Michaels, Geoff Geary, Michael Bourn, Matt Kata, Chris Coste, Mike Costanzo, Pedro Feliz, and, of course, Brett Myers, but also he took former Phillies PR man Gene Dias to the Astros with him.

With moves like this and a run-in with pitcher Shawn Chacon where Wade ended up getting choked, the Astros did the only thing they could… they gave Wade a two-year extension.

·         Patience

OK, we don’t know if this is masterful foresight or just dumb luck, but Wade should get a ton of credit for not trading minor leaguers Ryan Howard, Chase Utley and Cole Hamels when he has the chance and everyone pleaded with him to do so. Remember that? Of course you don’t because you don’t want to admit how dumb you were. Still, it’s hard to believe a few folks got all lathered up because Wade refused to make deadline deals involving Howard that would have brought back guys like Jeff Suppan or Kris Benson from Pittsburgh.

With the core group of Howard, Utley and Hamels, Wade’s successors could be bold enough to do things like trade for Cliff Lee and Roy Halladay as well as sign Pedro Martinez, Greg Dobbs and Jayson Werth. In fact, it was Wade who swiped Shane Victorino away from the Dodgers in the Rule 5 draft in 2005. Sure, the Phillies eventually offered him back, but sometimes it counts to be lucky, too.

Make no mistake about it, Wade’s fingerprints are all over the Phillies’ roster. Maybe as much as Amaro’s, who has the strange honor of being one of the only GMs in the history of the game to trade and sign three Cy Young Award winners in the span of five months.

Oh yes, Amaro’s moves have been solid, considering the trades for Lee and Halladay and knowing when to cut bait on guys like Pat Burrell. However, he loses points for giving Jamie Moyer a two-year deal worth $13 million. With that money on hand, the Phillies probably would have had a rotation with both Lee and Halladay at the top and Cole Hamels, Joe Blanton and J.A. Happ filling out the other three spots.

Imagine that… Amaro got all those Cy Young Award winners, but would have had two of them in their prime at the top of his pitching rotation if he had allowed then 46-year-old Moyer to walk away.

Hindsight. It has to be a GM’s worst enemy...

Or best friend.

The return of Brandon Duckworth

In mid-July of the 2001 baseball season, the Phillies surprisingly found themselves in the midst of a battle for the NL East with the Atlanta Braves. At the time, no one thought the Phillies were ready to contend yet, but the Phillies surprised a lot of people by hanging around until the next-to-last series of the season.

For 159 games that year, the Phillies gave the Braves all they could handle.

Give some credit to first-year manager Larry Bowa for getting the most out of his kids by putting his foot on the gas and never letting up. Bowa made his players treat every game as if it was the seventh game of the World Series and for the most part they responded. Of course those tactics backfired often throughout Bowa’s tenure in Philadelphia, though in the manager’s defense the team’s talent wasn’t quite there yet.

In 2001 though, Bowa took on the Braves with a rotation that featured Robert Person, Randy Wolf, Omar Daal and rookies Nelson Figueroa and Brandon Duckworth. Person reached the apex of his career by winning 15 games that season before the injuries mounted, while Wolf entrenched himself as a bona fide big-league starter. Daal was the veteran lefty in the mix who got the ball on opening day simply because he was the only guy the team had ready to go.

Meanwhile, Figueroa and Duckworth held down spots in the rotation because of injuries and the fact that Bowa didn’t quite trust Amaury Telemaco and Dave Coggin too much. Maybe he didn’t trust those guys either, but for a little while he was pleasantly surprised.

Who would have guessed that all these years later Figueroa and Duckworth are still out there fighting for spots on big-league rosters? Last season Figueroa made 10 starts for the Mets and has appeared in 32 games for his hometown team over the past two seasons. In between his 2001 season for the Phillies and 2009 work for New York, Figueroa has pitched for Milwaukee and Pittsburgh in the Majors, as well as Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, Indianapolis, New Orleans, Nashville, Long Island, Buffalo, Chihuahua in the Mexican League as well as South Korea.

Yes, with his 36 birthday quickly approaching, Figueroa will pitch for whatever you want to pay him.

The same goes for Duckworth, too, only in locales that are not as exotica as his old buddy, Figgy. After landing in Bowa’s crowded doghouse, Duckworth was a piece in the trade that brought Billy Wagner from Houston to the Phillies. Following a couple of seasons where he shuttled up and down between the Astros and New Orleans/Round Rock, Duckworth moved to the Pittsburgh organization where he pitched for Indianapolis.

Duckworth appeared to be a cornerstone of the Phillies future during the 2001 season. However, the mild-mannered right-hander got around the league a couple times after the ’01 pennant chase, big-league hitters caught up with his repertoire. However, in Game 159 with the Phillies clinging to hope that they could catch the Braves, Bowa yanked veteran 13-game winner Omar Daal from a start in Atlanta in favor of Duckworth.

Since 2006, Duckworth has been pitching for Kansas City and their top farm club, Omaha, where he worked mostly in relief.

The relief role just might be where he fits in with the Phillies in 2010.

What goes around, comes around…

Of course Duckworth has to make the team, first. However, in making the official announcement that Duckworth had agreed to a minor-league deal with the team on Tuesday, the soon-to-be 34 year-old righty will likely spend the summer in Allentown with the Triple-A IronPigs.

In the meantime, Duckworth will get into a bunch of Grapefruit League games this spring and get a first-hand look at how much things have changed since he left before the 2004 season. Sure, some tired old faces are hanging around, but for the most part the Phillies are a different beast than they were in the early 2000s.

Regardless, it’s always neat to see guys like Duckworth and Figueroa hanging around the game and still battling for a spot on a roster. At its essence, those are the guys who make Major league Baseball interesting. They are just regular dudes who work as hard as they can in order to carve out a little spot in the game for as long as possible. They may never get to an All-Star Game or see their picture on too many baseball cards, but it’s difficult not to respect their perseverance and love for the game.

Gotta love the guys just hoping to get by.

When Roy (nearly) fought Larry

By 2003, there were plenty of players in the Phillies’ clubhouse who wanted to take a poke at their manager and the pitching coach. Eventually, one pitcher is said to have cold-cocked the pitching coach, but the manager only ever (publicly) started fracases with the opposition.

That manager, of course, was Larry Bowa whose house-divided style of skippering never really caught on. And certainly we’ve seen enough of his act to know how it works. It’s just like clockwork:

• Something happens in the game that wrankles Larry’s delicate sensibilities.
• Larry starts talking trash.
• Benches clear.
• Larry gets behind two or three players/coaches in uniform who, “hold him back.”
• Rinse and repeat.

It was something that was put on display a few times during Bowa’s stint as manager of the Phillies and then, famously, during the 2008 NLCS where as a coach for the Dodgers, Bowa was reported to have been chirping, “You started it!” toward Brett Myers.

Cooler heads prevailed before Davey Lopes could put Bowa over his knee.

Nevertheless, one of Bowa’s better known bench-clearing incidents with the Phillies happened in a spring training game during 2003 at Jack Russell Stadium against the Blue Jays. That was the one where Roy Halladay plunked Jim Thome with a pitch and immediately got an earful from Bowa. By the time Halladay took his turn at the plate, he had heard all he could handle from Bowa and did what most sane people do in those situations…

Try to stick a foot down his throat.

Before he could dig in, Rheal Cormier missed twice while attempting to plunk Halladay. Still that wasn’t enough to stop Bowa from running his mouth. By the sixth inning of the game, Halladay had heard enough and went after the Phillies’ skipper only to be intercepted before he could shove his foot down Bowa’s throat. Bowa, meanwhile, fell back into his old tricks… he talked, postured and talked some more.

Take a look:

After the game Bowa claimed Halladay intentionally tried to hit Thome—in a Grapefruit League game—and based it on the fact that the Jays’ pitcher has really good control. Ultimately, Bowa was suspended for a game. He later had his revenge, too, when he had rookie Ryan Madson drill a Blue Jays hitter in a Grapefruit League game in 2004.

Halladay, meanwhile, was a bit stunned by the whole thing. He said he told Bowa that he didn't try to hit Thome, but just got cursed at.

"He said a lot of things," Halladay said back in 2003. "But when he finally came close, I said, 'I didn't mean to hit the guy.' And he said, '[bleep!]' and a few other four-letter words."

All that yelling by Bowa was a bit confusing to Halladay.

"I don't understand why anybody would think I'd intentionally hit Jim Thome in that situation," Halladay said. "After all the times I faced him in the American League and never hit him, I can't imagine why they thought I'd intentionally hit him here."

Halladay continued:

"I didn't mean to hit the guy, but I understood why they were upset," Halladay said. "So you take your shots at me. Then it's over and done with. That should have been the end of it. ... If he hits me, fine. He tried twice, and he didn't get me. But to come out there screaming and yelling ... that was ridiculous."

Bowa was a bit more, um, curt.

"I don't know what he said, to be honest with you, and I really don't give a damn," Bowa relayed from his on-the-field "conversation" with Halladay.

So not only was Halladay a next-door neighbor to the Phillies during spring training at the Jays’ base in Dunedin, but like a lot of the old-time Phillies he also wanted to fight Larry Bowa.

Welcome aboard, Roy!

The NLCS: Greatest Phillies team ever?

Comparisons between teams of different eras are not only difficult to do logically, but also they are odious. Seriously, the game changes so much from generation to generation that there is no way one can compare, say, the 1977 Phillies to the 2009 Phils. The game does not exist in a vacuum (or whatever). We see it just by looking at the stat sheet.

Needless to say, baseball statistics are essentially meaningless.

Take that with a grain of salt, however. The numbers are the only proof that a lot of people have to understand if a player is performing well. But I don’t need to look up Garry Maddox’s VORP or OPS to know that he was a better center fielder than Shane Victorino. Sure, there are numbers on the page and I suppose they have meaning. But if you ever got the chance to watch Maddox go gap to gap to chase down every single fly ball hit into the air, you just know.

Nevertheless, since the Phillies are on the cusp of going to the World Series for th second season in a row, those old, odious comparisons come up. They kind of have to, right? Well, yeah… after all, there really aren’t very many good seasons in the 126 years of Phillies baseball to compare.

The good years are easily categorized. There were the one-hit wonder years of 1950 and 1993; the stretch where ol’ Grover Cleveland Alexander took the Phils to the series in 1915; and then the Golden Era from 1976 to 1983 where the Phillies went to the playoffs six times in eight seasons.

Then there is now.

Obviously two straight visits to the World Series are unprecedented in team history. Actually, the five-year stint in which Charlie Manuel has guided the team are the best five years in club history. At least that’s what the bottom line says.

In just five years as the manager of the Phillies, Manuel has won 447 games. Only Gene Mauch, Harry Wright and Danny Ozark have won more games in franchise history and those guys were around for a lot longer than five years. Interestingly, Manuel ranks fourth in franchise wins and seventh in games.

That pretty much says it all right there, doesn’t it? Based on the wins and accomplishments, this is the greatest era of Phillies baseball and the 2009 club could very well go down as the best team ever—whether they win the World Series over the Yankees (Angels are done, right?) or not.

Still, I’d take Maddox over Victorino, Steve Carlton over Cole Hamels, Bake McBride over Jayson Werth; Bob Boone over Carlos Ruiz; Greg Luzinski way over Pat Burrell (and Raul Ibanez, too); and, obviously, Mike Schmidt over Pedro Feliz.

But I’d also take Chase Utley’s bat over Manny Trillo’s glove; Jimmy Rollins over Larry Bowa; and Ryan Howard over Pete Rose or Richie Hebner.

Those are the easy choices. Those Golden Era teams had some underrated players like Dick Ruthven and Del Unser, but they would have been much better with a Matt Stairs type.

No, the truth is I’d take the 2009 Phillies over those other teams and it’s not because of the players comparisons or the win totals. It’s because they are a better team.

Yeah, that’s right, these guys are the best team.

Of course I never got to go into the clubhouse to see Larry Bowa’s divisive act, Steve Carlton’s oddness, or Mike Schmidt’s diva-like act. You know, that is if the stories from those days are true…

Nope, give me a team instead of one that had the indignity to run into a pair of dynasties in the making. First the Phillies had to contend with the Cincinnati Reds and The Big Red Machine before those great Dodgers’ clubs emerged. There is no team in the NL East or National League, for that matter, that is as good as the Phillies have been.

The Mets, Dodgers or Cardinals? Nope, no and nah.

More importantly, now that Pat Burrell is gone the Phillies don’t have a true divisive force in the clubhouse. There is no more of that creepy us-against-them battle anymore considering the relief corps did a reality show with the MLB Network.

Think Warren Brusstar and Kevin Saucier would have been asked to do something like “The Pen” if they were playing these days?

No, the these Phillies have nothing as obnoxious or weird as Bowa or Carlton. They are not the 25-guys in 25-cabs team. It’s a real baseball team.

We’ll see what happens when (and if) the Phillies get to the World Series, but in this instance we’ll go with Victorino gang over Maddox’s group.

See what I was saying...

Ladies and gentleman, Larry Bowa: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6Tjps_-JnQ&hl=en]

Fava beans and a nice chianti

Snow flurries are fluttering around here in The Lanc and it's cold again. Perhaps going from perfect, sun-soaked 60-degree mornings in Florida to blustery winter evenings in Pennsylvania is a lot like jet lag. Oh well, Mother Nature is perfect in her demented little way, so whatever... it's just weather.

Anyway, it would have been nice to spend a few more days in the Tampa Bay area, specifically to head up to Dunedin to check in on the Blue Jays and their new third baseman. Apparently, he used to play for the Phillies or something like that. Also working out with the Jays this spring are fellow McCaskey High alums, John Parrish and Matt Watson. Parrish, a lefty pitcher and a wintertime signing for the Jays after spending the last few seasons with the Orioles and Mariners, could figure into the Toronto bullpen in 2008.

Watson is a non-roster invitee for Toronto after spending last season playing in Japan. Prior to the stint in Japan, he played in the Expos, Mets and A's organizations with 34 big-league games under his belt.

So far this spring, Watson has gotten into two Grapefruit League games and is 0-for-2 with a strikeout. Parrish hasn't appeared in any games yet, but he's expected to pitch against the Devil Rays this afternoon.

*** This spring, Major League Baseball required the first and third-base coaches to wear batting helmets when on the field. This decree comes as a reaction to the death of minor-league coach Mike Coolbaugh, who was hit by a line drive below the ear while coaching first base. Needless to say, a handful of coaches aren't too jazzed about the new mandate, but have complied in almost all cases.

All except for one guy, of course.

"That's not for me," new Dodgers' third-base coach Larry Bowa told MLB.com.

"My question is, how can I be in the league 40 years and the league says who wears a helmet and who doesn't? One guy got killed and I'm sorry it happened. But bats break and they can be a deadly weapon. Do something about bats.

"Umpires get hit with line drives. I've probably seen 50 of them get hit. If coaches have to wear helmets, umpires should. I'll sign a waiver. And there should be a grandfather clause. These are very cumbersome. They talk about delay of game, and when the helmet falls off, you'll have to stop the game. It should be an option. I know I'm talking for a lot of guys who won't say anything. I'll write a check for 162 games if I have to to not wear it."

Bowa makes salient points. However, after seeing Bowa in action for four years as manager of the Phillies, perhaps simply wearing a helmet isn't the best call.

No, Bowa might be better off out there with one of those masks they put on Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs.

Next time: Billy Wagner and C.J. Wilson.

On the road to 10,000

Dan McQuade, of Philadelphia Will Do, asked a handful of writers to celebrate the Phillies 10,000th loss with a 50-to-75word essay for a piece he’s putting together for Philadelphia Weekly. Because I like Dan and tell him that he was the best intern we ever had at CSN.com (I like to pump up his ego… he needs that), I agreed.

But because I like to follow directions in my own way, Dan’s call for 50-to-75 words quickly became 758. That’s a few too many. As a result, I gave Dan permission to rip apart what I sent him in any manner he sees fit and my version of one of my memories of the Phillies’ march to 10,000 losses is printed below:

The very first baseball game I ever saw was at Veterans Stadium between the Phillies and the Mets during the Bicentennial summer of 1976. All I remember was how big and green the place was and how tiny the ballplayers were from our seats somewhere in the upper reaches of the stadium (not ballpark).

I like to think Steve Carlton faced Tom Seaver that day, but I can’t be sure. One thing is for certain though, and that is Larry Bowa played in the game. Growing up in Lancaster, Pa. and Washington, D.C., Bowa quickly became my favorite player. He was a smooth fielder at shortstop with a strong arm and fought for everything he got with the bat. Bowa skills as a hitter were so poor that it was fair to say that every hit he got during his 16 seasons in the Major Leagues was earned. It was a fight and to a kid interested in the uncool, that was kind of cool.

Since Bowa was my favorite player, I naturally assumed that he was articulate, sensitive, intelligent, witty and noble. Isn’t that the way all heroes and adults were supposed to be? Because I lived so far away from Philadelphia and there was no proliferation of sports media like there is now, I knew next to nothing about Larry Bowa aside from the profile of likes and dislikes in the team-issued yearbook. According to the 1980 Phillies Yearbook, Bowa liked The Supremes.

Who would have guessed?

I knew nothing about how his teammates thought he was obnoxious, the opposition hated him or that once in the late 1970s he supposedly lured a writer from the Camden Courier Post into the darkened clubhouse by getting another player to tell him he had a phone call so that he could assault the scribe.

I was a kid who played shortstop for my little league team and loved baseball – what better reason to like Larry Bowa?

So when Bowa was hired to replace Terry Francona before the 2001 season, I was excited. The 2001 season was also my first full year writing about the Phillies for Comcast SportsNet and what could be better than doing that than with my favorite player running the club?

There are certain poignant moments in a man’s life when he can remember still feel the way the sun shined on his skin on a particular day, the way the air smelled at a precise moment, and how time stood still for the smallest fraction. For me those times were when my son was born, my wedding, the first time I saw a Picasso painting up close and the first time I heard Minor Threat.

Then there was the first time I met Larry Bowa. After a couple of days of following the team around in Philadelphia at the beginning of the 2001 season, I finally had a chance to go into his office in the clubhouse at the Vet and introduce myself. I would be one of the guys writing about the club, I told him, and it was going to fun and interesting getting a chance to hear his wisdom and insight on baseball.

Needless to say, he wasn’t too impressed.

He was even less impressed a couple of days later when I asked him a harmless question about pitcher Randy Wolf in a post-game press conference. Knowing that Wolf was working on a strict pitch-count because of an arm injury that limited his work during the spring, I wondered if the pitcher still had enough left to go an inning or two longer than Bowa had allowed.

In retrospect it seemed as if I didn’t phrase the question so succinctly, because Bowa answered my question with a few of his own:

“Are you following what’s going on here? Do you know anything about baseball? Are you bleeping stupid? He was on a pitch-count. That’s why I took him out.”

Oddly, as Bowa was shouting at me as if he was R. Lee Ermey in Full Metal Jacket, I felt myself leave my body and watch it all from above the fray. At the same time I wondered if I was supposed to answer those questions. After all, he did ask…

What does one say? Kind of; a little; and it depends on who you bleeping ask.

By the end of the 2001 season I took solace in the knowledge that Bowa would one day be fired. I knew then that firing Bowa was the only hope the Phillies had.

What in the name of Mike Jackson...

You have to give credit where credit is due, and in this case kudos go out to the Phillies. Big kudos.

The Phillies, finally, have figured out how to misdirect (read: lie) everyone without tipping their hand. Oh sure, in this particular instance there were plenty of clues as well as the proverbial writing on the wall, but when pushed and shoved and asked all the probing questions, the Phillies stayed on message, stuck to the story and never wavered.

Boy how things have changed. How so? Well, there was a time – back in 2004, I suppose – where Jim Thome was held out of a game and then not used in a late-inning, pinch-hitting situation against a right-handed pitcher even though the tying runs were on base and a home run could have won it for the Phillies. When pressed on why he didn’t use Thome in that particular situation, manager Larry Bowa tersely answered that his slugger was “unavailable.” Time and time again Bowa repeated those words… “He was unavailable.” Or, “I told you he was unavailable.”

Over and over again, like a broken record, he spoke.

But upon some reflection, Bowa slowly and thoughtfully sauntered back into the clubhouse, called over the writers as he propped himself up on the table in the middle of the room and waited for a few stragglers to gather around.

Then he confessed.

I know, Larry Bowa.

Bowa just didn’t feel right about hiding Thome’s injury and used the notion that the opposition would read the stories and use that knowledge in an attempt to expose the slugger’s weakness. After all, ballplayers do not talk amongst themselves and rely on the daily coverage from the press for their information for all of the happenings around Major League Baseball. Nevertheless, Bowa couldn’t keep the secret, though, like any self-respecting baseball manager, he blamed the press the same way Ol’ Man Johnson did with “those meddling kids” in the Scooby Doo cartoons.

"I would have gotten away with keeping Thome on the bench if it wasn't for you muckracking little newshounds... drat!"

In the caper of Tom “Flash” Gordon and his meddlesome shoulder, however, Charlie Manuel never charted off message. When his closer was spotted at the Tampa International Airport waiting to board a plane back to Philadelphia, Manuel and the rest of the Phillies’ brass stuck to the script.

“He’s just going back for a routine check-up,” they said. “Nothing to worry about.”

Nah. Gordon had to have his arm checked out during his first spring training with the Phillies and went on to have a first half worthy of an All-Star nod. At the time the news of the check-up conjured up images of Mike Jackson and the 2000 Phillies. Remember that? Think of where the Phillies would have ended up that season if they didn’t have Jeff Brantley… wait, 2000? Never mind.

But, when Gordon stumbled out of the gates, blowing three save chances in April and complaining about his strength and inability to through his curve with his normal panache, the Phillies followed the lines.

“Gordon still has good stuff,” they said. “The fact he's gotten hit is the location of the pitches he's thrown.”

When Brett Myers, the Opening Day starter, was bumped out of the rotation and into the role of set-up man for Gordon, the answers remained the same. Myers to the ‘pen? It was just a way of shoring up the team’s weakness. Why would anyone think anything different?

“Gordon is our closer and we're committed to him until Brett becomes better,” they said.

So wouldn’t you know it that after Gordon’s first perfect inning of the season for a save in Tuesday’s victory in Atlanta that everything would come unhinged? The day after that outing, where he got a pop out and a pair of strikeouts for his fifth save, Gordon told leading bulldog and Delawarean, Scott Lauber, that his shoulder wasn't feeling so good and that probably wouldn't be able to pitch regularly until it starts to feel better.

After the game, and nearly past the deadline for most of the newspaper writers in Atlanta, Manuel finally revealed the truth. Gordon was hurt with an injury similar to the one that sidelined him for most of last August. Gordon, 39, reportedly could miss significant time.

“Since spring training, I’ve been concerned about Flash,” Manuel told the writers late last night.

What?

“He was sore in spring training when we kind of shut him down,” Manuel told the writers last night. “He was a little stiff and sore.”

Come again?

“I don’t want to speculate,” he told the scribes. “Hell, I’m not a doctor.”

Huh?

“I'm sure Brett will get some opportunities to close,” he revealed to the writers.

Uh, yeah. Anyway, as his teammates headed for a charter flight to the coast where they open a four-game series against the Giants tonight, Gordon jetted back to Philadelphia to be examined – again – by team physician, Dr. Michael Ciccotti. When he returns is anyone’s guess.

More: Phillies lose game and Gordon
Even more: Ouch! Gordon ailing as Phils fall again
Sweeps week bonus coverage: Gordon out, Myers in

Bowa fired as Phillies look to future

Like anybody else, Larry Bowa has many faults. Perhaps his biggest fault -- if one wants to label it that -- is that he loves baseball and the Philadelphia Phillies more than anyone else. Bowa eats, sleeps and breathes the Phillies, which very well could have been his undoing. Very often he was unrelenting, curt, difficult, crude and mean when pursuing what was most important to him than, seemingly, anything in his life.

That was winning ballgames for the Phillies.

The Phillies relieved Larry Bowa from his duties as manager of the ballclub on Saturday afternoon, general manager Ed Wade announced in a somber press conference an hour prior to the next-to-last game of the 2004 season. And like anything that involves Bowa, the move was emotional and difficult.

Bench coach Gary Varsho will guide the club for the final two games of the season, which obviously was not the move Wade nor team president David Montgomery wanted to make until next week.

Bowa, as usual, forced the issue.

After responding to questions in his pre-game meeting with the writers regarding numerous published reports speculating on his imminent ouster, Bowa forced Wade to make a decision.

Now.

"When I got to the ballpark this afternoon, I got a call from Larry Bowa asking me to come see him," Wade said at a news conference. "He said he's been getting inundated with questions about his job status and wanted to know sooner or later. After a lengthy discussion, I decided the fairest thing to do was make a move at this time."

It was not the first time that Bowa had forced Wade to make a decision regarding his status as manager of the Phillies. Just last month, Bowa responded to a story in the Bucks County Courier Times by asking Wade to fire him immediately or give him a vote of confidence. In response, Wade fired off a hastily written press release saying that all coaching staff would be evaluated at the end of the season.

	Ed Wade explains his decision to fire Larry Bowa during a press conference before Saturday night's game against the Marlins. (AP)

Even though Bowa and the Phillies had wrapped up the franchise's first consecutive winning seasons in more than two decades as well as second place in the NL East for the second time in the skipper's four season, he had failed to end the 11-year postseason drought for the losingest franchise in North American sports history.

Surely there was no escaping his fate either. Despite blatant campaigning to save his job in which he used the club's plethora of injuries during 2004 as song and verse, Bowa always talked about returning for 2005, but deep down had to see the writing on the wall.

After Wade made the decision, Bowa took off his Phillies uniform for the last time and quickly left the ballpark before anyone knew what had happened. Wade informed the coaching staff, players and Montgomery of the news sometime between 4 p.m. and 5 p.m.

"Ed determined it and made the decision, but it's one I support,'' Montgomery told reporters." Ed came and told me his decision, but in no way am I going to wash my hands of this decision."

Neither is Wade, who said the failure to reach the club's goals this season is as much the fault of his and the players as it is Bowa's.

"The disappointment of this season does not rest with one person. It rests with myself, Larry, the staff, players, we all take a measure of responsibility. This should not be construed as finger pointing at one individual for why we are here today," Wade said. "I greatly appreciate what Larry has done and it wasn't a decision that was arrived at easily. It was certainly one that was struggled with for quite some time."

Nevertheless, it was a decision that everyone knew was coming. As Bowa would have it, the verdict came sooner rather than later.

At the same time, Wade's ouster has been called for almost as much as Bowa's by the Philadelphia fans. When injuries ravaged the club, Wade was unable to make any type of significant deal to make the team better. Instead, he picked up less-than-mediocre journeyman Paul Abbott for the rotation. He also added Cory Lidle, who has pitched well, and veteran relievers Todd Jones and Felix Rodriguez.

In 2003 when the Phillies were battling the Florida Marlins for the wild-card berth, Wade added Mike Williams, Valerio de los Santos and Kelly Stinnett. Wade has also traded away Scott Rolen and Curt Schilling, who are both in the mix to win the big postseason awards as well as the World Series.

Be that as it may, Wade isn't going anywhere. In fact, Montgomery gave Wade an enthusiastic vote of confidence after the announcement about Bowa was made.

"He has put together a championship-caliber team and made a good decision in hiring Larry Bowa four years ago," Montgomery said. "I think he can take us to a championship."

Though Bowa kept pointing out the injuries at every turn -- pitchers Kevin Millwood, Randy Wolf and Vicente Padilla, all three former All-Stars, missed about 35 starts. Reliever Ryan Madson was sidelined more than a month and closer Billy Wagner was out almost 11 weeks, and was placed on the disabled list twice in 2004 -- Wade dismissed the notion. Sure, the injuries had an affect on the club, but injuries are a part of baseball. The Anaheim Angels are a team that had numerous injuries in 2004, but they were able to overcome them and advance to the postseason for the second time in the past three years. The same goes for the Houston Astros, a team that overcame injuries to as many key members of the pitching staff as the Phillies. Somehow, the Astros were able to overcome and advance to the playoffs.

"We don't want to dwell on injuries. We're not going to use anything as an excuse," Wade said. "We're not going to portray Larry as the scapegoat, but in our evaluation of things we are in a situation where we need a different voice."

Though speculation runs rampant, no one has any concrete idea who will stand behind that next voice.

Who is next? Wade says the Phillies are not looking for a certain "type" of manager to guide the club where only one other skipper ultimately took the club. The next manager may or may not be the "anti-Bowa" just as Bowa was the polar opposite of his predecessor, Terry Francona. Who knows, the next manager might not even be Wade's first choice to guide the club, just as Bowa was not the top before finally getting the job in 2000.

According to team sources, the Phillies were all set to name Darren Daulton as the team's skipper heading into the 2001 season. In fact, as the story goes, press releases had been written and a phone call to Daulton was about to be made informing him that he had the job before special assistant Dallas Green stepped in like the governor with a midnight reprieve to stop the execution. Instead, Bowa was hired and the rest is, well, history.

Still, Wade remains pleased that Bowa was the one he hired four years ago.

"When I hired Larry four years ago he was clearly the right person for the job," Wade said. "Anyone who has been around during the past four years knows the knowledge he has, the passion for the game and the commitment to winning."

Though he was the prodigal son returning yet again to a franchise he has carrying the stormiest of relationships with, Bowa was considered as someone from within the organization. That is a road the Phillies would not be shy about trodding down again if the situation is right, Wade says.

Often laughed at for its need to relive its past (one played upon hearing there was a pre-game ceremony before a game earlier this season chided, "What, is this the 14th anniversary of the 10 anniversary of something that happened in 1980?"), the next Phillies manager could very well come from close to home.

Special assistant Charlie Manuel, Triple-A skipper Marc Bombard, Bob Boone, Varsho and (are you ready for this... ) Jim Fregosi are names that have been bandied about.

From outside of the organization, Bob Brenly, Davey Johnson, Mike Hargrove and Grady Little have been mentioned as possible replacements, but chances are the new skipper is still out there somewhere. Before the franchise settled on Bowa, third base coach John Vukovich, Boone, Daulton, Rick Dempsey, Jeff Newman, Lloyd McClendon, Willie Randolph and Ruben Amaro Sr.

Wade said some of those fellows could find themselves on the list of interviewees again.

"We want to find someone who gives us the best opportunity to win, and it's not comparing and contrasting one manager against another," Wade said. "It's about finding the right manager for our circumstances."

Bowa's tenure To describe Bowa's time as manager of the Phillies as "stormy" or "controversial" would be gross understatements. Along those lines, "harmonious" would not be a way to describe any team managed by Bowa. Oh sure, the players get along very well. In fact, Jimmy Rollins stated earlier this season that the 2004 club rates as the most cohesive group he's been with.

So what's the trouble? Take a big guess.

	Larry Bowa compiled a 337-308 record during his four seasons as the Phillies manager. (AP)

On several occasions over the past two seasons, the acrimony between the players and coaches has been so palatable that one could cut the tension in the air with a butter knife. And despite having a room full of some of the best character guys in sports, the Phillies clubhouse was often not a nice place to be.

Because he was the manager, Bowa is responsible for fostering that atmosphere.

Surely the players were put off by Bowa's emotional style and life-or-death way he was perceived of handling every pitch of the game, but it went deeper than that. Players thought Bowa was conniving and undermining and always trying willing to put someone else down if it meant putting himself in a better light.

Former Phillies with other clubs either refused to speak about Bowa or they say that the current Phillies report no changes in Bowa's demeanor despite reports of the contrary.

"I really believe that Larry tried to change. In fact, I know Larry tried to change," Wade said. "We had that conversation about how he has tried to adjust and adapt to certain situations. I think he did his darndest to try and do that for us."

But perception and reputation are hard to overcome. In 2003, Sports Illustrated printed a poll of players in which Bowa was rated as the worst manager.

Think that's just the "spoiled" millionaire players who complain about Bowa? Guess again. Even old-school baseball lifers have certain perceptions of Bowa. One complained that Bowa was a "whiny [jerk] when he was a player and he's a whiny [jerk] now."

Often, players and coaches old and new want to talk about Bowa's relationship with former Phillie Scott Rolen, who in a recent poll conducted by Peter Gammons of ESPN, was regarded as the most respected player in baseball.

The relationship between Bowa and Rolen certainly has been well documented in these parts, but the current players have been very quiet about their true feelings about their former skipper. On the way out, the players had nothing but kind words for Bowa.

"Ever since I got here, Larry has always treated me with respect," said Jim Thome, before his voice trailed off and he walked away from a group of reporters.

Wade said he told the players to behave with a certain decorum in giving them the news.

"I spoke to [the players] about the importance for those who are back next year to understand to approach this in a professional manner, and to clearly recognize that we all take responsibility for what's taken place here today," Wade said. "I would certainly hope that the atmosphere we create in spring training will allow us to get to our ultimate goal, which is to win a championship. Our goal wasn't to finish second. Our goal wasn't to go through the things that we've gone through this year. Our responsibility is to create a different environment."

Certainly such a statement wasn't necessary with this bunch of Phillies. Actually, most were very contrite and felt as though they let Bowa down.

"It was just a pleasure to play for Bo and I enjoyed it. I hate to see it come to this,'' Wagner said. "He's a great man and we should feel a bit responsible for this."

Said shortstop Jimmy Rollins, who spent a lot of time working with Bowa by virtue of being the team's scrappy shortstop, "You expect to play for more than one manager over the course of your career, but he's going to surface somewhere. It's just unfortunate that it had to happen the way it did. I believe he is a good manager, you just have to accept him for who he is."

Regardless of what is said of Bowa, no one can deny that he is a great baseball professional. Though the chances of him managing another team in the immediate future seem slim, there is no doubt that Bowa will be in a big league uniform -- if he chooses to be -- before spring training starts in February.

At the same time, Bowa gets to keep collecting a check from the Phillies. And if he is given credit for one thing, it is raising the level of expectation for the baseball team in Philadelphia. That's good.

"Larry is not going to struggle to find a job," Wade said, expressing a familiar sentiment. "Remember, he is under contract with us through 2005 and we will pay him through the life of his contract, but at the same time I expect him to be in uniform at the Major League level trying to help a team win next year."

Chances are he'll keep doing it his way, too.

E-mail John R. Finger

'I've Died and Gone to Heaven... ' Phillies Deal 'Excited' Scott Rolen to St. Louis

After months of speculation, tons of rumors and lots of innuendo, the Phillies have finally traded Scott Rolen. Once viewed as the rightful heir to Mike Schmidt's throne at third base and as the cornerstone of a franchise on the way up, Rolen left town after an acrimonious season-and-a-half where the luster was chipped away from the city's one-time golden boy. And Rolen, as stated in an interview with ESPN.com's Peter Gammons, could not be happier about the trade.

"I felt," he said to Gammons upon hearing the news about the trade on Monday night, "as if I'd died and gone to heaven. I'm so excited that I can't wait to get on the plane (Tuesday morning) and get to Florida to join the Cardinals."

For Rolen, Triple-A reliever Doug Nickle and an undisclosed amount of cash, the Phillies have obtained infielder Placido Polanco, lefthanded pitcher Bud Smith and reliever Mike Timlin, general manager Ed Wade announced in a spare conference room in the bowels of Veterans Stadium on Monday.

But more than receiving three players in return for the game's best defensive third baseman, the Phillies have ended a once-happy marriage that seemed destined to end with a ceremony in Cooperstown and his No. 17 hung on a commemorative disc beyond the outfield wall.

Instead, it ended in a soap-operatic mess filled with more whispered back-biting than an episode of Dynasty. With the dust finally clearing, the Phillies have lost their best player and receive a lefthanded pitcher in Smith who threw a Major League no-hitter last Sept. 3 but is still only in Triple-A, a one-time closer in Timlin who is eligible for free agency at the end of the season and might again be dealt before the season ends and an infielder in Polanco who is more akin to line-drive hitting Marlon Anderson than the powerful Rolen.

And it marks the second time since 2000 that the Phillies have lost a player worth the price of a season ticket. Almost two years to the day, Wade dealt Curt Schilling to the Arizona Diamondbacks for Travis Lee, Vicente Padilla, Omar Daal and Nelson Figueroa. Since the deal, Schilling has won a ring and composed a 45-14 record.

Once Spring Training was in full swing, Wade knew Rolen was not going to be a Phillie in 2003.

"I knew in Spring Training that we had a zero chance to get anything done," Wade said.

In brokering the deal, Wade admits that the Phillies are giving up a lot, but he's more interested in the players the team has now opposed to the players they once had.

"We did not replace Scott Rolen with an All-Star, Gold Glove third baseman, but we did replace him with a very good baseball player, and we got some other guys who should help us,'' Wade said.

In adding Rolen, Cardinals GM Walt Jocketty believes his club has added the piece of the puzzle needed to finish off the rest of the NL Central. With a five-game lead over the second-place Cincinnati Reds, Rolen not only picks up a lot of ground in the standings, but also seems slated for his first-ever appearance in the playoffs. This fact should satisfy Rolen, who said during a cantankerous press conference at the beginning of spring training that the Philles were not committed to winning.

"We are very pleased and excited to add Scott Rolen to our lineup," Jocketty said in a statement. "He is an All-Star, a proven run producer and an excellent defensive player."

In a quickly assembled press conference in which only Wade spoke, the GM broke down his side of the negotiations and relayed Rolen's feelings about the deal. After returning to Philadelphia from Atlanta where Rolen belted a home run in a victory over the Braves (wearing a throwback, powder-blue Phils uniform, no less) on Sunday, the new Red Bird was trying to figure out how to get to Miami where he will make his debut against the Marlins on Tuesday.

"He said he appreciated the opportunity and the organization and wondered where he goes from here and how he gets there," Wade said. "He was fairly single-minded in getting his gear and getting on an airplane and making sure that he was with the Cardinals in Florida in time for the game [Tuesday]."

Like Rolen's last season in Philadelphia, Wade said the negotiations with the Cardinals were quite tempestuous with each club making concessions. According to Wade, trade talks between the Cardinals and Phillies broke down without a deal at 11 p.m. in Sunday night and that as of Monday afternoon, the Phils were currently negotiating a deal with an unnamed team until the Cardinals jumped back into the fray.

"We were one phone call away from Scott not being a Cardinal and going somewhere else," said Wade.

The Phillies' GM faced the prospect of getting nothing for his star if Rolen stayed in Philadelphia. If the new basic agreement between players and owners includes a redesign of the the First-Year Player Draft, it's possible that it will eliminate compensatory draft picks for teams that lose free agents.

"At some point you have to say the deal that sits in front of me is good enough that it outweighs gambling that something better is going to be out there 48 hours from now," said Wade. "The players were right."

According to Wade, the deal was finalized at 5 p.m. on Monday and was announced officially at 6:30 p.m. With Monday being an off day in the National League, all players will be with their respective teams by Tuesday. Smith will report to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and will start either on Wednesday or Thursday.

Still, Wade says the deal occurred because the Phillies were very aggressive. Some teams, he claims, "moved out of the process because of the ebb and flow of the labor situation." He categorized the Cardinals as one of those teams as well as six others that he claims he was talking to.

Rolen had been the subject of trade rumors after deciding not to negotiate on a multi-year extension that Wade categorized on Monday as a "lifetime deal." The Phillies report that they were anticipating giving Rolen a 10-year contract extension last November that could've been worth up to $140 million. Rolen ended up signing an $8.6 million, one-year deal in January that kept him and the Phillies away from an arbitration hearing, but made it clear he wanted to become a free agent after this season. That decision forced the Phillies to make a move or risk losing him for nothing.

"I regret the outcome," Wade said. "We were very serious about the offer we made and when that didn't work out we tried to get him to sign a two-year guaranteed contract with player options. We regret the outcome but don't regret the way we approached him."

In reality, the Phillies never offered the 10-years and $140 million they keep touting. Instead, it the guaranteed portion of the offer was six years, $72 million. The deal stretched to 10 years and to $140 million only if one included all the options and incentives and buy-outs in the package, all structured in the club's behalf.

Surely it's not a deal to sneeze at, but nowhere close to the "lifetime" contract Wade and his minions keep throwing out there.

Art of the Deal Rolen did not sign an extension with the Cardinals, so he remains eligible for free agency. However, when rumors reached fervor on Saturday, Rolen said he would be interested in signing a contract extension with the Cardinals.

About signing, potentially, with the Cardinals, Rolen said on Saturday that the Red Birds were one of the teams he would consider.

"We all know that is a situation I'd be willing to talk about," Rolen said on Saturday.

On Monday, he was a lot less ambiguous with his comments as told to Gammons. Growing up in Jasper, Ind., Rolen says he went to two parks as a kid — St. Louis and Cincinnati.

"I was there at Busch with my dad, sitting in the stands wherever we could get a seat, watching Ozzie Smith," Rolen said. "It may be the best place to play in the game, and it's the place I always dreamed of playing.

"As I said, I've gone to heaven."

And dropping him in the middle of the Cardinals' powerful lineup looks like hell for opposing pitchers. When the Cardinals come to the Vet on Aug. 16 for a three-game set, Rolen should bat fifth in a lineup that looks something like this:

Fernando Vina, 2b Edgar Renteria, ss Jim Edmonds, cf Albert Pujols, lf Rolen, 3b J.D. Drew, rf Tino Martinez, 1b Mike Matheny, c

Signing potential free agents hasn't been a problem for the Cardinals, who play in front of well-mannered fans in a baseball-crazy city. In the last five years, the Cardinals traded for potential free agents Jim Edmonds and Mark McGwire and convinced them to stay in St. Louis long-term.

However, while Wade says there were numerous suitors all clamoring for Rolen's services, ComcastSportsNet.com sources indicate otherwise. According to one well-placed baseball executive, if a deal with the Cardinals wasn't consummated, Rolen would still be wearing the red-and-white Phillie pinstripes.

"I really searched for another team that was interested and I couldn't find one," the source says. "The Phillies were trying to create a market for Rolen that didn't exist."

Originally, rumors circled that the Phillies were going to receive Double-A prospect Jimmy Journell, who is rated as the Cardinals' top up-and-comer by Baseball America. However, a source says that Journell was never part of any deal. Instead, the source says, the Cardinals were not going to make a deal with the Phillies unless Timlin — a free agent when the season ends — was included in the deal.

But Wade says it was Smith who was the "deal buster."

"He was the key part of the deal," Wade said.

Like the other rumors, it was reported that a deal with another club would not occur if the Phillies had to pay the remainder of Rolen's contract or if he couldn't work out a contract extension with an interested club.

Not at all true.

"I wish I kept a list of all the misinformation," Wade said.

The Players Polanco, 26, is hitting .284 with five homers and 27 RBIs. He batted .307 last season and .316 in his first full year, in 2000. Wade said he'd play third base and bat second in the Phillies' lineup against the San Francisco Giants on Tuesday night.

Polanco is a slick fielder who plays three infield positions and leads third basemen in fielding chances. However, he has played too many games at short and second to qualify for the league lead. A prototypical contact hitter, Polanco has struck out just 26 times in 92 games this season.

Smith, who pitched a no-hitter in his rookie season last year, was sent to Triple-A Memphis on July 20 after going 1-5 with a 6.94 ERA in 11 appearances, including 10 starts. The 22-year-old lefthander was 6-3 with a 3.83 ERA in 16 games last year.

In his last outing in the big leagues on July 19, Smith allowed eight runs and nine hits in 4 2/3 innings in a loss to the Pirates.

Smith is best compared to Randy Wolf.

"He's a surplus prospect," Wade said.

Timlin is 1-3 with a 2.51 ERA in 42 appearances and is holding righties to a .197 average. The 36-year-old righthander is in the final year of a contract that is paying him $5.25 million this season. In 1996 he saved 31 games for the Toronto Blue Jays and has saved 114 games during his 11-year Major League career. However, this season he has blown two saves working primarily in middle relief.

Timlin won two World Series' with the Blue Jays and appeared in two games of the 1993 series against the Phillies.

Nickle, 27, was 3-5 with a 2.97 ERA and seven saves in 34 games — one of them a start — at Scranton this season. He appeared in four games — 4 1/3 innings pitched — for the Phillies this season and has made 10 career major-league appearances.

Glory Days When Scott Rolen came to Philadelphia as a fresh-faced 21-year old, he was too good to be true. He played hard, possessed Midwestern, homespun values and spoke about fair play and hard work. If he was going to do something, he said, he was going to do it all out and to win.

Philadelphia fans immediately latched onto the quiet kid from Jasper, Ind.

After winning the Rookie of the Year Award in 1997, Rolen signed a four-year, $10 million deal with the idea that he was going to be a Phillie for life. In fact, Rolen signed for far less than he could have gotten because he believed the Phillies were on the right path and he was enamored with the idea that he was going to be like his kindred spirit, Mike Schmidt, and spend his entire career in Philadelphia.

But all those losing seasons caught up with Rolen. So too did the firing of mild-mannered manager Terry Francona, who is a close friend of Rolen's. Meanwhile, Rolen's quiet nature in a city full of loud and sometimes abrasive sports fans, wore thin on both sides. Sensitive and thoughtful, Rolen chose to do his talking on the field or in the clubhouse — nowhere else. Philly fans wanted their rough-and-tumble athletes' personas to translate to a give-and-take relationship with the city that Rolen was not willing to have. His family (and his dogs, Enis and Emma) came first and nothing else was a close second.

When prodigal son and fan-favorite Larry Bowa was hired as the team's skipper, many speculated when he and his sensitive third baseman would clash. It didn't take long.

In June of 2001 during a series against Tampa Bay, Bowa told the Philadelphia Daily News that Rolen's recent futility at the plate was "killing us." Rolen took the criticism not as constructive but intended to embarrass him and had it out with the manager before a game against the Devil Rays.

"I came in here with the intent of kicking your ass," Rolen reportedly told Bowa as he walked into the manager's office that day.

Their relationship remained strained ever since and the soap opera began in earnest.

Later that year, Phillies executive assistant and manager of the hard-boiled manager of 1980 World Championship team, Dallas Green, told a radio station that Rolen was OK with being a "so-so" player and that his personality would not allow him to be a great player.

After the season, Rolen summed up the 2001 campaign as the worst he ever went through and cited Bowa and Green as the main culprits in his dissatisfaction. His ire manifested itself during an edgy press conference to kick off spring training.

There, Rolen held a press conference to explain why he opted for free agency questioning what he thought was the team's commitment to winning.

"Philadelphia is the [fourth-largest] market in the game, and I feel that for the last however long, the organization has not acted like it," Rolen said in February. "There's a lack of commitment to what I think is right."

Rolen pointed out that the Phillies, who entered the season with a payroll around $60 million that ranks in the bottom third of all Major League franchises, were notorious for allowing players of star quality walk away when their contracts are about to expire. It happened two seasons ago with Curt Schilling and he wasn't so sure it was going to stop now, he said.

"Part of my whole problem is that I look around and see Bobby Abreu, I see Pat Burrell, I see Doug Glanville and Mike Lieberthal and this is the core that's been talked about for three or four years," Rolen said then. "These are unbelievable ballplayers. But three years from now, when everybody becomes a free agent or arbitration-eligible and it's time to re-sign everybody, I want to turn around and see Bobby Abreu and Pat Burrell and Doug Glanville and Mike Lieberthal. To me, what history shows, I will not be able to do that."

Not unless they are playing for the Cardinals.

What followed over the next six weeks were a few public discussions with Bowa and a miserable slump in May and June that turned his .284 April into a .240 average by the end of May. In June, an unnamed teammate reportedly called Rolen a "cancer" and that his status was a distraction to the team.

However, things haven't been all bad for Rolen this season. He started in his first-ever All-Star Game and is on pace to drive in over 100 runs for the second year in a row and third time of his career and belt 25 homers for the fifth season in a row.

But the constant circus around his future was starting to drain him, he told Gammons.

"I think I must have been asked more questions than the rest of the team combined," Rolen said. "It was crazy. In spring training, all the way back to the winter, it was that way. Before the All-Star break, I know I was a little down. I shouldn't have been, but having people leaning on both my shoulders all the time drained me.

"People would tell me that I needed to be more selfish, to play for numbers. But that's not the way I know how to play. I'm not good at playing for numbers, I'm not good at playing for myself. To go from last place to first is more than I ever could have dreamed."

The Future Even with Polanco in the fold, Wade says the Phillies go into the offseason in a position they haven't been familiar with in almost a decade.

"We go into the offseason for the first time in nine years potentially looking for a third baseman," Wade said.

For now, Wade says his concern is to build for the future and not look into the past that saw superstars Curt Schilling and now Rolen leave amidst acrimony.

"I don't think we did anything to necessarily make the player unhappy,'' Wade said. "We're always trying to do things the right way. We're always trying to make our players comfortable. We're always trying to compensate them fairly. We're always trying to bring teammates around that they are comfortable playing with and gives us a better chance of winning.''

He certainly has given Rolen that chance now ... problem is, it isn't in Philadelphia.

E-mail John R. Finger

As the Clubhouse turns: Rolen takes heat from management

Try this one on for size. A player — a weak-hitting but slick-fielding shortstop at that — hosts his own radio talk show before every game. In this show, the shortstop rips his manager, calls the fans the worst in baseball and challenges his teammates to play better than they are.

In turn, the manager — an old salt of guy — alienates all of his players. He calls them names and tells them that they are an embarrassment to the uniform. The team ends up being so unified in their hatred of their boss that they go out and win the World Series for the first (and only) time in the franchises' history.

Flash ahead 21 years. That shortstop is now the manager and the old salt is up in the front office as the team's special assistant to something or other (thank you old-boy network). This time it's the old salt that's going on the radio and the manager who is alienating his young players.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

So here it is one last time before we put it to rest forever. That's barring — at the very least — someone else associated with the Philadelphia Phillies opening their big mouth and sticking their big boot in there.

First, the recap:

Last week, special assistant to the General Manager Dallas Green, told the listeners of WIP that Scott Rolen — who won the Rookie of the Year award in 1997 and owns two gold gloves for fielding excellence at third base — was nothing more than a "so-so" player and that he lacked the "personality" to be a great player. He later reiterated those comments to the beat writers in a loud discussion in the press box before a game against the San Diego Padres.

That little turn of the soap opera dial spawned a story in the Bucks County Courier Times that the Phils' clubhouse is nearing mutiny and if the players put it to a vote on whether manager Larry Bowa should stay or go, Bowa would be a loser in a landslide.

"He can manage. He knows baseball," one player said. "But if we win, it will be just to spite him. Everybody hates him that much."

You would think that a team going through all of this after just completing a three-city road trip where the team went 4-6 with four losses coming on walk-off dingers while falling three games out of first place would be the beginning of the end. After all of Green's chirping about the players, the players whining about the manager and the manager and his coaching staff complaining to each other that the players don't care enough or don't take the losses as hard as they do, there was nothing more than a great big mess.

Call it As the Clubhouse Turns.

So all week this silliness is hanging over the team in its sheer pleonasm, causing anyone who wanders into the Phils' clubhouse to think what move they should make if a rumble breaks out between the players, coaches and media. Maybe that's why the press tends to gravitate toward the bat rack in the middle of the room — in case anything happens, they can come out swinging.

But something quite odd happened while all of this was going on. There were no fights, in fact, the warring factions were very complimentary of each other. Instead of folding up the tent and exposing their pink, rounded belly to the Atlanta Braves letting them run away with the NL East, the Phils got mad. And they fought back like a bunch of wolverines on speed.

Sound familiar?

More than 12 years ago, Bowa lost his job for many of the same reasons his players cite. One player, in a story published by the Philadelphia Daily News Tuesday, said the skipper is on them for even the most minute mistake and no one has a good word to say about him.

"He's a real good baseball man. He knows the game and fundamentals and nobody can get lackadaisical around him," a player told the Daily News. "If you make the same mistakes, he'll stay on top of you."

"The thing is, though, that it's a 162-game season. Guys are going to struggle, and he doesn't always seem to understand that. I think to say that [everybody hates him] might be a little overstated, but his approach might hurt in the long run.

"For a franchise-type player, [Bowa] might be a pretty good reason not to come back. Every player has his story. If you're on his good side, you're fine. But you can get on his bad side awfully quick, especially pitchers. He's definitely different than any manager I've ever seen in the big leagues. If I was a manager, I definitely wouldn't be like that."

Some of the players may not want to admit it, but Bowa has a lot to do with the team's success this season. His predecessor, Terry Francona, was widely liked by all of his players but last year they only won 65 games for him. Already this season, the Phils have won 66 for Bowa — maybe that's because he won't aw-shucks a loss. Last year Francona was almost glib after a loss, giving the boilerplate answer of: "We're still running them out. Our guys haven't quit."

This season, losses sting and Bowa takes them hard. When his team loses, Bowa feels the loss like it's something personal. He manages his team like they are a college basketball team in late February who desperately needs a couple of more wins to get off the bubble and get into the NCAA Tournament. It's a nice attitude to have but can be a bit grating if you're a player. How would you like it if your boss pointed out all of your tiniest mistakes and told you that you're costing the company millions because you forgot to dot one "I." Chances are you would lash out.

Barring a collapse where the Phillies fail to win at least 15 more games, Bowa will be the National League manager of the year, just as Green was in 1980. But instead of emulating that abrasive style, perhaps there could be a lesson learned from those halcyon days.

The year following the World Series victory in 1980, the Phils jumped out to a big lead in the NL East. But just before the player's strike in 1981, the team was so fed up with Green that they couldn't take it anymore. Winning just wasn't worth it anymore.

So it had to end like something out of Shakespeare. Green, the only man to lead the Phils to a title was exiled to Chicago and took Bowa and Ryne Sandberg with him. After a NL East title in 1984, Green was on the move again, proving that maybe professional athletes don't need a drill sergeant.

Hopefully, Bowa and the rest of the Phils can learn from the franchises' history. Lord knows a lot of it has been repeated ad infinitum for 13 of the last 14 years around here.

Who's Up First
One thing Bowa has been able to do well is measure the whims and rhythms of who is ready to go on a big hitting surge and who isn't. Take the most recent lineup change for instance.

Just after the All-Star Break, the Phillies were 7-12 with Doug Glanville leading off, Jimmy Rollins hitting second and Marlon Anderson flip-flopping between seventh and eighth in the order. Two weeks ago, Bowa moved Anderson to the two-hole, Rollins to the leadoff spot and Glanville to seventh. Since then, they are 9-4.

The players have benefited too. Rollins is 12-for-47 in the top spot with two homers and three stolen bases. Glanville is 7-for-30, including a 0-for-5 Tuesday night in Milwaukee. Anderson is 12-for-37 with eight runs hitting second and has hit in eight of nine games since being moved up.

Quote of the Week
"I thought I had a so-so series."

— Scott Rolen after going 8-for-11 with three home runs against the Dodgers, which helped him earn National League player of the week honors.

Stat of the Week
Wins in 2000: 65.
Wins in 2001: 66.

Bull's Eye
It seems slugging left fielder Pat Burrell has caught the eye of a former Phils' left fielder who was known to smack a few into the upper deck at the Vet.

Fan-favorite Greg Luzinski was at the Vet last weekend to take part in the Phils' alumni weekend and apparently sought out the young slugger to talk a little ball.

Although much more athletic than Luzinski, Burrell's game is uncannily similar to the Bull's. In his first full season in 1972, Luzinski belted 18 homers on his way to 307 in an often brilliant but sometimes injury-plagued career. He also hit .281 with 68 RBIs and 114 strikeouts.

Burrell also belted 18 homers last season, drove in 79 with 139 whiffs and a .261 batting average. If he picks up the pace, he could match Luzinski's second year homer numbers. In 1973, he smacked 29 dingers with 97 RBIs and 139 strikeouts to go with a .285 average. Burrell's on pace for 23 homers, 95 RBIs and a .270 average.

However, Burrell's 123 whiffs should surpass the Bull's numbers.

During a career that spanned 15 seasons, Luzinski hit .300 four times, hit over 30 homers four times and drove in 100 or more runs four times. Looks like Burrell has a pretty good mentor in the Bull and it's impressive that he was willing to take the time to listen to an old, wise player.

Then again, it's not like Burrell shouldn't know who Luzinski is. After all, Burrell chased all of the Bull's records at Reading during the 1999 season.

On the Horizon
The two games left against Milwaukee on Wednesday and Thursday will be the easiest ones for the Phils over the next few weeks. Friday night, they open a tough, weekend series against the Cardinals in St. Louis before heading home to face the Central-leading Astros for three games and the West-leading Diamondbacks for four more.

Beginning with Tuesday night's 10-4 win in Milwaukee, the Phils face a stretch where they will play 26 games in 27 days and only have three more off days the rest of the season.

Bowa called the homestand against Houston and Arizona "a minefield."

John R. Finger
ComcastSportsNet.com