• March 28, 2024

Projections For The 2014 Phillies

cleebeastTomorrow afternoon, the Philadelphia Phillies’ 2014 campaign will get underway.

Reasons For Optimism

The top of the rotation could still be a strength for this team. Cliff Lee is still an elite pitcher. Cole Hamels has been making progress with his rehab, and if he’s his old self he’ll form a great one-two punch with Lee. A.J. Burnett should serve as a fine compliment as the team’s third starter. These three have the ability to go deep into games, and give the Phils a pretty decent chance to win their starts.

The bullpen has a chance to be much better this year than its been in recent seasons. We know that guys like Justin De Fratus and Jake Diekman have strong, talented arms, but they’ve been pressed into action during the last two seasons before they were ready for the majors. Maybe this is the year that they’re able to put it together an become dependable seventh and eighth inning guys. B.J. Rosenberg and Brad Lincoln also had productive Spring Training games, and might have a chance to be decent as well.

A year ago, the team started the season with guys like Raul Valdes, Jeremy Horst, and Philippe Aumont out in their pen. You could take one look at each of those guys, and you just knew that they weren’t going to give the team anything that resembled quality relief pitching. At least this year when you look at the names on paper, you can see some glimmers of hope.

Offensively, the hope has to be that Ryan Howard is finally 100%, and can give you production at least somewhat close to what he was before the 2011 injury. Marlon Byrd was one of the only players that shined consistently at the plate during Spring Training, and he should be a noticeable upgrade over the garbage that the Phillies had been rolling out in right field last year (Delmon Young, Laynce Nix).

Causes For Concern

Age has been an issue with this team for several years, and with the same core group of players returning, its a problem that won’t be going away anytime soon. Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, and Carlos Ruiz are all shells of what they were in their primes, and the Phils are continuing to rely on them to recapture their glorious past. And even though Marlon Byrd played really well in Spring Training, he’s no spring chicken himself.

You look at this lineup, and you wonder where the runs are going to come from on a consistent basis. Every now and then, the old bats might turn back the clock and look good for a short stretch. But there’s also going to be too many stretches where this team will struggle to score more than two or three runs in a game.

The bottom of the rotation is going to be a concern, especially while Cole Hamels is out. Roberto Hernandez is a guy who has struggled to stay in the major leagues, and the team will be lucky to get 5-6 innings and less than five runs per start. Kyle Kendrick will have stretches where he looks like a competent pitcher, but will also have a couple of months where his ERA is north of 6.00. Jeff Manship is holding down a spot until Hamels returns.

My Projected Outcome: 76 Wins

I don’t think the Phillies are going to be a terrible team, but they just don’t have the talent, depth, or explosiveness to keep pace with the rest of the division.

I think they’ll hang around and keep things interesting up until Eagles Training Camp kicks off, and then they’ll slowly fade further out of the race as the year goes on.

Denny Basens

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paulman
paulman
March 30, 2014 5:34 pm

Maybe you should Start with the Correct Season Denny….
It’s 2014… 🙂

paulman
paulman
March 30, 2014 5:42 pm

This 2014 Team will be terrible and be 12 Games out by June 1st
By July Trade Deadline they will be buried as 1 of the worst Teams in the NL (along with the Cubs)
At Deadline Phils will Trade Lee, Adams, Papelbon and probably flat out release Jimmy Rollins since he won’t agree to waive Trade Clause
72-76 Wins with a battle for the basement in the NL East with the very young but talented Marlins.. Every other Team in the NL East improved while the Phils took another step back.. It’s simply foolish to believe the 5 Phils Core Players
Are going to stay healthy & productive over a 6 month season
While the Braves locked up their Core Young Players for the next 4-5-6 Seasons..

Eaglehaslanded
Eaglehaslanded
March 30, 2014 5:46 pm

Heartache and disappointment

mhenski
mhenski
March 30, 2014 6:18 pm
Reply to  Eaglehaslanded

This team reminds me or the land underneath the platt bridge on a hot summers day.

Eaglehaslanded
Eaglehaslanded
March 30, 2014 6:21 pm
Reply to  mhenski

LOL!!!

DCar
DCar
March 31, 2014 12:41 am
Reply to  mhenski

EWWW! That’s worse than trash truck juice! LOL!

DonP
DonP
March 30, 2014 8:36 pm

This team reminds me of the movie Deep Impact

eagles0superbowls
eagles0superbowls
March 30, 2014 8:53 pm

this team reminds me of the New York Knicks.

paulman
paulman
March 30, 2014 9:38 pm

I remember one of regular Posters telling me and DCar
That the Phils don’t rebuild they reload and were on equal footing with
The Yankees, Red Sox as far as the Organization
Fully committing to go all in every year..
We told him that was a croc 3 years agoOath and that window was closing quickly in 2012 and then again more so in 2013..
Now guess what, Phils could very well draw below 2 Million Fans for first time
In about 10 Years.. I am sorry to day the Phils are in for their typical lean years
That we all remember from the mid 90’s

DCar
DCar
March 31, 2014 1:02 am
Reply to  paulman

paul, please don’t start up his delusional @$$ again. He’ll go on for days, why it’s sports, it’s business, it’s hindsight, it’s armchair management, it’s injuries, we are fraud fans, we are bandwagon fans, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH! Dude, is an irrational, blindly loyal, lemming, who doesn’t want anyone to have a voice, or mind of their own, & if you don’t share his alter bowing of his hero Ruin 2morrow, you aren’t a true fan, & don’t know sports. 3 years now, & he has yet to admit what a catastrophic failure Ruin 2morrow has been, now given me any credit for being right about him. He’d rather waste his time researching all of my prior posts, to find 1-2 things I was wrong about, rather admit he is wrong about Amaro. OOOOh forgive me for getting Papelbon, wrong, & saying we’d win the division in 2012. He always manages pick & choose what he wants, but conveniently leaves out the conversations after those comments. At least when I’m wrong, I admit it, like a man, & eat crow. Some people can’t handle the truth. Amaro is an unqualified, inept, moron, who only got his job, because of the friendship, & loyalty, .300 Monty has to his Father. He has managed to systematically destroy, an entire organization by his decisions, by good scouts unable to work for/ with him, & his non-creative, shortsighted decision making. We are now a hopeless franchise. We have no minor leagues! We have contracts, that nobody will trade for! We are ancient, injury prone, & declined in skill. This team has a looooooong way to go. But’ if he would have started the process of rebuilding after the 2011 season, & shedding some of those dinosaurs they have, we wouldn’t be in this predicament. If he was smart, proactive & creative enough, to make good trades, we be in this predicament. If he didn’t overpay, wasting money, bidding against nobody but himself in FA, we wouldn’t be in this predicament! Well, I hope he’s happy, we are officially back in the mid-late 90’s with this $#!t ownership, & front office! YAYYY!!!!

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 8:49 am
Reply to  paulman

Paul that describes my position back then but once I saw utley quit on the team, Howard regress and Reuben not trade quality assets like victorino pence utley Rollins for quality assets I knew we were fucked.

Dcar was always right about reub and I couldn’t say that definitively until this past season when he didn’t trade utley and or dump Pap smear. Paul u throw so much at the wall and aren’t extremely consistent so it’s hard for me to remember your point / assessment.

Regardless where we agreed or disagreed it was a fun run. Hopefully asche and Franco can play and we can get rid of the quitter utley this year and retool next year or year after

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 8:51 am
Reply to  mhenski

IMO the wheels fell off when we desperately signed that cancer and loser Pap smear and didn’t trade the quitter utley last year

paulman
paulman
March 31, 2014 10:06 am
Reply to  mhenski

That Off-Season of 2 Years ago set this Franchise Back
Time to Clean house and start anew, they won’t be competing in the NL East for some time with the younger and more talented Teams in NL East let alone the Standard of the NL the SL Cardinals or the Teams out West
(Dodgers,Giants,Diamondbacks)
They are not even close to Wild-Card Contention on the horizon so it will be a few Years before anyone sees Post-Season..

As far as my previous postings and thoughts on the Phils, I’ve been very consistent about their Lack Of Leadership,Eneergy and Talent and have stated so for 3 Years now.. DCar can vouge for my consistent stand on this Franchise that flushed a good thing down the Toliet by remaining too emotional and attached to their Core Player’s as they aged, became injury prone, etc,etc..
This is what happens to an “immarture” Franhchise that doesn’t know how to handle to succes.. You can just stand pat while Teams around you improve.. Look at the Cardinals, how they retool, address areas of need every off-season to field competitive Teams.. How they Draft and Develop Players.. It’s Night and Day, to be brutally honest, the Phils caught a little lightning in a bottle with some good Moves made by their previous GM who knew how to build a Team.. once the aging,big contracts, poor player development, poor free-agent signing, poor contracts startred to mount, there was no real vision or plan by the Current Front Office and now we as fans pay the consequence of wathing an old, lethargic, boring ass Team…

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 10:39 am
Reply to  paulman

paul this is where i dont get you. i agree with the cardinals for sure being the standard of excellence but giants? diamondbacks? dodgers? cmon if the phillies payroll and personnel were converted to either of those 3 teams you would be blasting them…. dodgers 220 mill payroll with insane and ridiculous bloated contracts everywhere and plenty of holes… giants are ok but holes everywhere and way to cheap… diamondbacks? please…

now i agree youve been consistent with “Lack Of Leadership,Eneergy and Talent” but thats just critiquing. what was your plan? not resign howard and put who in his place that bum singleton who cant even make the astroS? should we have got rid of utley in his prime?

should we have blown up the team up after a 102 win season where the lack of energy, leadership and talent did not stop us from dominating the regular season and getting beat by the cards? i just think its easy to say you didnt like the team for 3 years but that first year they had 102 wins and were favorites to win it all and just ran into a bad matchup (it happens)

dcar on the otherhand has been screaming reuben is a moron for years and i didnt see any evidence of it until last year…

its easy to identify problems but the part that matters if you can identify solutions and clearly our GM is too incompetent …

hopefully the phils shock us all this year

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 10:40 am
Reply to  mhenski

by the way Phillies shouldve took a flyer on grady sizemore instead of wasting everyones time with bubby areu

paulman
paulman
March 31, 2014 10:54 am
Reply to  mhenski

Sizemore had a great Spring and seems to finally b ehealthy after 2-3 Years of some bad luck and various injuries, still is probably about 30-31 Years Old..

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 11:01 am
Reply to  mhenski

yep and it was worth a gamble for 700k. reuben just shit on money when he gave abeau $1. that was the most idiotic phillies signing ive ever seen

haveacigar
haveacigar
March 31, 2014 11:10 am
Reply to  mhenski

abreau only got that money had he made the major league roster. that said i like sizemore..i was swearing off gcobb and the phils if he came north!

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 11:21 am
Reply to  mhenski

im certain bubby areua got at least $1 for spring training and that was too much for a 42 year old career loser that was a loser when he was here in his prime

DonP
DonP
March 30, 2014 9:47 pm

Reuben has to go with the owners in order to fix this ship and whats the chances of that happening probably like hitting the powerball 2 weeks in a row. Get used to them being bad lotta yrs and as far as attendance I dont think they make 2million I looked at this month schedule they gonna be buried already. We have no farm system, nothing to draw off of at all,amaro wont go owners wont sell to someone that cares so its hopeless and watching this old washed up has been team aint my cup of tea I wont be watching them or going to games I advise everyone stay home do spend the bread on this debacle maybe it gets fixed in 3-5 yrs if not frigg them.

atra1781
March 30, 2014 10:59 pm

72-90

Fire sale wiil begin early.

Team is full of has beens and junk. Dom. Brown turns in a dud year hits 17 homer runs the whole year and is traded for Steve Jeltz JR.

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 2:35 pm

good start to the year for asche!

one thing remains consistent with this team cliff lee is a bulldozer!

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 2:38 pm
Reply to  mhenski

JROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL

championship

paulman and dcar i told you so phillies are gonna dominate FOREVER. haaaaaaaaa just kidding

mhenski
mhenski
March 31, 2014 2:54 pm
Reply to  mhenski

what i meant to say was dcar and paulman were right guy shouldve been traded long ago. fuckin gas can.

haaaaaaa

paulman
paulman
March 31, 2014 3:57 pm

I forgot about Opener Today against Long-Time Rival Rangers??
7-7 in the 5th .. Wow… R Howard batting 1.000% for the Season

pdiddy
pdiddy
March 31, 2014 5:29 pm

Offensive explosion, way to start the season boys.

pdiddy
pdiddy
March 31, 2014 5:32 pm

Please don’t blow this one Pap.

pdiddy
pdiddy
March 31, 2014 5:45 pm

Yes one down, 161 to go. Goooooo Phil’s!!!!

DCar
DCar
April 1, 2014 12:21 am

YAY!!!!