One of the Phillies biggest weaknesses last season was their lack of bench depth. The bench contributed almost nothing to the World Series run, with the possible exception of Matt Stairs, who scared Dodgers closer Jonathan Broxton into pitching around him in Game 4 of the NLCS. That walk lead to Jimmy Rollins game-winning hit and put the Phillies in a commanding 3-1 lead.
This season the bench is not looking much better. Greg Dobbs, Ross Gload, and Ben Francisco are all hitting below .200. In addition to poor hitting, Dobbs and Gload are also defensive liabilities. All three players show a lack of discipline at the plate, and swing at bad pitches way too often.
With the bench so ineffective, the Phillies can’t rest players like Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, and Jason Werth without putting a massive hole in a lineup that is already missing Rollins.
As bad as the heart of the order has been during the current hitting slump, the Phillies still feel better sending the starters out to battle through their struggles rather than resting them for a game or two with a bench player. This is a dangerous practice that could leave the Phillies with worn-out players by the end of the season.
The Phillies can’t continue with a bench this bad and expect to contend for a World Series again. A championship caliber team needs to have a dependable option or two off the bench. In 2008, the Phillies got strong contributions from Dobbs, Stairs, and Chris Coste. Right now, the Phillies don’t have a single player they can rely on to give them a decent pinch at-bat.
On the positive side, bench players can be found from all different sources, and at all different times during the season.  In fact, many times one man’s junk turns out to be another man’s treasure.
Stairs was a late season pick up in 2008 who was terrific for the Phils down the stretch. In 17 at-bats, Stairs had 5 hits, 2 homeruns, and 5 RBIs, not to mention the spectacular homerun against the Dodgers in the post season.  Coste came up from the minors as a 33 year old rookie and knocked in 36 runs in 2008.
So there are always players who will be available to help, and there is no doubt that Ruben Amaro is not only concerned by the weakness of the bench, but is already scouring the league looking for this year’s jewels. Amaro has not had much luck finding bench players recently but that can change with one sharp move.
What’s hurting the Phillies is the middle of the line-up is all slumping at the same time.
Utley average has dropped 50 pts in the last 4 weeks, something is wrong with him (probably his Hip
or leg area for his swings lately look to be all arm and doesn’t appear to be using his lower body as
much in his swings..) , Howard is hitting pretty good but has led-off too any innings or is coming up with not many baserunners on. Werth has cooled down after a hot start but appears to getting his stroke back and Ibanez has been slumping all season and looks like his reaction time is slower versus the fastball which he was killing last year…
One thing I notice is that opposiing teams/pitching staffs who throw a lot of junk pitches (sliders,curves,cutters,change-ups) are giving this line-up fits and especially left-handed pitchers who
really change speeds..
Bottom line is that this 2010 Phillie has not played very well for most of the season,
take out their 8-2 fast start versus last place teams like Nationals & Astros, and they are below
.500 with a 22-24 record since then… They haven’t even played the Dodgers,Reds yet and have a difficult stretcg versus the hot Red Sox,Yankees,Blue Jays and Twins who all have been playing better than this years version of the Phils…
Call me crazy, the Phills really started to slump as a team shortly after announcing a long-term deal with R Howard was reached… any coincidence…. I don’t know , but I do know that there will be no
Postseason for Phils unless they snap out of this funk and soon..