With the start of Spring Training rapidly approaching, the Phillies will be scouting the field for possible players to fill up their bench positions.
With Ross Gload, Brian Schneider, and any combination of Domonic Brown/Ben Francisco/John Mayberry Jr. occupying the bench, the Phils will need to fill up a few more spots by either calling up some of their minor league players or brining in some fresh faces.
Considering that most of the remaining free-agents will sign for relatively cheap, the Phillies could strike a deal to acquire a low risk-high reward type of player.
The Good Phight, a Phillies blog, recently suggested the idea of Philadelphia signing Lastings Milledge, only if he were to sign for the league minimum.
In my opinion, bringing in Milledge would be a great move.
Although it seems he has played in the majors for a long time, he is still young at 26 years old, and he has plenty of time to turn things around in his career.
He’s been a major underachiever throughout his career, going from the New York Mets’ top prospect to a struggling free-agent who may have to play for the league minimum in the upcoming season.
Over his career, Milledge is batting .269 and is coming off a season in which he batted .277 with 34 RBI’s for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
He never batted over .272 during his two seasons with the Mets, but he has seen a slight increase in his average since he joined the Pirates back in 2009. He has combined for eight homeruns the past two years, with only one season of 10 or more home runs (14 in 2008).
He would also present the Phillies with an above average defender and base-runner, totaling 40 stolen bases over his four-year career.
But more importantly, as I have already mentioned before, he is just turning 26 years old this year. The possibility of him turning things around isn’t as far-fetched of an idea as some people think. As we have all seen before, Jayson Werth didn’t peak until he was in his late 20’s, so why can’t Milledge do just that?
And who knows, with the right field position still up in the air, maybe Milledge could bring some healthy competition into Spring Training.
