Any professional who talks to the media about his area of expertise is succeptible to a certain level of contrarianism. Legend has it that even God the Creator once answered a question with the words, “I don’t know if ‘rest’ is the word I’d use to describe that seventh day, but. . .” So when the man responsible for the short and long-term success of the Phillies organization said on Monday afternoon that he doesn’t “do five-year plans,” it may have offered more of an insight into his psychology ...

RIP, Stan Lopata…

Stanley Edward Lopata died Saturday from heart complications at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania at age 87.

Stan played for the Phillies from 1948 to 1958, accumulating a .257 batting average with 25 triples, 116 home runs and 395 RBI in 822 games.

His biggest year was 1956 when he had 33 doubles, seven triples, 32 homers, 95 RBI and a .267 batting average. He was selected to the National League All-Star team in 1955 and 1956.

Among Phillies catchers, he ...

Who Is the Ornery American National Leaguer?

Already in an ornery mood after his team followed a five-game winning streak with a four-game losing skid, the manager became agitated and went on a lengthy rant about his team’s struggles in general when asked about Howard’s place in the lineup.

“How many runs did we score last night?” Manuel said of a 3-2 defeat. “[Howard] knocked in one of them. What the [bleep] are you getting at? Who’s going to hit there? Let me ask you a question. Let me turn ...

Praying for a second chance…

Ryan Howard being on pace for just 18 home runs this season:

“That’s just unacceptable. Is he healthy? I would think Ryan Howard would hit 18 home runs if his eyes were closed.”

Ryan Howard’s approach at the plate:

“His job is not to go up there and work the coun. Hey in the eyes of a lot of people he earned his $20 million, that’s just the way baseball’s played today, but you got to have a guy that can make some contact sometimes when you got a ...

In The Beginning Was The End…

It is June 10 and Ryan Howard has seven home runs in 231 trips to the plate. Seven home runs used to constitute a good week for the slugger. Among full seasons, his previous low for home runs on June 10 was ten in 2010. His .185 isolated power this year is 90 points below his career average and his .306 weighted on-base average nearly matches his output last year when he was hobbled by his Achilles.

The biggest and most obvious change is that Howard struggles ...

Blow-Up: At the dazzle and madness of oldsters today!

CSNPhilly.com’s Jim Salisbury has a very wide-ranging interview today with Philadelphia Phillies GM Ruben Amaro Jr. which touches on pretty much every issue with his baseball 64 games into the season. Amaro admits that they simply haven’t gotten the production they expected to get out of their veterans, citing Ryan Howard’s very poor output (related) as well as injuries to Chase Utley and Carlos Ruiz.

RAJ admits that Ben Revere has ...

Is J.R. Gamble The Next ........

While Apel’s story is surely one to watch moving forward, 16th-overall pick, J.P. Crawford is compelling as well.

Crawford, who ranked 19th on MLB.com’s Top 100 Draft Prospects list, is the cousin of the Dodgers outfielder Carl Crawford, so you know multi-tooled dopeness is in the genes.

He’s also a rare “black” shortstop, considered by many experts to be the best middle infielder in the draft and only one of three taken in the first 20 picks.

Most ...

Sports! Paul brings the case against his friend Jeremy. Paul loves to wear his favorite baseball team’s gear to games, even when that team isn’t playing the game.

At issue: is it okay to wear a Phillies hat, jersey, t-shirt, and (possibly) pair of crocs to a Dodgers-Reds tilt in Dodger Stadium?

Plus…The Domonic One has 2 more taters tonight.

This may come as a surprise if you’ve watched him play lately, but Domonic Brown — Phillies outfielder and current team leader in home runs with 13 — was having trouble hitting a single ball out of the park during batting practice Thursday afternoon before a game against the Red Sox.

Make no mistake: The ball was carrying in the late-day heat, teammates were reaching the small pockets of early gatherers at Citizens Bank Park with ...

It has been nearly 16 years since Philadelphia lost Richie Ashburn, one of the greatest Phillies players of all time. The beloved Hall of Famer, who played for the team from 1948 through 1959, died of a heart attack in 1997 after broadcasting a Phillies-Mets game from Shea Stadium. His family buried him in the cemetery outside of Gladwyne Methodist Church, where all was quiet until some developers announced plans to turn the church into condos and put a parking lot next to the cemetery. ...

“I scare myself
and I don’t mean lightly
I scare myself
it can get frightenin’”

Chase Utley swung for the first time in batting practice Tuesday and it did not feel right. He took a second hack, then another, and one more. That is when he went to Charlie Manuel and told him his right side hurt.

“It definitely scared me a little bit,” Utley said Wednesday.

Depending on what an MRI examination Thursday in Philadelphia shows, the Phillies could be without their second baseman and top offensive ...

New Green book looks to be a diamond Dallas page turner.

It is a good, lively book and it mirrors Green’s good, lively 6 decades in the game. He rips only three people, Bobby Valentine, Art Mahaffey and Gene Mauch.

“Valentine is a phony and that’s what I call him in the book,” Green grumbles, choosing to skip details of the possible backstabbing while Dallas managed the Mets.

He reveals that in the minors Mahaffey cared only about his numbers. “He didn’t root for other guys to win, because ...

Get ready for WORLD WAR Z.

The Phillies have officially announced the signing of Carlos Zambrano to a minor league deal. He will report to extended Spring Training in Clearwater, Fla. Zambrano is represented by Praver/Shapiro, as shown in MLBTR’s Agency Database.

The 31-year-old Zambrano had previously agreed to a contract with the Long Island Ducks of the Atlantic League but never signed the contract as he continued to look for employment with a Major League team.

After spending parts of ...

Sufferin’ seeds of terror, I was hoping for…

“I’ve been thinking the last couple of days. I just felt like I should address the fans.

“I know there is a lot of mixed opinions on pitching, not pitching, all that kind of stuff. I know there are people who are disappointed about how I pitched the last two years. I know there are a lot of people who are very supportive. So, one, I just wanted to thank them for their support. And my heart goes out to all of the people who spend all of their ...

Will the rotator cuff tear be repaired, or will the joint just be cleaned out, referred to as a debridement? The thickness and location of the tear will likely be the determining factors. If the labrum shows degenerative wearing at the edges, it may only require a bit of smoothing out. If a labral tear is evident once they are in the joint, Halladay will require a more robust surgery.  [...]  It is likely that Halladay is looking at a minimum six-month recovery if more than a simple debridement ...

All the signs were there. Roy Halladay, a former Cy Young Award winner whose success has been predicated on his control, threw more than a handful of pitches Sunday that were miles out of the strike zone. When he did throw it over the plate, it was blasted into the outfield or over the fence by hitters who normally wouldn’t stand a chance.

The sines of his arm angles kept dropping

So it wasn’t the 7.96 ERA over his last three seasons that made Mitch Williams retire. It was the fun factor! #tommyrot

This team I did pick to win the AL West because I thought the additions of Josh Hamilton and Jason Vargas would help them because they are both low-key players who would fit in to the Angels clubhouse — which I have since found out from a player who has since left was not a very cohesive clubhouse. And it shows on the field.

Harold Reynolds pointed out one specific play ...

Neck Twitch Of The Death Nerve Strikes Again!

Mitch Williams appeared on 94.1 WIP this morning and ripped into Phillies pitching coach Rich Dubee, saying the Phillies need a new man for the job.

He said Roy Halladay‘s problems were a simple mechanical fix that Dubee simply could not find. He mentioned an encounter he had with Dubee in Spring Training, when Dubee yelled at him for trying to talk to his pitchers, although he claimed that did not make his criticism this morning personal. ...

“The Fire Rube train is now boarding.”

I glanced at the screen as the game went to commercial and noticed that the Phillies had one hit. One ####### hit. Against Trevor Bauer, who I never heard of until yesterday.

You know who else noticed that the Phillies offense had one ####### hit through five? The pitcher, Cliff Lee: [Matt Gelb on Sulia]

  “They pretty much pounded us both games, there’s no way around it,” Lee said. “They crushed us both games. It was never really close, ...

Ruben’s team…forced to close due age/health infractions.

Ruben Amaro, Jr. may be one of the more polarizing general managers in baseball today. In an age when most acknowledge more information is better, and better information is worth more than ever before, Amaro has publicly admitted his front office doesn’t employ an analytics department. This effectively foregoes about 50 percent of all available types of information. How someone in charge of a hundred million dollar business could do that ...

Phillies outfielder Delmon Young opened the year on the DL following offseason ankle surgery, but he moved closer to joining the team on Sunday by playing in his first official minor league rehab game. He went 1-for-4 with a sacrifice fly and a strikeout for the team’s High Class-A affiliate in Clearwater.

Defensively, the 27-year-old Young had seven balls hit to him in right field and he misplayed two of them, including turning a would-be single into a triple. Following the game, GM Ruben ...

Ruben: Handbook of the Elementary.

GM Ruben Amaro is shocked — shocked! — that his team isn’t drawing walks.

Via Kevin Tresolini:

  “I think it’s ridiculous that we’ve had no walks in three days,” general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. said. “I cannot believe it. More importantly, it’s about not just walks, but producing, and we haven’t done that. We haven’t gotten hits, period. We haven’t gotten hits with runners in scoring position, we haven’t gotten hits to lead off ...

On Tuesday night against Atlanta, Royals second baseman Chris Getz did this for the first time since 2009, for the first time in 954 at-bats ...

That would be third home run of his career, which to date spans 1,350 plate appearances.

Getz’s rare clout calls to mind current notable homerless streaks—a list from which Getz has, of course, just removed himself. Here’s the rundown from FoxSports Kansas City’s Joel Goldberg:

Ben Revere it is! Revere, it should be noted, has no ...

Unless you’re on some really heavy duty shiit.

The Phillies must also operate on faith alone when it comes to their lineup, which was no match for young Mets righthander Matt Harvey’s mid-to-high-90s fastball. They managed four hits, one of them for extra bases, and struck out 10 times in 30 at-bats. The biggest piece, naturally, is Ryan Howard, who went 0-for-3 with two strikeouts and a sacrifice fly and is now 4-for-27 with 10 strikeouts and no extra-base hits. But they also need more out ...

Chino chimes in…“Fantasy owners, it’s a different story.”

Ryan Howard had a rough afternoon before singling in the ninth inning Sunday at Citizens Bank Park.

The Phillies’ first baseman had struck out three times in his first four at-bats. Even with the single, he is hitting .167 (4-for-24) with three RBIs, two walks and eight strikeouts in six games. He is still looking for his first extra-base hit.

“I think a lot of guys come out sometimes, you play two or three games, and if you don’t hit ...