Hello Fans,
Last week brought about a managerial milestone in Philadelphia. Charlie Manuel, the skipper with back to back Fall Classic appearances in ’08 and ’09, including a title during the former, reached his 1,000th career victory. His Phillies defeated the Atlanta Braves 5 to 1 at Turner Field in Georgia. Depsite a tough 2013 season for the Phillies due to injuries and an aging roster, an accomplishment such as this would seem to be cause for celebration. One would think everything was just peachy in the Peach State, right? Maybe not.
Manuel, as of last Monday, was 780 and 636 in Philly since his tenure began in 2005. That’s good for a .551 winning percentage, an impressive clip. In fact, it’s the 31st highest of all time for managers with 600+ games managed. And in reaching the 1K plateau, he became the 59th skip to do so. Twenty nine of the 58 men above him are in the Hall of Fame as either a player or manager, which explains the significance of the milestone. Oh and don’t forget that Tony LaRussa, Joe Torre, and Bobby Cox are waiting for the call from the Hall, and Terry Francona and Dusty Baker aren’t done writing their bodies of work yet either. They represent 5 of those 58 above him. He may never be Hall material, but he’s had an impressive career nontheless.
You get the picture. It is a major accomplishment and the vast majority of it was done in Philly. Manuel is practically an icon to the city. The next logical step would be to commemorate the occasion at the next home game. And that’s exactly what the team’s p.r. department had intentions of doing. Sadly, they never got the chance. The big boys of the front office had other plans. They CANNED Manuel a week ago Friday, the day of the scheduled pre-game festivities. WOW! You just don’t see that everyday, nor should you.
From here, it looks like that worked out just fine thank you (except for the dissing of Manuel). And not because the Phils got up and coming manager and legendary Hall of Fame second sacker Ryne Sandberg (originally a Phillie by the way) from their Triple-A affiliate Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs either. Rather, the Dodgers were in town. The red-hot, Yasiel Puig and Clayton Kershaw-led L.A. Dodgers, fresh off the one of the hottest road streaks ever, stopped at 15 games by St. Louis. The Dodgers were 42-8 overall since early June. That’s ridiculous and tied for the best 50 game stretch EVER.
Well, the Dodgers took care of business in the first two games last weekend as if they were sticking up for Manuel. It seemed like poetic justice. Sandberg had to wait until Sunday for his first big-league managerial ‘W’, a 3 to 2 game closed out by Jonathon Papelbon. However, Zack Greinke led the Friday shutout of the Phils 4-nil and Kershaw followed that Saturday as the Dodgers shut ’em out again, this time 5-nothing. In those two games COMBINED, Philly’s hitters mustered a paltry 6 hits and committed 4 errors to boot, no pun intended. The Dodgers rained on a parade that never was, but should’ve been.
Here’s why. The Phillies aren’t going anywhere. They’re well out of the playoff races and are now twelve games under five hundred. I know these teams are multi-hundreds of millions of dollars a year businesses, but you mean to say they couldn’t hold off a couple days or a series even to do Manuel’s hard work and time with the club justice? Even Sandberg would have benefitted starting out against Colorado, their next opponent following those historically hot Dodgers. This club can’t be in that big of a hurry and 40 games is plenty of time to begin a new era. Plus, they already had Sandberg in the organization so there was no risk in losing him to a higher bid, etc. Also, let’s not forget that it wasn’t Manuel’s fault that Roy Halladay’s shoulder fell apart or that Ryan Howard and Chase Utley aren’t what they used to be or that Cole Hamels isn’t having quite the year he’s gotten accustomed to. I’m not one to justify protecting a manager for too long when the team isn’t performing up to expectations, i.e. Mike Scioscia’s Angels (stay tuned there), but nobody really thought the Phillies were making a big run this year anyway. It was a poor move and worse timing to say the least. Nice work Charlie and good luck Ryne, I think you’ll need it.
Later Fans.