Much is being made of the fact that Jayson Werth is in the last year of his contract with the Phillies. Werth is due $7.5 million this year, which will make him the 7th-highest player on a team that has a $138 million payroll for the 2010 season. Ruben Amaro has made a lot of noise about the fact that this team is not the New York Yankees, presumably meaning that the Phillies cannot afford to have more than 4 or 5 players making more than $15 million per season. How this relates to their ability to resign Werth is unclear at this point, so let’s take a look at some of the Phillies’ payroll commitments for the near future.

In the short term, the six Phillies who will make more money than Werth this season are Ryan Howard ($19 million), Roy Halladay ($15.75), Chase Utley ($15.29), Raul Ibanez ($12.17), Brad Lidge ($12) and Jimmy Rollins ($8.5). All six of these players are under contract for the 2011 season and only two of them, Howard and Halladay, are due raises in ‘11 ($1 million and $4.25, respectively). This means that the Phillies are committed for about $88 million in 2011 for their top players and $133 million altogether.

Going a step further, Raul Ibanez’s advanced age and free agent status makes him a certain subtraction from the Phils’ payroll in 2012. Brad Lidge (who knows what he’ll be like in 2 years) is only due $1.5 million in 2012. Utley and Halladay are both under contract through the 2013 season so Jimmy Rollins will have to be renegotiated (2012 is the last year of his deal). With the bulk of the Phillies minor league talent existing in the form of outfielders, the need for Werth’s services past the 2011 season are questionable, which may make parting ways with him palatable for Amaro and the organization. But that all boils down to how much money Werth can expect from suitors in the free agency market.

Obviously, Ruben Amaro is better in touch with the mechanics of free agency than we are, so let’s just do a cursory look at what Werth, a career .265 hitter, can expect in the form of a raise. Statistically, Werth is coming off his most impressive season. He hit 50% more home runs in 2009 than in his next-most productive season (24 in 2008). He’s never tallied more than 100 RBI (max was 99 last season) and he’s never had an OPS better than .879. His career strikeout-to-walk ratio isn’t good (just about 1 BB for every 2 Ks) and while Werth does have good range in right field, his speed hasn’t translated that well to his stolen base totals: his best seasons were ‘08 and ‘09 where he stole 20 bases each season. For his career, he steals a base about once in every nine games he plays.

Let’s take Jason Bay’s signing by the Mets as a comparison. Bay’s contract will pay him $54.5 million over the next 4 years, plus a $17 million club option for 2014, meaning he’ll average about $13.63 million in his guaranteed years with the Mets. Considering Werth is making $7.5 million, should he expect a $6 million raise on par with a guy like Bay?

Like Werth, Bay has played 7 Major League seasons. His career average is .280. He hit the same number of home runs as Werth this past season (let’s consider Fenway Park and Citizens Bank Park to be washes in terms of their favorability to power hitters–two of the smallest lots in baseball). Bay has hit twice as many home runs in his career than Werth (185-93). Bay has tallied more than 100 RBI in 4 of his 7 seasons (119 in 2009) and has a career OPS of .896 which is better than Werth’s best single-season OPS. Bay’s SO-BB ratio is about 6% better than Werth’s. While Bay has a career best of 21 stolen bases (exceeding Werth’s best season), that was in 2005 and he only steals a base every 14 games.

We know the Mets are a relatively free-spending team when it comes to free agency. Considering they are spending less than $15 on Jason Bay (who has had a markedly better offensive career than Werth), can we really project that Werth will be able to command a contract that pays him in excess of $15 million per season? And assuming we can’t, how should we take Amaro’s argument that a likely parting with Werth will happen because the Phillies don’t want to overspend, on par with a team like the Yankees?

Jayson Werth is a very good outfielder who is coming off his best season. But it seems unlikely to me that Werth will command the kind of money that will prevent the Phillies from making him a competitive offer in free agency. So if the magic number is $140 million for 2011 and the Phillies are already committed to $133 million (with all the other top players under contract), it will be interesting to see how far over $140 Amaro will be willing to go to resign Werth.

Because Ruben Amaro thinks prospects are more important than winning, we thought we’d get you acquainted with some of them. Pictured above is Tyson Gillies who is one of three players acquired from the Seattle Mariners in exchange for Cliff Lee. Gillies is a 21-year old centerfielder from Vancouver and it must seem cruel to him that he has to toil at spring training for a team he won’t be playing for any time soon while the Olympics are going on in his hometown. The upside at spring training for Gillies is that now that Brett Myers is no longer a Phil, there’s no chance he’ll trade Gillies to Japan for a hot dog eater.

Another interesting thing about Gillies is that he’s legally deaf. That would seem to present little difficulty to a baseball player as really the only situation in the game that requires hearing is being called-off on a fly ball. And being deaf as a professional athlete playing in Philadelphia may actually be an advantage; assuming Gillies makes the big club, imagine the amount of crap his condition will prevent him from hearing from the media and fans in this town.

Ilya Kovalchuk was told yesterday by Atlanta Thrashers’ GM, Don Waddell, that he will be traded. That’s according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the same news outlet that lists Philadelphia, New Jersey, Boston, New York, L.A. and Calgary as Kovalchuk’s most-likely destination.

Several rumor mills have I.K. being traded as early as today. So when the Flyers don’t get him, you can say you heard it here first. My prediction is that Paul Holmgren will tell the media that they didn’t trade for Kovalchuk because of the promise they see in their young forwards. You know, kind of like Ruben Amaro saying that he wanted to replenish the farm system.

In fairness, Kovalchuk just turned down and 8-year deal with Atlanta that would have paid him $10 million annually. That tells you that he’s no cheap date. And as a guy with an expiring contract, any team that trades for him should probably be confident they can get a deal done (or simply rent him for a playoff run this season). But despite Kovalchuk’s relative anonymity, he is the NHL’s second-best goal scorer. If you’re a GM with any balls, you stick them out in the wind to get this guy.

It turns out Charlie Manuel would have liked Cliff Lee to stay in Philadelphia. Just like in the case of his wife’s decision to buy expensive furniture, however, Charlie was powerless to stop the front office from shitting its pants. This isn’t exactly a shocking revelation but the fact that he said so publicly is a refreshing piece of honesty, regardless of how obvious that honesty is. It’s like the opposite of the lying nonsense put forth by Manuel’s boss, Ruben Amaro, on the matter. Yes, Ruben, we believe you that given the choice between “replenishing the farm system” and having the N.L.’s best rotation headlined by 2 Yankee killers, the former was a hotter priority. Or that the $9 million they saved by letting Lee go is being put to better use in the form of Shane Victorino and Joe Blanton.

Sure, the manager always wants to keep the star player because that makes his job easier. Charlie doesn’t have to worry about contracts or free agents; he just needs to fill out the lineup card and pat his guys on their butts (and even a circus clown knows that Cliff Lee’s services should have been retained). I would have liked Lee to be back but oh well, I guess I’ll have to settle for Jose Contreras.

Eyebrows were raised this week when 2-time Cy Young winner, Tim Lincecum, asked for $13 million from the San Francisco Giants in his arbitration filing. The Giants are offering $8 million. Unlike other sports, in baseball arbitration the decision isn’t an arbitrated amount somewhere in the middle; it’s a process that results in either the team’s number or the player’s being awarded. The current record for money awarded through this process is $10 million (Ryan Howard, Francisco Rodriguez and Alfonso Soriano) which is probably why there’s so much noise about Lincecum’s request (for the record, Lincecum’s salaries during his two Cy Young seasons were $405,000 and $640,000).

The laugher in this year’s arbitration stakes is that Joe Blanton is asking for $10.25 million. Joe Blanton. $10.25 million. Granted, Blanton is a valuable middle of the rotation starter but this kind of request is about as reasonable as me asking for $50,000 for the work I do on this website. But that’s not even the punch line of the joke: the kicker is that the Phillies are offering $7.5 million.

Now take a moment and think about Ruben Amaro’s approach to the 2011 season with his offer to Joe Blanton in mind: if the Phillies are willing to pay the 3rd or 4th starter in their rotation $7.5 million this season (a guy with a career winning percentage of .538 and an ERA north of 4) why in the holy hell wasn’t Amaro willing to drop $1.5 million more on Cliff Lee?

There is no-one who lives in Philadelphia who will ever forget Game 1 of the 2009 World Series. Batter after batter on the most dangerous team in baseball came to the plate, and Cliff Lee just kept methodically mowing them down. Though our hopes would be dashed a little over a week later, the excitement we felt when Lee grabbed that chopper behind his back secured his status as a legend in this town, the same way that Aaron Rowand’s nosebreaking catch made him a Philly immortal. Two months later, he’s gone. And he can’t believe it.

“Disbelief. Shock. At first I didn’t believe it. I thought we were working out an extension with the Phillies and I was going to spend the rest of my career there.”

Even if he hadn’t worked out the deal, of course, the Phillies could have put away the National League by keeping Lee on the team. The combination of Halladay, Lee, and Hamels would have simply meant that the 162 game season and playoffs were a warmup for the World Series. Barring injury, this would have been the first National League team in a non-Wartime situation to go to three straight World Series since the early 1920s New York Giants. (Yeah, the Cards did in the 40s, but that’s when so many pros were at war that one armed guys played in the league. Doesn’t count.) That’s right. This Phillies team, for 9 million dollars, could have begun making their argument for being ONE OF THE GREATEST NATIONAL LEAGUE TEAMS OF ALL TIME. Instead, they decided to pick up a few players in the Mariners farm system. Just like they got prospects when they traded Bobby Abreu. How did “Replenishing the farm system” work out for the Phils that time? What’s Carlos Monasterios up to these days? The bottom line has nothing to do with prospects. It has to do with the Phillies being satisfied with “contending” instead of “dominating”. And they certainly will contend. But they blew their chance to end the 2010 National League season before it began. And if they don’t make it to the 2010 World Series and thus lose their chance to be one of the best teams ever, a replenished farm system is going to be very little consolation.

This picture from today’s Inquirer shows Carlos Ruiz breaking Game 1 wide open last night. His shot deep into the L.A. night put the Phillies on the right track and demonstrated why his continued offensive production is making him into one of the best catchers in baseball. Aside from Ruiz’s fabulous defensive skills, he’s developing into a potent bat in the back end of the order.

Great lineups aren’t defined as much by stars in the 3-4-5 spots as much as they are by trouble for the opposition in every spot. Like the Yankees, the Phils can do damage anywhere in their lineup which is why they’re never out of a game and why so few pitchers can go deep into games against them. Their depth means every inning is a concern for their opponents and the pressure that applies is a powerful intangible.

With Ruiz playing the way he is, it makes the Cliff Lee deal even sweeter in the sense that parting with Lou Marson looks even smarter now than it did then. Gambling that Ruiz’s development would continue and that he’ll backstop the Phils for years to come is looking more and more like a great bet on Ruben Amaro’s part. Go Phils!

Apparently Jamie Moyer is unhappy with the fact he’s been demoted to the bullpen. Of the impression he had that his starting spot in the rotation was guaranteed, Moyer said the following:

Ultimately, I’m a little disheartened because I know this past winter, when I was negotiating with the Phillies, this was a sore thumb, if you will, about this potentially happening. You can’t promise anything in this game, but I really feel like Ruben kind of parlayed to me that this type of situation would not happen.

In response, Ruben Amaro said “and you and your agent assured me and my staff that you wouldn’t suck.”

Of course Amaro didn’t say that but perhaps he should have. Obviously, the contract negotiations included the part about how the Phillies would intend to continue using Moyer as he’s always been used: as a starter. But nowhere is it written that he is inked-in for 40 starts during the season. Especially when his ERA ranks 91st in the N.L. among all pitchers who’ve started a game this year.

On one hand, I feel bad for Moyer because his benching really doesn’t accomplish anything. His replacement, Pedro Martinez, is most-likely not going to pitch his way into the playoff rotation so Moyer’s being cooled for a long shot. But on the other hand, Moyer has been around long enough to realize that performance dictates playing time. At some point (Brad Lidge) the manager has to make a change when something isn’t working (Brad Lidge) regardless of how dear the player is to the team’s soul.

Jamie Moyer (10-7, 5.32) will fire the Phils’ first shots tonight in a three-game series against the Colorado Rockies. Opposing him will be Jason Hammel (5-6, 4.66), who, not surprisingly, has a lower ERA than Moyer. What is surprising is that his ERA is lower than his near-namesake and fading ace, Cole Hamels (4.68). Well at least it’s close.

Just because Cliff Lee made the Giants look like a bunch of circus monkeys last week in his much-hyped debut doesn’t mean we’re all sold on the state of the Phillies pitching. Sounds like Ruben Amaro is however. The way things currently stand the best-possible playoff starting rotation would be Lee, Hamels, Blanton and Happ. Of course, there are many out there who would argue that Jamie Moyer should be in the rotation because he’s from Souderton. Oh well, either way that rotation is out-matched by St. Louis and San Francisco. To that effect Bill Conlin chimed in earlier today.

I don’t want to get too down on the Phillies. After all, they always manage to beat bad teams (provided they’re not A.L. teams). And I’m really not trying to knock Ruben Amaro; the guy’s done a pretty good job in his first year (see Raul Ibanez and Cliff Lee). But there are big question marks in the starting rotation as well as in the bullpen, most notably Cole Hamels and Lights-On Lidge. Hopefully, when Condrey and Romero return from injury and Pedro is ready to go (whatever that may mean), Charlie Manuel Rich Dubee will be able to fit the puzzle pieces correctly.

With the clock winding down on the media frenzy surrounding Roy Halladay, the only thing Phils fans need to do is wait with fingers crossed. Rumors are popping-up like crazy about whether or where Halladay will land. Yesterday it was Boston and today it’s the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Linked is an interesting take on the situation from a Dodgers’ perspective. While Ruben Amaro can’t be faulted for making a great trade for Cliff Lee, there remains a down side for the Phillies with Halladay still out there: the potential impact he’ll have if traded to another contender.

People are quick to point out that the addition of a starter to a team impacts one out of every five games. But when you’re talking about teams with at least two quality starters already there, the arrival of a front man takes pressure off the rest of the rotation and makes the 3-5 spots that much stronger.

I’m not going to suggest the Dodgers have a better top-3 with Kershaw, Billingsley and Halladay but I will say I’d prefer not to test that theory. The danger in getting Lee with 2 days to go before the deadline is that the Jays’ price is now lowered since their previous best-bet is no longer an option. The hope has to be that the Jays are going to sit on Halladay another year. If that happens, Amaro looks like even more of a genius than he already does.