Good Luck, Chuck

In the interest of full disclosure; and in case you didn’t know by now, I am a die-hard Philly sports nut. I live and die (mostly die) with my Eagles, Flyers, Sixers and Phillies. It is not easy being a Philly fan. Oftentimes we are locking horns with our Big Apple neighbors. Barbs fly about the lack of any recent success by the Philly franchises. The Eagles have never won a Super Bowl. Sixers haven’t won since 1983. Flyers? 1975. Phillies hadn’t won since 1980. All in all, to be a Philly fan, you had to display a certain love of masochism. No Philly team had won anything since I had been born. All of that changed in 2008. 

In the 1990’s the Phillies were one of the worst teams in baseball. After a failed trip to the World Series in 1993, the baseball strike and the arrival of the Atlanta Braves pushed Philly back down the NL East. Ed Wade and Pat Gillick had shaped the Phillies roster with young, vibrant talent such as Cole Hamels, Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley. With the arrival of Charlie Manual in 2004, the Phillies continued an upward trend that would lead them to their second World Series title in history in 2008. After that season, Gillick retired. His assistant Ruben Amaro Jr. was hired. And the ship came slowly crashing down. 

 

In 2009, the core of the unit was kept intact and the pitching was bolstered by the additions of Cliff Lee and Pedro Martinez. The Phillies would again reach the World Series, but lost to the NY Yankees.  From that year on, Ruben would trade promising prospects for players such as Roy Halladay and Roy Oswalt. Obviously, Roy Halladay was and is a great player, but the point of the matter is that Ruben had gotten “win-now” syndrome: he mortgaged the future in exchange for jamming the title window open. 

This was the same trap that befell the 2011 Eagles. Having come close to beating GB in 2010, they went all “Madden” on the league and tried to buy their way to a title. The problem was that A) he was trading away way too much talent, and B) he wasn’t trading for the right players. Halladay, Lee and Hamels would have been sufficient pitching to win. Meanwhile, the offense was getting older, and no promising young players were coming down the pipeline. 

Fast-Forward to now. The “win-now” approach has failed. The Phillies are expensive and the Phillies are old, the worst combo in sports. Ruben failed to give up any of his old players to restock the farm system, which remains almost barren. 

Today also marks what, in my eyes is an atrocity almost equal to Brian Dawkins being allowed to leave the Eagles; Ruben Amaro has fired World Series winning manager Charlie Manuel.  In a classic save my own ass maneuver, he has pinned these seasons failings on the manager. Is Charlie completely innocent? Absolutely not. The players don’t seem to be responding well. 

The blame, however, should be piled on Ruben. He failed to give what was plainly seen as an old offense any injection of life beyond Dom Brown. He was blind an stubborn and should be fired, having set back this organization many years. It was a coward’s act to get rid of Charlie. He deserved better than this. There was 6 weeks left in the season. He won the city’s only championship since 1983. He deserved better.

So to Charlie Manuel I say, Thank You very much for giving this Philly fan a reason to cheer. Thank you for finally allowing me to see a Parade down Broad Street. I wish you well in whatever job you take next. You were a class act.

In closing, I think Philly fans need to sit back and think about why we are so beleaguered by negativity. We should enjoy the success we have while we have it and we don’t. We should have more outrage when championship winning managers get run out of town by stupid GM’s that have success off other’s work. Ruben Amaro’s clock is now ticking. He no longer has any scapegoats to pin failure on. It now falls squarely on his shoulders. Like a good Philly fan, I’m not that excited by what’s coming next.