Lee To The Phillies, Can You Say Repeat?

Last year’s Cy Young to last year’s champions, sounds like a move towards a successful title defense to me. The Phillies are loaded like a freshman at his first fraternity party!

Now while I definitely want to talk some Cliff Lee today, I’d first like to say a few words about the late Jim Johnson.

While most of us never knew him personally, the former Eagles defensive coordinator was a source of pride for Birds fans this past decade. We love our players and coaches to attack you (see Ryan, Buddy), and we also like a guy that tells it like it is. Johnson gave us both in spades.

With Jeremiah Trotter up the middle and Brian Dawkins, the Eagles made their bones in the early Andy Reid era with a dominant defense. While Donovan McNabb struggled to find his early career consistency with a mediocre receiving corps, Johnson’s crew — led by Dawkins, Trotter, defensive end Hugh Douglass, and defensive tackle Corey Simon — was the heart of the teams that made those first trips deep in the NFC playoffs.

When age and free agency ate away at the talent on the defensive side of the ball the Eagles fell from their high ground in the NFC East. While Dallas and New York gained on us in recent years, last season’s turnaround was keyed by a defensive renaissance.  Johnson’s defense finished third overall in yards allowed and fourth in points allowed (one of the stats that Johnson cared the most about), and once again the Birds had a date with in the NFC Title Game. (I’m just going to pretend that’s the end of the story for the ‘08 team. Please don’t mention anything about Larry Fitzgerald, I’m begging you.)

My dad would always point out how Johnson would wag his tongue between plays. (I used to do the same thing when I colored as a little kid.)

While it made us laugh, we knew it was because Jimmy J. was concentrating hard on what he was going to throw next at the opposing quarterback. Most of the time, the other QB didn’t know what player or what position was about to hit him. I’ll miss that.

Rest in piece, Mad Scientist.

Anyway, on to the good news: the Phillies just sent notice to the rest of baseball that the defending champions are not satisfied with just one title.

The Phils sent three Triple-A prospects (catcher Lou Marson, infielder Jason Donald, and starting pitcher Carlos Carrasco) and one Single-A prospect (fireball pitcher Jason Knapp) to the Cleveland Indians for Cliff Lee and bench player Ben Francisco. In other words, we sent four guys there weren’t not good enough to play in the majors for the best pitcher in the AL last year. (Remember, the Toronto Blue Jays wanted starting pitcher J.A. Happ, top minor league arm Kyle Drabek, and top position prospect Dominic Brown for super ace Roy Halladay.)

While the drop off from Halladay to Lee is minimal, the Phillies were able to avoid giving up the three key players in their future. Talk about your no brainers — even Ed Wade would’ve done this.

I know a lot of Phillies fans were dying for Halladay, and you can’t blame them one bit. This trade for Lee, however, has a lot to do with what General Manager Ruben Amaro Jr. was willing to part with. The rookie GM seems to have pulled a rabbit out of his hat.

Here is why I think the Lee trade is easily more valuable than the proposed Halladay trade.

• Carrasco and Donald are not better than the team’s current options and Knapp is a few years away from any impact, so Marson is the only loss that hurts the team in the near future. Current backstop Carlos Ruiz will never make anyone forget Johnny Bench (or Mike Lieberthal for that matter), and Marson was beginning to look like the catcher of the future. Looks like the team will continue to look for the preverbial catcher of the future. (Of course, if Ruiz has another World Series like he did against Tampa Bay, good riddance Sweet Lou!)
• This move allows the Phillies to keep Happ and Drabek. Young J.A. has been a solid pro in every one of his starts, but more importantly, the Phils have him for cheap for several more years. Giving him away certainly would’ve hurt the back end of the rotation. Drabek, on the other hand, seems ticketed for the front end of the Phillies rotation sometime in the next season or two. Like Hamels before him, Drabek was given the “untouchable” decree from the Phils front office. Now, whether he’ll be taking the Hamels route or the Gavin Floyd detour to stardom…
• The only thing I had against the Halladay trade was not wanting to disturb the current Phillies hot streak. By not dealing anyone from the 25 man roster, problem solved! (On a side note, my dad would like to pass along that he was against the Polanco trade mainly because he thought that Polanco should have been moved to third base. Like the rest of the Philly Phaithful, my dad wasn’t too fond of David Bell.)
• Cliff Lee did win the Cy Young Award over Halladay last season. Just saying.

After giving away zero major leaguers for Lee, the Phillies are ridiculously deep and talented in almost ever facet of the game, and it all starts with the Phillies lineup. From one through six, the Phillies lineup has All-Star caliber players at every spot — with four hitters (Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, Raul Ibanez, and Jason Werth) currently on pace for over 30 home runs.

But how about their starting pitching?

Here are the SEVEN pitchers the Phils can plug from for their eventual starting rotaton: Hamels, Lee, Happ, Joe Blanton, Jamie Moyer, Rodrigo Lopez, and soon Pedro Martinez. Manager Charlie Manuel has options with his rotation. Here’s my recommendation for ol’ Chuck for his eventual regular season rotation:

1. Cole Hamels
2. Joe Blanton
3. Cliff Lee
4. J.A. Happ
5. Pedro Martinez

After moving Moyer to the bullpen for long relief and waiving/demoting Rodrigo Lopez (who did a great job filling in the past month), this is how I’d set it all up. Hamels and Lee are similar pitchers, so separating them with Blanton — the team’s best pitcher this season — seems logical. My guess is that Manuel will have to decide between Happ and Moyer for the fourth starter spot. My gut tells me that Charlie puts Moyer in the rotation.

Now here’s where it gets tricky. When the postseason roles around, one of the starters will need to be dropped from the rotation. Charlie will have to decide between Happ/Moyer and Pedro for that last spot. That decision I suggest we table until we see just how good Martinez looks in the September stretch drive.

But wait, there’s more!

No it’s not an infomercial, it’s the return of Brett Myers.  When Myers returns from hip surgery late in the season, he’ll go right into the bullpen, which has really been the only chink in the armor of the defending champs this season, surprising given last year’s dominant performance. Now Myers, the closer for the 2007 Division Championship team, joins the late inning fray to help spell Ryan Madsen and even Brad Lidge – both of who have stuggled in 2009.

I’m don’t like to get ahead of myself with these things — growing up in Philly, who could blame me — but this move really makes the Phillies favorites to win the next two World Series titles. (Wow, say that out loud a few times.) With their deep pitching staff, and that lineup, who is going to stop them? No one could stop them last year, and that was before Ibanez and Lee joined the team.

Not that I like to brag or anything, but I’m feeling pretty good about the Phillies chances for a repeat AND a threepeat. It sure is great to be the defending champs!

I’m feeling so good, kind of like I did at that first fraternity party…

Tags: Cliff Lee, Jim Johnson, Philadelphia Phillies, Ruben Amaro Jr.