It's tough working on the West Coast.
Sure, there is the beautiful weather, great cities, great ballparks, great food, great scenery and In-N-Outs every five miles, but there also are terrible deadlines. The only story to make today's paper was my story about how Charlie Manuel is getting more and more comfortable with his bullpen. The bullpen has pitched better recently and once Brett Myers returns, Manuel figures they can be pretty effective.
So, naturally, the bullpen struggled last night in a 7-3 victory over the San Diego Padres. No, they didn't blow the game. In fact, they gave up just one run in 3 1/3 innings. But they allowed four hits and five walks to make things interesting the final few innings ... and drag out the game long enough that my game story made no editions of the paper.
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Now that the Philliles have signed No. 1 pick Joe Savery, Jim Salisbury writes that the Phillies need to step up and sign unsigned picks Brandon Workman and Julian Sampson. It makes sense. A small investment today -- at least compared to the $17.5 million the Phillies are paying Freddy Garcia and Jon Lieber this season -- could pay off big in the future. And if you have watched the Phillies play at least one game this season, you know how badly they could use some pitching help.
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I'm sure this won't stop some people from saying, "The Phillies just don't want to spend money on a pitcher," but Jayson Stark writes about the lack of quality starting pitching available as the July 31 trade deadline looms.
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Jose Contreras? Forget about it.
