One of the biggest stories in baseball after a week or so of spring training activities, aside from news of the budding friendship between Lenny Dykstra and Charlie Sheen, has to be the St. Louis Cardinals loss of stud pitcher Adam Wainwright for the entire season. After visiting with multiple specialists, Wainwright has decided to have Tommy John surgery on his right elbow. While you hate to see this kind of longterm injury happen to any player of Wainwright's caliber, Cincinnati Reds' manager Dusty Baker took the opportunity while discussing the Cards' situation to praise our boys.
From this morning's Daily News:
"It's early for those kind of problems. Nobody has the depth to overcome [the loss of] a Wainwright. You can replace him, but in Wainwright and Chris Carpenter you're talking about two of the top six or seven pitchers in the league." Baker paused. "Philadelphia has most of the other ones," he added with a laugh.
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Indeed.
It's funny because it's true.
Which leads to the topic Phillies fans immediately think of when Wainwright's season-ending injury comes up: will St. Louis now be interested in Joe Blanton and what could we get in return for the Phillies current fifth starter?
In my opinion, you don't just unload Blanton to the first team that comes asking. The goal is to obviously win this year, so whatever the Phillies would get in return must be a piece that can fill a current weakness. As the team is currently constituted, the only real areas of uncertainty are right field/bench depth/right-handedness.
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I also wouldn't be real quick to pull the trigger on any potential deal before we get to see how the Dom Brown/Ben Francsico/Ross Gload project plays out at all. Joe Blanton is the best fifth starter in baseball, but he could be even more valuable this summer when a team in a position to make a playoff run and is in need of starting pitching help.
Inevitably, whenever any MLB team loses a starting pitcher this season, Phillies fans will wonder we could get from that team in return for Joe the Lumber. Are there any fair/tempting pieces you'd love from the Cardinals? Otherwise I'm coo with Joe the Fifth in Philly.