Ruben-amaro-charlie-manuel
"Dude, what do you want from me? We gave all the money to Cliff!"

He's not expecting something by tomorrow at noon, but Phillies' skipper Charlie Manuel is hoping for a contract extension before Opening Day. If one isn't signed by April 1, don't expect to hear anything about it until after the 2011 campaign.

"I think that once the season starts, I don't want to talk about my contract," Manuel said.

According to agent Pat Rooney, who represents Charlie Manuel, the two sides are apart on money more than anything.  He breifly shared his stance on the matter with CSN Philly's Jim Salisbury.

“Charlie deserves to be paid as one of the top five managers in baseball,” Rooney told CSNPhilly.com on Monday night. “I don’t want to negotiate through the media, but they know our position. Hopefully we’ll have something by opening day.”

 

It's one of the few times that we've really heard either side mention the matter in the media. Both sides have been saying this offseason that a contract extension is likely, but plenty of time has come and gone. And Manuel still has no guarantee that he'll be with the team after 2011.

Ruben Amaro breifly mentioned the negotiations yesterday, saying that "we want to get something done, which we have since December. I don't view it as a distraction for our players because we don't make our negotiations public."

We can't argue with that. We didn't know that Cliff Lee was a possibility until the very day he agreed to terms in December. The Phillies do business rather quietly, so it can be tough to draw inferences from the situation, but there are a couple of things to consider.

The Phillies may not think that Manuel is deserving of a salary comparable to the top five managers in baseball, despite his success in the National League East and the playoffs. There's also that World Series ring… ya know… that thing.

We can also assume that negotiations clearly aren't going well. As we've established, the front office likes to keep their business behind closed doors, and yesterday could be a sign that this may become more of a public matter. It's nothing like what's happening in  St. Louis with Albert Pujols, but if Manuel isn't locked up for a couple more years by Opening Day, it will leave a lot of fans scratching their heads.

You can always say that situations like this won't become a distraction during the season, and if there's anyone who can probably follow through on that claim, it's a guy like Charlie. But it may not really be in his hands. The questions about the contract won't go away, especially after the season begins. This will linger, and ultimately, it could potentially become a distraction for a team that already has so much going for them (on paper).

Manuel has won 56% of his games in a Phillies uniform and the team led the league in wins last season, 97, despite a barrage of injuries (Remember Wilson Valdez?).  Additionally, David Murphy notes at the end of his piece today that he is 103 wins away from becoming the winningest manager in Phillies history…

…103 wins is a possibility for the 2011 version of this team. So, could you imagine a situation at the end of October next year, where possibly the winningest manager in Phillies history could walk away? It's a long way away, but you never know.

Having said all this, it would be nice to hear some good news on this front in, I don't know, the next 45 days.