Photo courtesy St. Pete Beach Photo
Does anyone else get the sense that Ruben Amaro is poking a caged tiger, perhaps intentionally?
Hai! Hai! Hai! You’re not going to make the big club. You’re not going to make the big club. Hai! Hai! Hai!
Then the tiger jumps out of the cage and rips his fucking head off.
That’s kind of how I see spring training going down… or at least how I’d like to see it go down.
Brown comma Domonic, who worked out with Gary Sheffield this offseason, wasn’t awful with the Phillies last year. He batted .245 with 10 doubles, 5 home runs and 19 RBI in 184 AB, good for a .333 on-base percentage and .725 OPS– not hideous by any stretch, but not great either.
Brown was sent down when Hunter Pence arrived last season. He struggled in the minors and never returned, save for one late-season at-bat in garbage time. In October, Amaro told reporters that his vision was for Brown to spend the 2012 season in AAA.
Brown no like.
This morning, the Phillies rolled Brown out for the legion of scribes to simultaneously tweet about:
One thing that stood out, as detailed by Delco Times beat writer Ryan Lawrence:
He cut off a reporter who started a question by asking if Brown would be "almost at peace" with starting the season with the IronPigs.
"Almost at peace?" Brown interrupted. "No, I’m not almost at peace if I start at Triple-A. I think you got me wrong there. I’m coming to win a job, I’m fighting to win a job here, and that’s the goal. But if I start at Triple-A, I start at Triple-A. It’s that simple."
Somewhere, Ilya Bryzgalov wants to search for that peace with Dom Brown.
Anyway, what Brown said contrasts a bit with Amaro's plans, as told to the Inquirer's Matt Gelb:
"Spring is a good time to dream a little bit," Ruben Amaro Jr. said. "It's important for Domonic to show us what he's got."
Get back into the cage, you dreamer.
The Amaro Challenge: Rube’s way of cock-slapping an underachieving player to better results.
Rube’s talking a big game, and, quite frankly, everything he says is fair: Brown needs more time. But it’s odd that a guy who, not more than a year ago, was viewed as such an important piece in the franchise’s plan is seemingly being treated as a work-in-progress. Something tells me Rube has a method to his madness. In this case, he’s trying to piss off Brown, and it seems that it may be working.
Now the tiger just has to hit the ball.
28 Responses
Bryz takes notes. It takes balls like Dom is finally showing to play in this city
I never thought I would see the day when Gary Sheffield became a hitting coach. I guess his message is to ignore the tinkers and trust your ability.
Dom needs to cut down on that LONG ass swing of his. Until he does that, hell always be in AAA. The difference in movement between AAA pitching and MLB pitching is huge. He might be able to tear up AAA with that swing but until he shortens it he’ll be no better than what he was in his call up time last year.
Plus it might be a bit of a help if he didnt look like he needs a compass in the OF.
“Dom needs to cut down on that LONG ass swing of his.”
way to not read into the part about working with sheffield…..
Dom Brown is a bust
Pretty sure it aint his bat or swing mechanics keeping him in the minors. Pretty sure it’s the fact that he looks like my drunk irish ass when chasing down routine fly balls.
yeah, Sheffield had one of the quickest bats in the league. Good person for Dom to work with. Brown is still really young, don’t give up on him just yet…….
You seem to be slowly morphing Ruben Amaro into KSK’s version of Rex Ryan.
If he’s got a master plan for Dom Brown, this is at least the 3rd version of it.
I like his attitude. Honestly, he fell all the way to the back of my mind, and I hadn’t thought much of him until now. I’m a little excited to see him again. Now, just work on your play in the field.
Domonic Brown’s debut to the majors has been totally mismanaged. It’s a shame that Raul Ibanez continued to play over Brown, let alone Mayberry. If Amaro is guilty of one thing, it is over-reliance on veterans. He simply seems to have no trust in anyone under the age of 28.
What the fuck does “Hai! Hai! Hai!” mean?
i don’t know, it’s just a sound.
@teamozzy
Is it a reference to Rerun from What’s Happening!?
who would he replace? certainly not mayberry…
That little kid with the oversized head in the verizon add on the right side of this page is really creepy!
Sheffield has a quick bat which can help Dom with that “Howardesque” swing of his. One problem with him though.. He spent all summer explaining to Dom how “the man” and most white people in general are against him “trying to control” him. Gary Sheffield is a racist sad to say. I hope The kid can sift through the bullshit Gary spews and just get batting lessons out of the deal.
For all you retards who think Dom is already a bust just shut up, you obviously know nothing about baseball. Utley hit .239 in his first 43 games of his rookie season (03) Doc’s ERA was 10.64 in 2000 in 19 games and Clifton Phifer was sent back to the minors in 2007 when he was 28.
That’s exactly the type of attitude everyone should want Dom to have. Man, what a dick response by the Rube though.
the (deadly-accurate) pecota rankings & baseball prospectus were not very kind to domonic brown this year.
imo he’s just another one of these toolsy players that the Phillies love to develop up to AA & ship off via trade. The problem is that they thought he might be the real deal (unlike all the others over the years) and held onto him too long. Now they’ll ship him down to AAA, hope he puts up some stats, and they can trade him for a nice piece at the deadline. The last thing they need in their lineup is another left handed undisciplined free-swinger with a inability to handle a certain pitch. I love how they were saying on 610 today that Howard’s advice to dom brown the past few days has been to just “be himself” and don’t listen to everyone telling him he needs to change this and change that. Howard’s refusal to adjust is why we were one and done last year.
Right you are, Blonders. Utley and Howard didn’t come up til they were about 25 either. Dom Brown- 24 right now.
Brown is going to be a productive MLB player, its just extremely unlikely that he develops into a star.
I think he could easily spend the next 7 or 8 years in left field for the Phillies, hitting around .275 each year with 20 HRs and 80 RBIs. Just a good bat at the bottom of the lineup. Or if shit hits the fan and we suck in a few years, he’ll be a decent bat at the top of the lineup.
Anyone who flat out says “Dom Brown is a bust” I want to punch face. He’s struggled but he was majorly mismanaged and fucked with. Dude put on a ton of muscle, worked on hitting with Sheff and seems to have a clearer mind. Give him a chance. If he falters, be thankful we have JMJ
@ Calvin Candie ….”undisciplined free swinger”? Do you have any idea what you’re talking about? If nothing else, Dom Brown demonstrated patience and a feel for the strike zone…see his .333 OBP with a .249 BA. In other words, he had to walk a few times to get that OBP to a respectable level. Honestly, get a clue. Start by not getting your info from what “they were saying on 610 WIP today”.
Bill, that’s in 210 major league plate appearances last year you jackass. His stance is prone to strikeouts, especially on same-side breaking pitches, and it doesn’t utilize his power potential fully. The only thing I got from WIP was the Howard comment. Don’t hate because you bought a domonic brown shirtsey.
You have a better chance of a 3 arm midget then Dom Brown being a productive MLB player. Kid will never stay in the show.
A 3 armed midget would probably be an exceptional late inning defensive infielder.
@ Calvin Candie So you can develop an (inaccurate) opinion and talk about his Pecota rating based on a small sample size but I cannot use the same sample size for my argument? By the way, his walk rate has been fairly consistant his entire professional career and is in line with what he did in those 220 PA’s last season.
You also called him “an undisciplined free swinger”. He may swing through strikes, but that has nothing to do with his plate discipline. Surely you know the difference between an undisciplined hitter and a hitter who simply swings through pitches…in the case strikes. I mean, anybody who can analyze a professional baseball player’s stance, swing, and power utlilization from his couch has to know the difference, right?
Speaking of which, one more question…what the hell would you know about his stance and how much of his power potential he is utilizing? …or are you Milt Thompson posting under an alias?
after reading this post through i have to say that it is quality writing. many thanks for sharing.
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