I don't know what I'm doing!

Ruben Amaro spoke to reporters at baseball’s Winter Meetings yesterday. Ah yes, the Winter Meetings. You remember those. We used to live blog them, but then the Phillies dropped out of contention, interest waned, and we learned that Rube spends more time talking about what he’s doing than actually, you know, doing anything, making the running commentary of baseball’s winter selfie a completely fruitless page-view grab. Rube’s media friendliness gets him a relative pass from most talking heads, but the fact is his leadership inspires about as much confidence as Christopher Walken’s Captain Hook inspired in his crew when he was in the presence of that ridiculous purple crocodile. And just in case you were still taking Amaro seriously, yesterday he reminded everyone just how old school the Phillies are when he was asked if there was anything to that persistent rumor that the Phils are overvaluing their players. Mr. Ryan Lawrence on the ones and twos:

“That’s a bunch of malarkey, as far as I’m concerned,” Amaro said. “Frankly, we’ve done very little asking; we’ve done a lot of listening. That’s why that strikes me as interesting that people would say that.”

Lovely. This remains me of the hypothetical scenario I used in our hiring process in which Scott Hartnell called Tim Panaccio “bucko.” Jim wrote that it was a term you may have heard Foghorn Leghorn use, and I think that sentiment applies here.

Meanwhile, in actual news, there’s not much. But here’s what we have:

  • Lawrence notes that, for some reason, starting pitching seems to be a priority: “Starting pitching remains the Phillies’ main target, seeking low-risk, high-reward veterans coming off injuries or off years. Amaro said there are “a couple guys” the team is targeting.” Because if a strategy doesn’t work the first three times, it’s best to just keep trying until it does, like an insane person. Further, the low-risk, high-reward vet strategy makes sense so the Phillies can compile something resembling a Major League roster in 2015… but this isn’t a rebuilding plan, it’s a sell enough tickets to keep the lights on plan. Of course, they could always just play day games.
  • It appears as though Cole Hamels’ most likely destination – if he goes anywhere – is Boston. Gordon Edes of ESPN Boston reports that the Red Sox have the pieces to get a deal done. No shit. The question is: how many of them do the Phillies want?
  • Rube is slyly trying to sell Cliff Lee. “He’s got no issues… he’s in his normal program now.” Trading Lee and convincing other GMs Lee is fine would be the greatest trick Rube ever pulled.
  • There’s a strong possibility that the Phillies trade disgruntled Marlon Byrd, who’s apparently a huge dickhead.
  • And finally, Pat Gillick told reporters that, yeah, the Phillies probably didn’t sign Yasmany Tomas because there’s no captain on this ship!

But, as acting club president, Gillick has some control over where and how the Phillies spend their money. He could make a determination on a player’s worth, though he wouldn’t say whether he advised against signing Tomas.

“I could say that or I could say I’ll talk to our ownership and have [Amaro] represent why we should pay this guy $65 million,” Gillick said. “Let me say this, I control the purse strings up to a certain point. But when you get to $65-$75 million, that’s a decision to be made not only by the general manager, but by whoever’s the acting president and by ownership because it’s a commitment they’re taking on. It’s different than acquiring a player that’s making two years at $12 million or something like that.”

In other words: Who could we ask for approval if there’s no one in charge? WHERE’S SCOTT BAIO WHEN YOU NEED HIM?!