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Crosswalk

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Last week, in a well-publicized interview with Jim Salisbury, Ruben Amaro trotted out the most tired talking point in the cliché-ridden world of sports-speak: the fans, he asserted, “don’t understand the game.” Why? Because, according to Salisbury, the Phillies’ patient approach toward the development of minor league pitchers Aaron Nola and Zach Eflin “does not sit well with fans who want to see the Phillies be aggressive with their prospects.” The identity of these “fans” was not disclosed; nevertheless, the worst general manager in baseball proceeded to attack the straw man his inquisitor constructed for him as if he were swinging at a hanging curve ball:

They don’t understand the process. There’s a process. And then they bitch and complain because we don’t have a plan. There’s a plan in place and we’re sticking with the plan. We can’t do what’s best for the fan. We have to do what’s best for the organization so the fan can reap the benefit of it later on. That’s the truth.

Here’s the real truth.

The fans, generally, do not care what the Phillies do with their “elite” prospects. The anger from the fan base that arose two years ago over the reality of Amaro’s incompetence has given way to apathy over the absurdity that Amaro remains employed. Few people care about the Phillies because the GM does not care about the Phillies. How else to explain a pitching rotation that includes the likes of Sean O’Sullivan, Jerome Williams, and Severino Gonzalez? The folks who have bravely warded off indifference are not upset that the Phillies have finally committed to a rebuild. They’re mad because they do not trust the architect.

The fans were not the last to realize that the Phillies championship window had slammed shut. The fans did not draft so poorly over the past six seasons that the farm system has been left barren. The fans were not slow to embrace analytics. The fans did not botch the Cliff Lee trade to the Mariners in 2009 that netted a bevy of failed prospects headlined by Phillippe Aumont, a mediocre reliever who was last spotted trying to locate the strike zone in Allentown.

The fans did not give up two prize prospects in Jarred Cosart and Jon Singleton for Hunter Pence in 2011, only to flip Pence for peanuts a year later. The fans are not responsible for the regression of Dom Brown and the stalled progress of Jesse Biddle. The fans did not cripple the payroll with absurd, untradeable contracts handed to aging veterans Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, and Jonathan Papelbon.

Clearly, ignorance about the finer points of team management has hindered the Phillies progress. It’s just not emanating from the fan base. So instead of condemning the nonexistent impatience of Phillies partisans, Amaro should take a long look in the mirror and realize that there’s only one “rube” in this town who’s responsible for running the franchise into the ground.

[pvc_paratheme ]