The Phillies signed catcher Brian Schneider today to a 2 year/$2.75 million deal, to backup Carlos Ruiz. I said here on the site a few weeks ago that Schneider was probably my top choice for a backup catcher, so this is a nice signing by Ruben Amaro.
Schneider is pretty much exactly what you want in a backup catcher. He’s a veteran who has many years as a full-time catcher under his belt. He’s solid defensively and bats left-handed. As an added nice benefit, he’s spent his entire career in the NL East with the Expos/Nationals and the Mets, so he has good knowledge of how to pitch to a lot of the players in the division. He’s also from the Philly area, as he played high school ball in the Lehigh Valley. And, finally, he seems to be a good all-around guy and good teammate. He should be a nice addition in the clubhouse, a nice option for when Ruiz needs a day off, and a nice option if Ruiz goes down with an injury at some point. It’s a signing that makes a lot of sense.
Also, last week the Phils signed Juan Castro to replace Eric Bruntlett as the team’s utility man. I don’t have as much to say about this signing because I don’t know a whole lot about Castro, but I do think he’ll probably be an upgrade over Bruntlett. I never liked the idea of Bruntlett as our backup middle infielder, because I just never trusted him at shortstop. Castro should be able to give solid defense at the spot if J-Roll were to go down for any period of time.
Isn’t Bruntlett the only Philly to ever make an unassisted triple play? Why replace him when he can make plays like these?
Ha, well Rob, he’s actually the second Phillie to ever have an unassisted triple play, after the equally immortal Micky
Morandini. Also, he made that play to end a Mets rally in the 9th inning that he allowed to happen by making two errors in
the inning, so I’m not sure he even deserves whatever credit he gets for the triple play. He does have a solid beard though.
Great point about the beard- only a razor can take that away from him.
Random sports musings because I’m bored at work:
1. In 2007/2008, under Steve Spagnolo, the giants defense ranked 7th and 5th respectively in points allowed. This year, under Bill Sheridan, they are tied for 24th out of 32 and the only things that have changed are that they ADDED: a healthy Osi and Michael Boley who is having a great year at lb. (they also added Canty and Bernanrd, but those guys have mostly been hurt). Bill Sheriday should be fired, tarred, feathered, and hung.
2. Can anyone explain why Lebron is getting a pass for the way he is stringing cleveland, and its fans, along? I never get annoyed when baseball players pull this shit because their contracts are unknown and theoretically, unlimited so they have a right to test the market. Lebron’s deal will either be Max (from a team that has Max space obviously) or Max +1 year (Cleveland only). Those are the only two possibilities. So the deal is set. You could kind of make the argument that not signing allowed him input into the team direction and composition and gave management an incentive to surround him with talent. Sure. But Cleveland’s team is basically set for the year at this point, no? At minimum, haven’t we reached the point where the input he might have into hypothetical future trades over the course of this year is outweighed by what he is putting that city through and the distraction to his teammates who should be answering questions about basketball? My view is that at this point (i) he’s being a very selfish for attention; or (ii) he’s going to leave Cleveland, which is why he hasn’t signed long term. Either way, as a Cleveland fan, aren’t you a little pissed?
3. There should be a provision in all ownership agreements whereby the league can force an owner to try to sell the team at fair market value to a non-affiliated third-party where the team (i) hasn’t had a winning season in the last 10 years; and (ii) has become an embarrasment to the league. Let’s call it the Al Davis / Jimmy Dolan rule. Tow of the signature franshises in their sports in the two biggest markets, one gets killed by senility, the other by a semi-retarded trust fun baby. For shame.
4. Mayweather / Pachio could revive boxing if it’s a great fight. It could also kill boxing once and for all if it blows (decided by the ref, 12 rounds of dancing, etc.) due to the size of the expectations and audience.
5. In the battle of what do I care about less, hockey has a slight lead over Tiger Woods’ accident.
6. Memo to Notre Dame: it’s not the coaching. It’s the fact that you’re trying to compete as a big time football powerhouse while at the same time keeping your admissions standards at 3.2 gpa, 1250 sats, for football players. A lot of good football players are not that bright. For a school full of supposedly smart people, you seem to be having a problem with a rather simple concept.
7. Is there anything more nausiating than the media’s love affair with Tim Teabow? Yup, great college player, we all admit it. Would you be shocked if he has the pro career of Ked Dorsey? Me neither.
8. The fact that college football STILL doesn’t have a playoff system continues to be the most ridiculous fact in all of sports. Champions aren’t crowned by voting or mathematical algorithms. I’m convinced that the only thing that will make this happen is a media conspiracy whereby everyone agrees to call the college “national champion” the “this year’s selection by a mathematical algorithm nobody really understands.” That’ll do it.
About Lebron, I think you’re mostly right, he’s AT LEAST strongly considering leaving Cleveland. I hear a lot of the experts saying they think he’ll stay, but if he was going to stay, why not just sign the deal now and get the positive publicity of being able to say, “I’m not interested in waiting see what other teams pursue me, I love Cleveland, it’s home, I’m staying here.” But, he’s keeping his options open, and it’s hard to really blame him.
Not that I disagree with you, but your comment about Tebow shows you view football in an “NFL-centric” way. There’s a huge part of the country that cares about the college game WAY more than the NFL, and most of those people could care less about what Tebow or any other player does once he graduates. If he leaves Florida with 3 national titles and 2 Heismans, he’ll be a legend for a lot of people, and not just people in the state of Florida.
And, of course, I completely agree about the lack of a playoff system. My interest in the college game would increase by about 1000% the day they announced a playoff system. The Florida-Bama game on Saturday is the first non-Penn State game all year that I’ll even consider going out of my way to watch. And that game is, for all intents and purposes, a semifinal game for the title. The worst part is how the people in charge continue to insist that not having a playoff system can be explained by anything but money. I read just a week ago about one of these guys saying, “Oh, we can’t figure out how to work around finals.” Total BS and a ridiculous excuse.