Reuben Amaro…The First 100 Days

I heard on WIP this afternoon that today marks exactly 100 days since Reuben Amaro took over GM responsibilities for our Phils. Apparently, this is some kind of new benchmark as the media has adopted the 100 day mark as the first milestone for our new President. So, I thought we should take the opportunity to look at the progress of our new GM after his first 100 days in office. Overall, I’m pretty impressed.

First of all, I commend Reuben for nailing down deals with both Cole Hamels and Ryan Howard. With brand spankin' new deals, both players can avoid the annual albatross of the arbitration process for the next three years. Nothing good ever comes out of an arbitration hearing, so the Phillies definitely didn’t need that distraction to plague them every offseason for the foreseeable future. Hamels, Howard and the Phillies organization can now worry more about the task at hand than on a pending gruesome arbitration process. With these deals, Reuben was able to prevent a great deal of headache down the road.

Secondly, Reuben was also able to lock down three more important second-tier players as well, by signing Jayson Werth , Ryan Madson and Jaime Moyer. The deal with Moyer was especially important because I think Moyer probably had a lot to do with Cole Hamels development so far. Moyer brings a lot of experience to the table so keeping him around to mentor the young pitchers will pay huge dividends.

As far as the Ibanez deal, the jury is obviously still out on that one. Yes, I think Ibanez serves as an upgrade over Pat Burrell. I don’t think anyone will dispute that fact. However, as I wrote before, I have a problem with the economy of the deal. I’m not convinced the additional output we’ll get from the left field position will be worth the $36 million over three years the Phils spent. Ibanez will be 39 by the end of this deal. Will he still have the numbers at that point to justify his contract? Eh, I’m not sure. I think the better move was to keep Burrell for two more years at the discounted price Burrell accepted with Tampa.

Plus, Burrell would have provided the right-handed bat the Phillies desperately need. Although the numbers show Ibanez can hit lefties, I still don’t feel completely comfortable with the 3-4-5 part of the lineup all hitting from the left side of the plate. This might pose a problem for the Phils in the late innings of a tight game. With the middle of the lineup full of left-handed hitters, they may find themselves on the short end of a matchup war in the 7th, 8th and 9th innings. This lack of a solid right-handed bat is my main criticism of the Amaro era this far.

I give Reuben a solid A- for his first offseason in the corner office. He didn’t exactly inherit an easy situation with so many key pieces of a championship team arbitration-eligible. However, he was able to avoid a lot of bitterness and provide some solid peace of mind by lock up some of his biggest talent. With the payroll now north of $130 million this season, the Phillies will surely pay for it though. I guess that’s the price of a champion. Now I know how the Red Sox feel.