The Phillies were playing a bit tight last night, though that might have had a little to do with Kerwin Danley being behind the plate.  Still, this series is a long way from over.  The weather in Philly is supposed to be miserable tomorrow, which could make that a long long game.  Tampa may have home field advantage, but the three games in Philly will tell the story. If the home team is getting booed, or even players like Rollins get booed as is being predicted, look for Philly to go down down down.  Philly is hard place for a young team to walk into, but if the fans are down on their own guys, the Rays will sail through the week.

I know you have been reading a fair amount about the trade rumors surrounding Jake Peavy.  I hadn’t had too much time to delve into it, but read Paul DePodesta’s week old blog post about it this morning.  DePodesta doesn’t make a strong case for trading Peavy but he does give you the parameters for how a team looks at deciding to make such a trade. I would add though, that putting Peavy on the block in such a public way is basically saying the Padres don’t think they can contend without filling many big holes that couldn’t be filled through free agency or their own system.  They need too much.  And, perhaps because of a change in budgetary constraints the long-term plan to fill holes through free agency is no longer an option. (This may all be conjecture, but rumor has it that the owner of the Padres is going through a messy divorce, which has limited his assets, and asset allocation for the upcoming year and cut the Padres budget unexpectedly.) Just something to think about if you are a Padres fan.

Quick link to a John Hickey article about the new Mariners GM, Jack Zduriencik.  He’s responsible for the Brewers drafts that have produced the young talent on the team and have made the Brewers quite deep in position players. Good for the Mariners. We will have to wait until Friday to hear his plans for the 2009 season, though. Jon Daniels, GM of the Texas Rangers sat down with Mike Hindman for an extraordinary interview.  This piece is not to be missed because it shares the wealth of knowledge this super young GM has, and it also trumpets one of my main thoughts about organizations, which is stability. Texas is about to make a big move with their organization, mark my words.