Yes the future first ballot Hall of Fame pitcher is in Philadelphia. Yes the dominant ace days are in the past. He no longer has the intimidating array of pitches to toy with opposing hitters. The fact is he had a stretch where is was one of the best ever. Fortunately he still can be productive.

At 37 yrs old he appears to have kept a strong desire to pitch and do well. In his press conference he was very clear as to what he expects. He knows who he is now and he knows what he needs to do to help the Phillies.

Presently the Phillies rotation consists of Hamels, Happ, Blanton, Moyer, and Lopez. Lopez had to leave his last start with shoulder inflammation and no one has said definitely where we stand on that. The Phillies have also used farm arms Bastardo and Carpenter. Bastardo is recovering from injury at present. Kyle Kendrick is potentially in the wings but it is impossible to figure out what the Phillies plan to do with him. Carrasco is out there and down the road Drabek is pegged to come up.

At this point having a veteran may not be a bad move. But is there more?

It would like to think so. With the talks of bringing in stud Roy Halladay, the Phillies need to woo Toronto with something big. You have top prospects like Shorstop Jason Donald, Pitcher Carlos Carrasco, and Catcher Lou Marson in Lehigh Valley. And I guess you could throw in Kendrick who is also in Lehigh Valley. In Reading you have the big Left fielder Michael Taylor, and stud Pitcher Kyle Drabek lurking in the shadows. There are a couple other solid players in the system that may have some value but the above are the obvious names. But wait.

With Pedro on board you may have the option of packaging J A Happ into a Halladay deal. From Toronto’s end this would be tempting. He is a young arm and he has already proven he can win at the MLB level. If your Philadelphia you would hate to lose Happ but Halladay is the NOW! With the present Phillies squad you add Halladay to Hamels, Blanton, Moyer, Martinez and that is a significant upgrade! You would now have a legitimate 1-2 punch and solid bottom of the rotation pitching. Where as at present there is a large gap between Hamels and the rest. And Hamels is still growing into an ace. Halladay is there!

Yes Halladay is 32 but he should be great for another 3+ plus years. That is the window you need with the present Phillies club.

Sometimes the Future is NOW! As Apollo Creed once told Rocky Balboa “There is no tomorrow!”

       2 is not enough!

Over the weekend (May 16,17) we saw starting pitcher Andrew Carpenter get called up from Lehigh Valley,  for duty on Saturday night. It was his major league debut start. It’s hard to make anything out of it considering he only pitched 4 innings and it was his first start. He had his moments is about all I can say for now.

I just hope this experience will make him think “hey I can do this, if I work my butt off”. And then takes this challenge back with him to Allentown.

    It was interesting though that Kyle Kendrick was on his turn to start Saturday night and he has significant major league miles logged. In fact he did fairly well until he hit a horrendous rough patch at the end of the summer of 2008. It got so disappointing he ended up being cut from the playoff roster.

What happened? Did teams figure out what he was doing and he failed to mature and adjust? Did he lose his confidence once things started to go downhill? It’s hard to say from my vantage point.

But I do know this. Kendrick is not a flamethrower and he needs to hit his spots to be successful. He stopped doing that consistantly. Maybe his early success made him overconfident and maybe he did not prepare as much as you need to at this level. But something went squirrelly for sure.

What now? He was in the perfect spot to fly into DC and step right in. Have the upper suits lost confidence in him? Does he no longer fit into the Phillies plans? Which begs another question. If you want to trade him, don’t you want him to show he can still start in this league? Or are the powers that be afraid he will underachieve and lesson whatever trade value he stills has?

On Sunday the Phillies called up Sergio Escalona, and he made his first major league appearance. He even got the win with only 1 inning of relief. Kyle Kendrick has also had experience out of the bullpen. Although that would have meant missing his Saturday start. So there is not as much of a mystery with that scenario.

I guess only time will reveal what future Kyle Kendrick has here in Philadelphia. I wish him the best. Especially considering Chan Ho Park is not wowing any of us at the moment.