What's the Matter with the Phillies?

My journalist friend thinks something is rotten in the locker room (a la Eric Lindros) and he's proven to have a nose for news. We'll see.

He writes:

Seriously, this just sucks. For a while the hitting sucked, now the pitching just sucks, aside from whenever Halladay pitches. The team is in a free fall.

I now believe that something happened in the locker room. That someone is/was sleeping with someone else's wife or girlfriend. This is entirely inexplicable, this free fall.

Oh, another thing. Our bench sucks. Gregg Dobbs is a disaster. He can't hit for shit anymore, he clearly must've been on steroids back in '07-'08, or he was a bat corker. Castro was a nice addition until he also got hurt.

All in all, this is f*%!ing ridiculous.

This organization is in full fledged melt down right now. There's something much, much deeper going on. I don't know if it's Howard's big contract that has ruined the locker room or the caught-cheating in the bullpen in Colorado.

Something bigger, deeper has infected this locker room.

Here's a fun thing to examine:

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2010_05_21_bosmlb_phimlb_1&mode=wrap

Check the box score of that game, the Fri night game against the Red Sox, May 21. It's the last game Rollins was in the lineup. Look at those averages; 6 of the 8 starters were over .300 in BA.

Now, flash forward 3 weeks, after yesterday afternoon's Red Sox game, and there's not a single guy who's hitting over .300 anymore. (Unless you count backup catcher Schneider.)

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2010_06_12_phimlb_bosmlb_1&mode=wrap

At this point, Werth and Utley had dropped more than 50 pts each. Dobbs -- who flat out sucks and probably should just be cut at some point, he's useless at the plate and in the field -- he started for Polanco, who along with Howard is the only guy who's average hasn't completely plummeted. (Howard is down from .310 to .286, a significant drop, but compared to Werth and Utley, that's nothing.)

So, yes, a big chunk of this is driven by Rollins and his absence. It's infuriating. There's absolutely no indication of when the hell he's ever coming back. Is this a steroid/PED thing? Is that what's causing the injury? He's off the 'roids so now he's getting hurt?

[It's not binocular-gate that's the cause of the slump]. It took another 5-10 days after they got busted with the binoculars, because they went to Milwaukee and Pittsburgh and put up some big numbers, and beat the BoSox on a Fri night with JRoll hitting lead off for the 1st time since game 6 of the season.

Then the bottom fell out.

It really all appears to be related to Rollins being hurt. Because Utley has been a godddam disaster since Rollins went down for the 2nd time. Which coincided with Polanco getting hurt, which means Howard has not been hitting with people on base in front of him. A complete collapse.

From a Phils-fan baseball blog, a post about how bad the bench is.

These stats are effective as of May 31, but have changed little since.

Gload brought a .242/.242/.424 line into Sunday's game; he's been far and away the best hitter off the Phillies bench. Dobbs entered today's game with a .130/.200/.260 line (and was pinch-hit for by Castro, which might rank among the worst insults someone can deliver via lineup decision). Ben Francisco, who's seen time in place of Raul Ibanez, was hitting .194/.256/.250 on the season before getting a pinch-double today. Backup catcher Brian Schneider is batting .174/.296/.174; his terrible batting has made it more difficult for Manuel to give Ruiz rest as he battles through a variety of minor injuries.The reserves have failed both when starting games and coming in to hit. Collectively, Phillies pinch-hitters in 2010 came into Sunday's game batting .119—worst by far in the league, and actually worse than Phillies pitchers, who collectively hit .125 through their first 29 games. (The pinch-hitters are tied with the Padres for the NL's worst OPS, at .427.) Nor is the botched bench a one-year problem: last season, Phils pinch-hitters batted .186 (second worst in the league) with an OPS of .630 that was 12th in the NL.

And the problem is, sports writers protect sports stars, in general, so I'm not sure we'll ever know what ended this great team's play.

Question: why is there no discussion of when Rollins is returning? Why isn't it a full-blown crisis? Why is this not openly speculated upon?

The man went on 15-day DL on May 22, thru June 6, and now almost 10 days later nothing is happening. No one is asking Qs, no one seems concerned. Something is f@#$ing wrong. Something is weird.

The sports "journalism" is falling down on the job here. Something happened.

I'm convinced of it.