We'll burn that bridge when we cross it

It will be interesting to see what the Phillies do with their bench when Jayson Werth is ready to return. Interesting, I guess, in what it means for Chris Coste. Coste, of course, is owner of the best story going on in baseball and has contributed greatly not only to the Phillies’ playoff run last year, but also to this year’s charge as well.

Yet for whatever reason the Phillies’ brass – namely general manager Pat Gillick and his assistant Ruben Amaro – don’t seem to like Coste. Why? Good question. Maybe it’s because he sticks at it when everyone else would have quit a long time ago. Or maybe Amaro prefers players from big-time college programs that make it to the Majors on reputation and bounce around for nearly a decade and post less than mediocre numbers?

Whatever the reason, another trip back to the minors doesn’t seem fair for Coste. In his last four games last week Coste went 3-for-6 with a homer and seven RBIs. In July, Coste is hitting .343 in 13 games.

Conversely, Rod Barajas, the backup catcher who came in as a backstop to handle the bulk of the work for $3 million, hasn’t had a hit in more than two weeks and is 3-for-16 this month.

Sounds like manager Charlie Manuel has more confidence in a minor-league lifer making the league minimum as opposed to a guy making big, free-agent money. Worse, the Phillies have a .332 career hitter and they might not want him.

Either way it seems as if Coste is like ice cream and what weirdo doesn’t like ice cream?

***
With the non-waiver trading deadline set for tomorrow at 4 p.m., perhaps the Phillies will deal Coste for some pitching. At least then he would be going to a team that actually wants him. More importantly, the Phillies really, really need pitching with Ryan Madson headed for the disabled list and big holes in the starting rotation.

So far all we have are rumors – and it looks like I added to it by invoking Coste’s name – and nothing concrete. The rumor mill seems to be a cottage industry in the sports reporting business these days. Everyone loves reading about things that may or might not be happening or even true for some reason and there are a lot of people out there who have made careers about spreading disinformation.

It’s information, but it’s not really information. Like junk food… you know, what Ken Rosenthal does…

Wait, was that my out loud voice again?

Anyway, rumors bore me, especially when it’s so easy to find out facts and truth. But then again I’m a really bad sports fan so there you go.

I’ll give you this, though – call it a secret of the trade: if you read one of those rumors where it’s prefaced with the phrase, “sources say,” it’s a load of crap. The so-called “source” is probably a guy hanging around the press box or something.

Man, do those sources like to talk and boy or boy do they ever come in handy.

***
The Phillies head to Chicago for four days to face the surging Cubs at Wrigley Field tonight. The consensus around the press box is that Chicago is the favorite stop on the circuit and Wrigley, despite its not-so modern amenities, is everyone’s favorite ballpark.

Perhaps Chicago is best described as, “kind of like New York, but clean.”

I think of it like Japan where they take all of the good ideas from everyone else and make it look nicer. In Chicago they did it with pizza, too. New York pizza is far superior to the Chicago style, but they made it just a tad more interesting in The Windy City.

Either way, it will be a fun-filled four days for the scribes before heading off to Milwaukee for the weekend.

***
The Tour de France finally (and mercifully) came to a close yesterday with Alberto Contador called the winner and his Discovery Channel teammate and American Levi Leipheimer 31 seconds behind in third place.

(If anyone remembers -- and who wouldn't? -- I predicted a Leipheimer victory in the Tour over Vinokourov and Sastre.)

Certainly it appears as if the real drama in cycling will occur between now and the next Tour de France as the cycling union, anti-doping agencies and Amaury Sports Organization (the company that owns both the Tour de France and the newspaper, L’Equipe) pick at the carcass of the sport to gain total control.

It’s not going to be pretty.

Either way, the telecast of the Tour ended in a rather apropos manner yesterday when Lance Armstrong, with Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwen in Paris, departed the air and seemingly took the video along with him.

Yeah, that’s right, the last miles of the Tour were coming to a head and no one in the United States could see it.

Meanwhile it’s worth noting that Armstrong is in Paris celebrating with his Discovery Channel team and Floyd Landis is in Vail, Colo. preparing for the big race in the Leadville 100 on Aug. 11.

That race, friends, is going to be the highlight of cycling in 2007.

***
Needless to say, Armstrong's appearance on the telecast of yesterday's final day of the Tour was interesting. Perhaps the comment most intriguing (to me) was when Lance was asked what he missed the most about professional cycling. He told Liggett and Sherwen that he missed being "super fit" and the training lifestyle, which he compared to being monastic in that all one did was ride, eat and sleep. But he didn't miss racing, which makes sense to me... training like hell is a blast, but the pressure of competing can be a drag sometimes. I imagine the pressure for Armstrong was pretty intense.

Just hangin' out on a Friday night

Just a couple of things this afternoon/evening before I fade into working my tip-tap-tapping fingers away writing the night away…

Could a doubleheader sweep by the Mets be the beginning of the end for the Phillies? The notion that the Phillies could have moved into first place by beating up on the New Yorkers was a bit far-fetched, but it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. But as it stands at this precise moment (top of the eighth inning), John Maine is dealing and the Mets appear as if they are about to push the lead in the NL East to five games.

Regardless, it was nice to see that Chris Coste announced his presence with the Phillies with authority. In his first AB since being called up from Reading late last night, Coste went deep by smashing a pinch homer into the seats.

On another note, could Cole Hamels be a little tired? He seems to have hit a bit of a wall as the mathematical first half comes to a close and he really hasn’t had the same zip on his change the last handful of outings…

Dead arm?

***
I had a nice chat this afternoon with 2006 Tour de France champion Floyd Landis up in his old stomping grounds of Ephrata, Pa. My stories about Floyd will appear on CSN on Sunday and will be promoted very heavily by the crack marketing staff at CSN all day Monday.

Additionally, Floyd will appear on CSN on Daily News Live from 5-to-5:30 p.m. on Monday uninterrupted, where we will talk about all the details of his case, cycling, the book tour, his future and everything else.

Anyway, look for the stories on Sunday. I will post the links here when everything is finished as well as a few snippets of the actual interview that I recorded with my trusty iPod.

Meanwhile, I’ll give my knee-jerk impression of Floyd… if charm and class are part of his defense then he wins. He’s definitely a top-notch dude all the way. Having had the chance to talk to hundreds of professional athletes over the past decade, Floyd is at the top of the list as far as interesting and engaging guys. He very definitely could have mailed it in with me after going through thousands of questions and other crap over the past year, but he was intent on having a real conversation and taking me seriously.

It’s too bad he doesn’t play for the Phillies.

I’d definitely put Floyd up there with Scott Rolen, Doug Glanville, Randy Wolf and Mark Grace as far as the absolute best guys to talk to… a top-notch and classy dude all the way.

For some reason I was surprised at how fit Floyd still was. Though he hasn’t been training and didn’t touch a bike at all over the 10 days of his arbitration hearing, Floyd looked ready to go though he admitted that he has some work to do if he wants to ride better in the Leadville 100 in August in comparison to how he rode in the Teva Mountain Games earlier this month.

Regarding his rough ride in the Teva Mountain Games, Floyd said, “I got beat by a girl. Not just one girl, but two. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s not something I’m used to.”

I don’t know what I was expecting him to look like, but was definitely looked much more fit than me and I run 15 miles every day.

Oh yeah... minutes after I left, Floyd's wife was in an accident. Fortunately, everyone was OK.

***
I had the chance to meet Dave Pidgeon of the Lancaster Intelligencer Journal while waiting for Floyd this afternoon. Dave is the keeper of a stellar outdoors blog on his papers’ site, but politics is his main beat. Still, it's pretty clear that Dave knows his sports as evidenced by his work.

***
My friend Andy is an analyst for The Motley Fool in the D.C. 'burbs, and was quoted in an Associated Press story about Blockbuster shutting down 280-plus shops. That's certainly not big news, but his quote in the story is something else.

Check this out:

"Traffic is just not what it used to be when Blockbuster was the big rooster in the hen house," said Andy Cross, senior analyst with The Motley Fool.

Rooster in the hen house? What kind of hillbilly stuff is that?

I guess it beats, "We just take 'em one day at a time... "

Coste to Coast

It was hard not to smile when Charlie Manuel announced that the Phillies had recalled Chris Coste from Double-A Reading after last night’s rainy, soggy, humid, sloppy and long game against the Cincinnati Reds at the Bank. For one thing, Coste’s arrival back to Philadelphia (for the third time) will be a move the fans will applaud. Even cynical media-types like me have a hard time not getting a little weak in the knees when hearing Coste’s story and perseverance.

Aside from that, I truly believe Coste was shafted by the Phillies.

No, it wasn’t anything sinister or conspiratorial or anything like that, but the Phillies had no qualms about sending Coste out on all of the team’s winter caravan stops at all of the distant outposts to get the fans excited, and the manager was saying all sorts of laudatory things about his hitting. But all along the general manager was looking for someone else to fill Coste’s spot. Where Manuel talked up Coste, Pat Gillick threw a wet blanket on everyone’s good time and then went out and spent $3 million on Rod Barajas.

Let’s see: $3 million for Rod Barajas or the league minimum for Chris Coste… money well spent?

No.

Certainly Barajas has a better Major League pedigree than Coste, but when the movie comes out on everyone’s favorite backup catcher, Barajas ain’t gonna be in it. Besides, Coste didn’t do anything to warrant a trip back to the minors aside from hit .328 with seven home runs in a pennant race. Anything close to that would be a career year for Barajas.

***
Let’s leave the bullpen and Pat Burrell alone today… chances are he’ll be below the Mendoza Line by the holiday. That is, of course, if he plays -- Burrell is not in the lineup for Friday afternoon's opening game. That's the fifth game in a row in which Burrell is on the bench and eighth game in the last 11.

***
Is anyone else looking forward to Cole Hamels facing Paul Lo Duca in tonight’s nightcap? That is, of course, if there is one.

Lo Duca and David Wright of the Mets are the Matthew Barnaby and Danny Ainge of baseball… fun guys.

Nevertheless, the Phillies-Mets rivalry is turning into a pretty good one. It really seems as if the teams don't particularly care for each other and that is pretty entertaining.

***
For the gang in the press box...

Can't they all just get along?

Baseball players are babies… there, I said it. When one ballplayer has a beef with another player and wants to engage in fisticuffs, what does he do? Yeah, that’s right… he throws a ball at the other guy.

How silly is that?

Say I’m sitting in the press box at Citizens Bank Park or RFK or anywhere else in the country, and I have a problem with, say, Mike Radano. Do you think I’m going to throw an apple at him from across the room? No, of course not. If such a situation arises, I’m going to get up out of my seat, walk to the other side of the room, and punch Mike.

Hey, that’s how I roll.

I’m not going to shout and scream and carry on about beating up the other guy or yell about how tough I am. Instead I’ll introduce Mike to Jack Johnson and Tom O’Leary. Of course I’d probably end up in the roundhouse, but that’s a different story.

Anyway, every so-called baseball “fight” starts and ends the same way. One pitcher throws a ball that hits another player. Then, to retaliate, the pitcher for the team of the plunked hitter drills a player of the plunkers’ team. As you can see it’s a messy, tangled web.

Sometimes, when these bean balls get to a particular point a batter charges after the pitcher, which isn’t exactly a stealth move. It’s kind of like when the British Navy attacked the Falklands – first they told them they were coming, then they got in their boats and three weeks later they were in the southern hemisphere.

And then it was on.

Or at least a bunch of jostling and yelling takes place – like in the Phillies’ minor dust-up with the Marlins last night. In that instance Jon Lieber drilled Aaron Boone, then threw one behind Marlins’ pitcher Dontrelle Willis. When Lieber came up to bat in the fourth inning, Willis threw one three feet behind Lieber.

All even, right?

Apparently not. Apparently Lieber said something to Willis as the teams were changing sides at the end of the inning, which, according to sources, just might be the most Lieber has said about baseball all month since he has chosen not to engage the Philadelphia sporting press lately. Oh sure, he’s talking, but he’s not really saying much.

Nevertheless, Lieber’s comments stirred something in Willis to stand at home plate and call out the Phillies as if he was Tanner Boyle from the North Valley League Bears. Because of that, the Phillies’ bench spilled out onto the field and the Marlins emptied out and the tango was… well, it was more like the gang fight in Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” video.

So that was that. In the modern parlance, that’s a baseball fight. But in retrospect, perhaps baseball players aren’t wimps at all. Better yet, they seem kind of smart. After all, what good does fighting do?

Why, no good. No good at all.

***
Interestingly, one of the first Phillies on the scene of last night’s tango was maligned catcher Rod Barajas. In that instance, Barajas properly blocked a Marlin from advancing. It’s just too bad for the Phillies and Brett Myers that it didn’t come about 24 hours earlier.

***
More interestingly, in activating Ryan Howard from the disabled list the Phillies sent Chris Coste to Double-A Reading. Why Double-A instead of Triple-A Ottawa? According to assistant GM Ruben Amaro Jr., Coste was sent to Reading so that he can work as a catcher more often. In Ottawa Coste spent most of his time playing first base so that prospect Jason Jaramillo would get the majority of the time behind the dish.

Who knows, maybe with Coste going to Reading to catch means that he will be returning to Philadelphia as a backstop in the near future. It definitely seems as if the Phillies could use a reliable backup for Carlos Ruiz.

***
The umpiring crew featuring Dan Iassogna is working tonight’s game in Atlanta. Does anyone want to bet that someone gets ejected from the game? How about if I set the series over-under on ejections at five, or is that too low?

Every day is game day

The good thing about baseball is that anytime you need to take a day or two away, the game will be there when you get back. Baseball is not like the second part of a movie or an episodic television show where a person needs to keep up with the back story in order to enjoy it. Sure, it helps, but it’s not really necessary.

It is just baseball after all.

So after taking a few days away from following the baseball team to travel around with my family, it’s pretty easy to jump back in. The Phillies are still fighting to get back to .500, the bullpen is still a question mark and Ryan Howard’s struggles continue when he was sent to the 15-day disabled list with a strained quad and a sore knee.

As the season progresses the Phillies should continue to be a team of streaks and should win more than they lose. The bullpen, unless Pat Gillick can make a deal to get some help, will remain a sore spot. And Ryan Howard will continue to have trouble with his knees and legs until he gets in shape.

It’s pretty simple.

Howard, as he says and everyone noticed when he was a minor leaguer, is a big dude. But when he showed up in Clearwater for spring training he was an even bigger dude. Frankly, he looks soft and it’s funny to see him and remember that some speculated that he could have used performance-enhancing drugs during his breakout season last year. If he was taking steroids, it was pointed out then; he was taking the wrong kind.

Certainly baseball is littered with the failed careers of players who simply couldn’t keep in shape. Along those lines, many more careers were cut short for the same reason. In that regard, John Kruk comes to mind. Greg Luzinski, too. Mo Vaughn was another slugging first baseman whose injuries seemed rooted in his lack of fitness.

The good folks at Baseball Prospectus took note of Howard’s physique when putting together their annual yearbook in which they surmised that Howard, at 26, could be peaking:

Historically, players like Howard, big-bodied guys with limited defensive skills such as Mo Vaughn and Boog Powell, tended to have high but brief peak periods. Their legs just couldn’t carry that much mass for very long, and around 30 their defense plummeted, their playing time dropped due to nagging injuries, and their singles dried up and disappeared. The Phillies should have a three-year window in which they can expect this kind of production from Howard, but should not plan beyond that.

Mo Vaughn was washed up at 34. Greg Luzinski played his last season when he was 33. John Kruk walked away for a pinch runner after getting a single in a late July game for the Chicago White Sox when he was 34. Their bodies just couldn’t take the rigors of a baseball season any more.

Ryan Howard is a big dude looking for an even bigger paycheck. A good way to get to where he and the Phillies need him to be is to get in shape.

***
Chris Coste took Howard’s place on the roster when he was placed on the disabled list. But unlike last May when Coste’s call-up led to a nearly a full season of MLB service time, don’t expect this stint to last too long. The talk around the club is that Coste will go back to Triple-A Ottawa when Howard is ready.

Then again, no one expected his stay to last too long last year, either.

***
I have a theory that if baseball or soccer were introduced to Americans in 2007 with no prior knowledge of its existence, people would hate it. Baseball, more than any other sport, seems to be one that’s passed down from father to son or whomever – and yes, that’s as close to getting all Field of Dreams on anyone. That crap is just so annoying…

Nevertheless, it’s fair to say that Major League Baseball isn’t exactly a flashpoint with folks involved in the endurance sporting world. In fact, the runners, cyclists and triathletes that I’m friendly with don’t really keep up with more than one of the major sports – typically that one is football or hockey.

To a lot of them, a baseball game is a good way to wile away an afternoon with some junk food and a beer or two following a hard training session.

So when Outside magazine – billed as a periodical “dedicated to covering the people, sports and activities, politics, art, literature, and hardware of the outdoors...” – offered a small feature on a baseball player in its June issue…

Whoa.

The player, of course, is Barry Zito and the feature (an interview) didn’t cover much ground or space. The topics ranged from surfing and how it has helped Zito with his pitching, to meditation and yoga, which Zito is a well-known practitioner of.

An excerpt:

Question: You also do yoga and meditate, which has led the baseball press to label you as flaky.

Zito: The most outdoorsy these guys get is playing golf or hunting. So if I play guitar or surf or do yoga, I’m some weirdo. But you have to take it for what it is. Baseball is one of the oldest games in the country. There are definitely stereotypes, but I think we’re breaking through those things.

Given the choice of a DVD of Point Break or The Natural, Zito says he’d take Point Break.

Now that’s weird. The yoga and meditation is hardly anything unoriginal or flaky. It’s smart.

***
I’d love to write much more about the Floyd Landis arbitration hearing, but I’m pacing myself. Interestingly, though, I thought the yellow tie Landis wore to yesterday’s hearing was a nice touch and sent a bit of a message.

Yellow, of course, being the color of jersey the leader (and winner) of the Tour de France wears.

Another interesting point came from Juliet Macur of The New York Times:

TOMORROW, the American cyclist Floyd Landis, the would-be heir to Lance Armstrong, steps before an arbitration panel in California to rebut the charge that his come-from-behind victory last year in cycling’s most celebrated race was a fraud.

If he loses, Landis will become the first winner in the 103-year history of the Tour de France to be stripped of the victor’s yellow jersey because of doping. The disastrous toll his case has exacted on cycling’s credibility — races canceled for lack of sponsors, teams abandoned by their corporate underwriters, fans staying home — offers a stark picture of what can happen when a sport finally confronts its drug problem in a serious way.

This couldn’t be where baseball is headed, could it?

Very interesting.

All over the map

If you want to know how far Ryan Howard has come since hanging around in Reading and Moosic, Pa. it was in evidence on Tuesday night around midnight on CBS. There, Howard, sat in a chair usually reserved for the latest Hollywood star or pop culture icon to trade barbs with David Letterman.

From most accounts, Howard did well. He wore a nice suit, seemed personable and held his own against one of the sharpest wits (an oxymoron?) on television.

So I guess it’s fair to say that Ryan Howard is a superstar. Wow. Not bad for a guy who was “blocked” by Jim Thome.

Interestingly, Howard revealed to Dave that he “guesses 90 percent of time” about what pitch he’s going to get.

"Most of the time I'm swinging with my eyes closed anyways," Howard told Dave.

If only that were true. Howard is one of the better hitters at making adjustments on the fly. He might swing with his eyes closed, but that's because he already knows where it's going to land.

***
If you’re looking for someone to criticize the “traditional” style of newspaper writing, I’m the first in line. Without getting too much into it, I just don’t like doing the same old things the same old ways.

Hey, that’s just me.

But if you’re looking for good, quality newspaper writing, look no further than Paul Hagen’s story about Chris Coste and his “exile” back to the minors.

Coste, as we all remember, was the saccharine sweet feel-good story of 2006. After a decade playing and struggling in all levels of independent and minor-league ball, Coste finally made it to the Majors and played well enough that it seemed as if his days of being a bush-league cliché were over.

Or so it seemed.

Yet despite slugging seven homers, batting .328, and – more importantly – getting plenty of accolades from veteran pitchers about his abilities behind the plate, the Phillies really didn’t seem to believe what they were seeing with Coste. In fact, even when Coste was getting lots of important playing time during a late-season chase for the playoffs, the sense I got was that general manager Pat Gillick looked at Coste as an experiment that somehow went really well.

No, it didn’t seem as if Gillick or the Phillies wanted Coste to fail, but reading between the lines it appeared as if it wouldn’t have bothered them if the fairy tale would have ended with a loud thump. No matter what he did (it seemed to me), Coste never figured into the Phillies plans.

That’s a damn shame.

These days, Coste is grinding it out for Ottawa waiting for a call in his role as the perpetual insurance policy. He seems to be nothing more than a commodity or a number to the guys calling the shots, which is way it is in baseball a lot of the time. As Hagen wrote in his excellent story, “Heck, the Yankees got rid of Babe Ruth when they had no more use for him.”

Hopefully the Phillies will eventually do the right thing for Coste and trade him to a team where he can play. But then again, baseball is all business. Why would they want to do that?

***
Maybe a good place for Coste would be Kansas City, where former top prospect Brandon Duckworth has resurfaced as the team’s fifth starter after a few years kicking around the minors. In his first start of 2007 for the Royals, Duckworth held the defending American League champion Tigers to four hits and a walk without a run in 6 1/3 innings. Of the 19 outs he recorded, 12 were on ground balls.

Outings like that were kind of what the Phillies were hoping to get from mild-mannered right-hander when he arrived in the midst of a playoff chase in 2001. During that season, manager Larry Bowa yanked veteran 13-game winner Omar Daal from a start in Atlanta during the end of that season in favor of Duckworth.

But in 2002 and 2003, Duckworth didn’t take to Bowa’s managerial methods where it seemed that no matter what the pitcher did, it was never enough for the manager. Shockingly, it seemed to be a matter of someone having a personality clash with Bowa… like that has ever happened before.

Despite this, Duckworth averaged a little more than a strikeout per inning in 2002 though a forearm injury sidetracked much of his 2003 campaign. That winter the Phillies dealt Duckworth to the Astros in the Billy Wagner deal, where he struggled for two more seasons as a reliever and sometime starter. Before the 2006 season, he signed on with the Pirates where he spent most of the season in Triple-A before being sold to the Royals, where he pitched his way into the rotation.

Is this where Duckworth finally puts something together? Perhaps. Unlike Coste, Duckworth will get a chance.

***
Finally, on to the Imus fiasco…

For a while it was easy to be Don Imus. All he ever did was hate everyone, equally, for an entire career. In fact, Imus and his flunkies have hated everyone with vitriol and anger for as long as I’ve been alive. And I ain’t so young any more.

That’s why the outrage over his comments about the Rutgers women’s basketball team is so weird. Imus is the dog that has been pissing on the carpet for decades, but now, after doing something that has defined his career, everyone is trying to whack him on the nose with a rolled up newspaper. I ask, “What took so long?” One would be hard pressed to find a group that he hasn’t slurred.

Don Imus didn’t say one thing – he said a million things. Most of them were mean and aimed – without irony – at hurting others. That’s just how he rolls.

In fact, it’s fair to conclude that Imus is the purveyor of the schlocky and unoriginal talk radio tripe that pervades the airwaves. If Imus and his ilk have a legacy it’s creating a medium based on loudness and meanness with disciples all over the dial and ideological spectrum.

So when Imus picked on the young women from Rutgers for no good reason other than they can’t fight back, it seems as if those waiting to pounce finally found an opening. Enough, as they say, is enough.

Still Imus’ reign of hate has already scorched the airwaves. Because of his influence it seems as if the requisite for getting a talk show on the radio is to get some anger, bluster and the ability to pontificate in relative complete sentences. It doesn’t matter what stupidity pours out of one’s mouth as it gets a reaction... or ratings.

In writing about the extremely unoriginal talk-show host Colin Cowherd on ESPN Radio, Salon.com sportswriter King Kaufman (hey… I’m warming up to that guy) cites the lack of innovation in the sports-talk radio as one of the reasons for all the misplaced anger by hosts. The target, at least in Cowherd’s case, is the Internet which the ESPN host has stolen from and lambasted equally. Writes Kaufman:

It was the latest battle in an ongoing war between sports-talk radio and sports blogs, one that hardly seems like a fair fight. One side is a medium that's essentially unchanged since the 1970s, an industry whose only idea since the Carter administration has been to keep getting more “in your face.” The other side is, so far in its brief history, constantly adapting, changing, self-correcting, reinventing.

History tends to be on the side of the latter. There's no reason sports-talk radio has to be an enemy of innovation, no reason it can't adapt to the times, meet the challenges of new technologies and changing audience needs. It just hasn't.

Talk radio's response to the World Wide Web, possibly the greatest communications revolution since Gutenberg built his printing press and certainly the greatest since television, was to say, “Hey, you can listen to our radio show on your computer now!”

Dazzling.

After writing about Imus and Cowherd I think it’s time to take a shower.

Notes from the warmer ground

Got an extra $1.7 million sitting around? Jon Lieber's house in Newtown Square, Pa. is on the market. Do you think he's unloading it to pay for his $211,000 truck?

* According to the writers covering the team in Florida, Chris Coste has a big booster in manager Charlie Manuel.

The skipper told reporters:

"What Coste did last year definitely has to be considered. He caught for us in big games down the stretch. He showed he definitely can do the job in the major leagues, and he definitely can come off the bench and hit."

More: And So it Begins
Even more: Day 1: Chillin' in Florida

Though he only played with the team for a little more than two months, the New York Yankees announced that they will honor the memory of Cory Lidle by wearing a black armband on their trademarked pinstripes. Moreover, Lidle's No. 30 has not be issued to another player this spring.

Meanwhile, after spending a little more than two years with the team, the Phillies reportedly will not memorialize their former pitcher in 2007. In fact they have already re-issued his No. 30 -- twice.

More: The Cory Lidle Foundation

In drug news, some colleges that play Division III football are going to participate in a pilot drug-testing program.

Pat Burrell is in camp and talking about his role with the team in 2007. Yes, he thinks he can "protect" Ryan Howard.

More: The Protection Myth

What have you done for us lately...

Heard and seen at the Phillies media luncheon on Tuesday:

It seems as if the Phillies have cooled on Chris Coste. With the arrival of Jason Werth, Karim Garcia and Rod Barajas, the Phillies’ bench is packed. That could mean that Coste, who hit nearly .900 (actually.463) last spring training and .328 in 65 games with the Phillies, could be on the outside looking in.

“I like Chris Coste, and the reason I like him is he played good for us,” manager Charlie Manuel said. “The big thing is what happens in spring training. He had a job at the end of last year. Now, he's got to keep it. I'm not going to take it away from him.”

This is different from past comments where Manuel said that Coste didn’t look pretty swinging the bat but he got the job done and lauded him how he caught a lot of big games down the stretch.

Still, as Charlie says, “this game changes every minute.”

Since players like Coste are only as good as their last AB, baseball’s most interesting and a true feel-good story of 2006 seems destined to start 2007 in Ottawa.

Pitching prospect Scott Mathieson showed up at the luncheon after his check-up with team doctor Michael Ciccotti. Mathieson, who underwent Tommy John surgery in September after pitching in nine games for the Phillies in 2006, says he could start throwing in the next two weeks though he isn’t expected to pitch in minor league games until July.

Aaron Rowand says Phillies fans and the writing press will enjoy Freddy Garcia. Not only is he a big-game pitcher, according to Rowand, but also Garcia likes to have fun.

Rowand also said that one of the biggest reasons for the Phillies success in 2006 was the manager.

“He's a big reason the chemistry on this team is as good as it is,” Rowand said about Manuel. “You guys don't get to see it, the fans don't get to see it, because you guys aren't in the clubhouse all the time. You guys aren't in the dugout during the game when he's talking to the guys, when he's conversing with people, helping guys out, pumping guys up. He's one of the best managers I've ever had a chance to play for, and I would have been very sorry to have seen him go after last year.”

Like Coste, newly-signed reliever Antonio Alfonseca has to prove he belongs on the team this spring. Still, the veteran closer could have the inside track on the set-up job in front of Tom Gordon though Manuel says he likes some of the guys already on the roster.

“We need one of our guys to step up. Somebody like Madson or Geary. I definitely think Madson can compete. You guys always talk about how good he could be in the back of the bullpen. I hear our organization talk about how good he could be in the back of the bullpen. The door is open for him,” Manuel said. “[Alfonseca] can definitely take over that job right now. We might have that guy in-house. We need to beef up the back end of our bullpen. The more depth we get in the bullpen, the better we'll be.”

Whoever the set-up man will be, Manuel says he will lean heavily on him in order to keep Gordon fresh and healthy for the entire season.