After losing Brett Myers, Brad Lidge, Scott Eyre (running in from the bullpen), and Raul Ibañez, now they will be losing Clay Condrey to the 15 day disabled list. I should have written this a week ago, but now my point is even stronger; it’s time for the Phillies to make a trade. No offense to Sergio Escalona, who will replace Condrey, but I have little confidence if you’re behind Jack Taschner on the depth chart. The rotation that Charlie Manuel is running out there is not a World Series rotation at this point.  Far from it. Prior to losing Myers, the distance between Cole Hamels starts was great – now it’s insurmountable.

The ripple effect of having sub-par starting pitching is killing our bullpen. And if we’re going to lean heavily on the bullpen, as we can see, it will buckle. I’m not calling on Ruben Amaro Jr. to make a trade for trades sake; but it is obvious that this team needs bolstering. The longer we wait, the harder it gets. For instance, now that Daisuke Matsuzaka is on the DL in Boston, you can count Brad Penny off the list of available pitchers. Jake Peavy is on the DL and so is Erik Bedard.

If we wait until the trade deadline we may end up hoping to bring Adam Eaton back.