Pursuit of Lopez appears to be over
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Pursuit of Lopez appears to be over
Bob Brookover, Inquirer Baseball Columnist
The Phillies' pursuit of Houston reliever Wilton Lopez is over, multiple sources said Thursday.
A trade for the Houston reliever appeared to be gathering steam Wednesday when the Phillies brought the 29-year-old reliever into Philadelphia for a physical, but for some reason the talks stalled and then died.
It was first revealed on the Phillies' web site that the deal was not going to get done.
Lopez would have been an attractive and inexpensive alternative to filling the role of eighth-inning setup man, which was one of the team's biggest weaknesses last season.
Instead, the Phillies are still looking for that eighth-inning reliever as well as a center fielder and possibly a third baseman. Lots of work for general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. to do as the winter meetings in Nashville draw near. The meetings officially open Monday.
Comments (47)
Lopez spent some time on the DL this year with an elbow problem. That wasn't in all the initial rosy reports on the guy. My guess is the elbow resulted in a questionable physical and the Astros were asking for too much to take that risk. One report said it may have been one of the catchers as speculated plus a young pitcher like Cloyd. As bad as it may look, figure it's good if they got out of a deal that could have ended up with a million plus dollars on the DL. I'm not sure how much of a role the Phillies may have had in making it public before it was a done deal. My guess is it got out there through other sources, which means the Phillies only look bad because someone else hyped a deal up prematurely.— s- Washington's deal for Span might be a sign of the real value of the Phils Prospects. I'd rather have Span than Bourn and he was traded for a class A pitcher.— T Schick
- That Span deal sounds pretty good for the Nats. Span here was not ideal -- LH hitter without much power. He's a good defensive CF though. — s
- The Nats got EXACTLY what they needed in Denard Span, a legit lead-off hitter who can patrol CF and move Harper to left. With Morse taking over at first (if LaRoche moves on), the Nats will be loaded in 2013.
Other than all of this, I'd love to know Amaro's thought process about how his team will make up 15 - 20 games in the standings. The Braves and Nats are already improved over last season, while our guy sits tight.
Bourn might be part of the answer but he is hardly enough of an answer to the signings of Upton and Span factored on top of the already-huge gap between the Nats and Braves and us.
How the heck did we get here?— advantasux 
All you Amaro bashers need to calm down. You don't even know what happened! What if the Phils signed him and he was hurt? You'd be bashing Amaro later on for signing him. And surely you'd have given him little credit now had the deal gotten done. And you STILL wouldn't know the full story of this guy's health.— Rotcod- With Lopez and Madson gone and Denard Span just acquired by the Nats, expect us to be all in on Bourn. We did not acquire cheaper alternatives, so now we have to pay top dollar or Rueben will be looked at as a failure this offseason.— VinceNYC
- If ignorance is bliss then some of you are the most blissful people in the world...— Russ
- Just fire uncle rub— 658012
- Key to philly sports success:Fire Andy, Sell the Eagles to a owner who wants 2 win and fire uncle chuckles— 658012
- Key to philly sports success:Fire Andy, Sell the Eagles to a owner who wants 2 win and fire uncle chuckles— 658012
- Phils have opportunity to build for future at the winter meetings. Three good trade partners are the Padres, Twins, and Rockies, all of whom are needing starting pitching. The talent we should target are Jedd Gyorko(2b/3G), Nate Ardenaldo (3b), Aaron Hicks (CF), Russ Wheeler(3B). The guy who is ready for 2013 is Gyorko, a perfect fit for us.— fafink
- I think it is cause for celebration that Upton signed with the Braves and Amaro forced them to overpay. Upton is now the highest paid player in the Braves history. Good job Rubin. Make the opposition pay big bucks to stay competitive.— fafink
- He wouldn't agree to the regiment of pills the Phillies wanted him to tAKE.— Wilhelm Von Humboldt
- Look, I'm on record as saying the only transformative move out there for us is Josh Hamilton. He takes heat off Howard and means Frandsen-Galvis-Schmidt Jr. at 3B is OK, out of the eight hole. I mean, seriously, what's wrong with this:
1. Rollins, SS; 2. Utley, 2B; 3. Hamilton, CF (for only 2013); 4. Howard, 1B; 5. Ruiz/Kratz, C; 6. Brown, RF; 7. Schierholtz/Nix/Mayberry, LF; 8. Frandsen/Galvis, 3B.
Amaro had it right the other day: If Utley and Howard don't play to be $20 million guys, we're done. You can add all the Victorinos and Chase Headleys around that that you want, but we have two guys right there paid to be All-Star caliber. They either are, or they are not.
But, you sign Hamilton for 4-5 years, knowing he will be in left or right in 2014, and that Utley and maybe Halladay are off the books in 2014, you are good to go.
Complicating things with Fools Gold like Upton is ridiculous. We went out and signed Pete Rose for 1980 and won a World Series. That is the equivalent this year with Hamilton.
— eman - agree about Hamilton and what he would mean to this team, but I have to ask: why no Darin Ruf in LF? — advantasux
About this blog
The Phillies Zone is the place for up-to-the-minute Phillies coverage from the Inquirer.
Matt Gelb
Inquirer Staff Writer
Bob Brookover
Inquirer Baseball Columnist
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