Skip to content
Link copied to clipboard

Brookover: For good and sad, Phillies in a spring of change

CLEARWATER, Fla. - It's different around here and in so many ways that is terrific. After years of putting off the changes that needed to be made following the second great era in Phillies history, it is obvious that the franchise is headed in a different direction. Time, of course, will determine if it is the right one.

CLEARWATER, Fla. - It's different around here and in so many ways that is terrific.

After years of putting off the changes that needed to be made following the second great era in Phillies history, it is obvious that the franchise is headed in a different direction. Time, of course, will determine if it is the right one.

Managing partner John Middleton, once part of an invisible and publicly silent group of ownership partners, not only was in clear view during the early days of this spring training, he was also quite accessible. Ask him about the team's 2017 starting rotation and he'll tell you that some of the organization's best arms are still percolating down in the lower minors.

Andy MacPhail, in his second season as the team president, has his fingerprints all over the makeover at the Phillies' spring-training facilties. He did not have anything to do with the name change - Bright House Field is now Spectrum Field in case you had not heard - but the place has been spruced up with well-done images honoring players from the past and present.

Murals of Hall of Famers Richie Ashburn, Steve Carlton, Robin Roberts, and Mike Schmidt have been painted on each of the red concrete walls that identify the four fields at the Carpenter Complex practice facility. The walls leading to the home clubhouse inside the actual stadium also have fresh artwork that reminds all who enter of the franchise's best and brightest days.

General manager Matt Klentak has a year under his belt, a roster scrubbed of the past, a payroll ready to expand, and an extensive analytics department led by Andy Galdi.

"Yeah, it's different," said Phillies bench coach Larry Bowa, who has spent more than 30 spring trainings here in Clearwater. "The makeup of the club in particular. It's a rebuild and that's hard to do sometimes. People say it's easy to just cut the cord. It's not that easy."

Bowa said the daily baseball operations have been different, too.

"Even in our meetings," he said. "Back in the day, all the [front-office] brass would be in on them and we'd talk about everything. Now we just meet with the coaches. Everybody has different philsophies and, personally, I think that's good."

At the very least it is well intentioned.

But not all the changes we have seen in this camp have been so easy to stomach. Three men who have been organizational giants have not made an appearance and in two of the cases it's difficult to think about. Dallas Green and Bill Giles are still back in the Philadelphia area for health-related reasons. Former GM and presdient Pat Gillick, who has an ownership share of the team, has also been absent, but that's by choice. He'll definitely be in spring training at some point, and Giles, by all accounts, is still hoping to get here, too.

"It's real strange not seeing them," Bowa said. "They are always here and this is their favorite time of the year. They are baseball lifers who have given their heart and soul to this organization, and the fact that they're not here is tough. There are probably a lot of guys in this clubhouse who do not even know them, but there are a lot of us who respect both of them and basically owe a whole lot to them."

Green, 82, and Gillick, 79, have an encyclopedic knowledge of baseball history and were always great references whether you were a baseball writer, scout, or a GM. Giles, 82, probably loves the Phillies more than any man alive. If he has any competition, it comes from David Montgomery, the man who succeeded him as the team president.

Montgomery, 70, has been around this spring and his presence has been more welcome than a game-changing free agent because it means he is doing well after a two-year battle with jaw cancer.

"These guys are basically pillars of the organization," said Bowa, who at 71 remains a ball of energy who has defied time to remain on the field as a coach. "They have been here through bad times and they've been here through good times. They've been here when attendance was brutal and they've seen it the other way, when you couldn't find a seat."

Charlie Manuel, 73, also remains a spring-training fixture for the Phillies even though this will be his fourth full season since being removed from the manager's seat. Two of his players from the 2008 World Series team - Brad Lidge and Chad Durbin - are guest instructors, and another - Matt Stairs - is now the hitting instructor. We'll likely see more and more players from that team serve in coaching roles as time passes.

The 1993 National League champion Phillies are also well represented here with John Kruk moving into the TV booth as Mickey Morandini begins his second season as the first-base coach. The hope is that Darren Daulton, the leader of that team, will be at next Sunday's alumni game, but there's no guarantee because his battle with brain cancer that started in July 2013 has intensified again.

"I usually send texts to him and most of the time he sends them right back," Bowa said. "Lately he hasn't been. But I heard a few days ago that he was back on a drug that has rejuvenated him a little bit. I know at the fantasy camp [in January] he was scuffling."

The wall tributes to former Phillies greats at Spectrum Field and the Carpenter Complex are nice, but there is nothing more inspiring than seeing men like Green and Daulton in the flesh.

"Fighters," Bowa called them both. "If you put it in terms of baseball, they never gave up, and I know that's still their attitude."

Some things you hope never change.

bbrookover@phillynews.com

@brookob