Despite adversity, Phillies rolling toward 100-plus wins

OBSERVATIONS, insinuations, ruminations and plain opinions . . .

The Phillies are 10 games past the mathematical halfway point in the season. But the All-Star break has become the official benchmark for halfway-ness. Sort of like the true North Pole vs. the Magnetic North Pole. Or Easter falling on a different date each year. Whatever, they keep the calendar people in business.

When they came to the real halfway point and to this latter-day milepost, my spin is the same:

How the hell did they pull this off? How did they get to the break 23 games over .500 with a roster that some weeks had more All-Stars in Clearwater on rehab assignment than on the Citizens Bank field?

One week I was ready to head north when baseball's No. 1 prospect, Dom Brown, showed up at extended spring training. What impressed me more than his play with the low-rung kids waiting for their short seasons to open was his interaction with them. He encouraged them in BP and complimented them in the field. He played the whole time with a grin on his face, partly because his wrist was feeling good and partly because he is still a big kid himself.

Then he moved over to Bright House Field, put on a power show for a couple of days and was fast-tracked to Lehigh Valley.

Dom's here now, still a gangly work in progress. But what a work. And what progress from where he was last November when he raised eyebrows with his competitive Dominican Winter League no-show. He was in Santo Domingo in body only.

Before Dom showed up, Chase Utley was here. I covered his two-homer debut against a Blue Jays low-minors lefthander rehabbing from Tommy John. The important thing was that Chase still had the bat speed and power to drive two balls out of the yard in the Blue Jays complex. I think he'll have a productive second half.

I was packed and ready again, but here came Roy Oswalt. He had next to nothing in a rehab start with the Clearwater Threshers. There was lot of excuse-making then about just getting in his work against Class A hitters. I was seeing something different, however. Maybe after covering more than 4,000 games, osmosis sets in and you do sop up a little baseball knowledge. I had seen Oswalt pitch in Sydney for Team USA at the 2000 Olympics. He weighed about a buck sixty and was hitting 98 on the gun. And he was doing it with a Tom Seaveresque drop-and-drive delivery.

That's the same long-striding, low-finishing delivery that got him recognized as the hardest-throwing, pound-per-pound pitcher in the bigs. He is not that pitcher anymore.

Brad Lidge was out for the spring duration and is still baby-stepping. A sculpted mahogany log named Jose Contreras was on, off and back on the DL. Then Ryan Madson went down and is on the rehab trail, starting for the Threshers on Wednesday night against Charlotte. Meanwhile, the healthy guys weren't exactly tearing it up. Ryan Howard was a massive column waiting for a cathedral to be built around him. Chooch got hurt. So did Brian Schneider. Ben Francisco settled in around the Mendoza Line. Ross Gload could hit but he couldn't play the field due to a bad hip.

Something was way out of phase because the more the adversity, the better the survivors played. Antonio Bastardo not only was good when called on to set up for Contreras, better when called on to close in Madson's spot. The kid was putting up numbers as gaudy as any closer in the bigs.

And setting up in front of him was Michael Stutes, a kid with gunfighter eyes I compare to Warren Brusstar, whose poker face and steely demeanor helped save the day for the 1980 Phillies.

I couldn't help but think that we were getting a rare look at a near future that could be brighter than the recent past. Age has, after all, started to wither them.

So, it's probably not a disaster if Lidge or Contreras no longer play a key role. But Madson is needed. He was as good as any closer when he went DL. Vance Worley is short on power but long on finesse and cojones.

It would be nice to have Joe Blanton back. He has that September glow about him. But Kyle Kendrick at No. 5 is certainly no deal-breaker.

Despite signs of excellent defender John Mayberry becoming an offensive force and Dom Brown's still-skitterish-but-improved play, one constant concern remains. Ruben Amaro needs to come up with a righthanded bat. He can probably get something significant done if he finds the money to pick up somebody's unwieldy contract. Carlos Beltran would be a superb addition in right. And for the Phils to pick up about $9 million remaining on his contract, it would cost them very little in prospects. The Mets reportedly are getting a couple of warm bodies for Francisco Rodriguez. But Beltran will be a free agent, therefore a rental.

Amaro is a notorious soft-shoer who might be laying in the weeds even as we speak.

I picked this team to win 100 games in March. I was probably low.

At last count, there were more than 650 email responses and Philly.com comments to the Ryan Howard column. No way I could answer that number. Pro Howards were running 4-1. The 25 percent still bashing him were split between cybergeeks making WAR, not love. And personal attacks on me, mostly on the website.

Who is the only big-league player to wear the name of his town as his uniform number?

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