Phillies' rebuild to come later, as they lose again

ON THE DAY the Phillies named a new president - with the bonus of the ownership group ending its unofficial vow of silence - the soon-to-retire team president announced that the general manager with the expiring contract would stay in place for the duration of the season.

Got all of that?

Andy MacPhail is aboard for the Phillies' rebuild; he'll officially take the reins from Pat Gillick in October. Ruben Amaro Jr.'s job status remains up in the air, but he's not going anywhere until season's end.

And then there's the bespectacled stand-in manager, who sat inside the home dugout at Citizens Bank Park three hours before first pitch on his fourth day on the fill-in job, and on his first day with the regime change in the front office.

Yep, that's right, lost in Monday's events was the fact that the Phillies still don't know who will be managing the team when it leaves for Atlanta for a weekend series.

It could be Pete Mackanin, who accepted the interim role when Amaro and Gillick were, in Amaro's words, "scrambling around" after Ryne Sandberg's abrupt exit last Friday. It could be someone else.

"I'm a Philly organization guy, I'm a solider," Mackanin said Monday afternoon, before the Phillies dropped a deflating, 7-4 defeat to the Milwaukee Brewers, their last-place neighbors of the National League Central. "I'll do what they ask and try to do anything I can to get the Phillies back where we should be."

Although some people have begun linking the managerial vacancy to candidates with connections to MacPhail (former Twins manager Ron Gardenhire) or others who have recently been let go (Bud Black, formerly of San Diego), that's not the direction the Phillies are headed, at least for the 84 games remaining on the schedule.

"We're not going to make the decision on a manager for 2016 now," Gillick said. "It will be an interim position, whoever it is. After I leave, Andy or whoever the general manager is, they're going to make the decision who the manager is for 2016 is. That's the decision that lies with them. We don't want to hire a permanent manager right now, because I think that wouldn't be the right thing to do."

The expectations for said undetermined manager are unclear.

The Phillies (27-51) are playing a special brand of bad baseball. They are on pace for 106 losses, which would be the sixth-highest loss total in the franchise's 133 years. They made Milwaukee, owner of the second-worst record in baseball, look like a legitimate major league ballclub.

Brewers All-Star catcher Jonathan Lucroy, who finished fourth in NL MVP voting last year but entered Monday with an OPS that rivaled Chase Utley's and Carlos Ruiz', broke out of a seasonlong funk with four hits. Natural-born Phillies killer Ryan Braun had three hits.

Sean O'Sullivan, meanwhile, allowed a season-high 12 hits and saw his ERA climb to 5.76. Amazingly, that's only fourth-worst among Phillies pitchers who have made at least five starts: Jerome Williams, 6.43; Severino Gonzalez, 8.28; David Buchanan, 8.76.

The Phillies have dropped four of their last five games since last week's modest three-game win streak was snapped at Yankee Stadium. Wins aren't vital on a major league team during a complete overhaul and rebuild - the front office's focus is more on the minor leagues, something Gillick readily acknowledged Monday - but they also aren't unimportant.

"[During] all of the years I spent in the minor leagues, development was always No. 1," Mackanin said. "We're developing players. You don't pinch-hit for certain players because they have to learn, how to handle certain situations. But on the other hand part of that debate was the fact that winning is part of development. In order to become players, you have to develop winning players.

"Winning to me is almost as important as watching them fail and learn from that. The more you can win, they get that feeling. Winning is part of development and is part of what we're trying to do. That's why we're trying to win. You see them out here [during batting practice]. Larry [Bowa] has got them out here all the time, Juan [Samuel, too]. These guys are working hard to try to get to that spot."

Mackanin will be content to continue working to make that happen, if asked. The front office is expected to make a decision on the managerial position in the coming days.

"If that's what they feel helps the organization, I'm happy to do it," Mackanin said. "If they want to go a different direction, I'm good with it. I'm loyal to the Phillies. This is my sixth year as a coach and played here a little bit over a year, although I was hurt. But it's meant a lot to me. Seeing a World Series. I've seen the good times towards the end and I'd love to be here when they get back to it, no matter what role I'm in."

Chad Billingsley (right shoulder strain) will return to the rotation on Thursday. Billingsley is 0-2 with a 6.75 ERA in three starts. The Phillies will make a roster move to accommodate his return before Thursday's start.

Blog: ph.ly/HighCheese