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Seeking signs of hope with Phillies

Andy MacPhail, the Phillies president, is telling everyone to be patient. The team didn't become the worst in the major leagues in just one season, and it will take more than just that to turn things around. This makes perfect sense.

Phillies president Andy MacPhail, general manager Matt Klentak and part-owner John Middleton.
Phillies president Andy MacPhail, general manager Matt Klentak and part-owner John Middleton.Read more(Alejandro A. Alvarez/Staff Photographer)

Andy MacPhail, the Phillies president, is telling everyone to be patient. The team didn't become the worst in the major leagues in just one season, and it will take more than just that to turn things around. This makes perfect sense.

Matt Klentak, the fresh, young general manager, preaches slow growth. Building a team is a process, and the process takes a while. Baseball does not reward haste, and he couldn't be more right.

But it is still January and there is no hope to be found anywhere else. The crocus shoots that impudently poked up their heads when it was 70 degrees on Christmas now lie flat on their backs under the deep pall cloth of snow.

The gray of the season is matched by the muted landscape of the local sports scene. The football team dissolved into nothing; the basketball team, which really doesn't fool around when it comes to slow growth, continues on its nonchalant path; and the hockey team wins and loses and wins and loses and skates in frustrating circles.

So, I put my fingers in my ears when Andy MacPhail speaks. I pull the covers over my head and say, "Bah, bah, bah, bah," when Matt Klentak comes around. And don't get me started on Benny Looper or Joe Jordan. Wet blankets, every one of them.

The Phillies are going to be interesting this season. They are going to be fun to watch. They are going to be . . . good. All right, all right. Let's just stick with the interesting and fun to watch part.

Manager Pete Mackanin said he has settled on four of the five starting pitchers in his rotation, at least as much as they can be settled upon before a single pitch is thrown in spring training. He wants to pencil in Aaron Nola and Jerad Eickhoff, both of whom began 2015 at the double-A level; veteran Charlie "Ground Chuck" Morton, who has been on the disabled list in five of the last six seasons; and Jeremy Hellickson, who was 9-12, with a 4.62 earned run average for Arizona last season.

If that doesn't inspire confidence that the bad old days of Aaron Harang are behind us, you should know that the Phillies have been collecting arms, with many of them attached to very tall men. Of the 36 pitchers the team lists among probables, possibles, hopefuls, maybes, and just-taking-a-look, 14 of them are 6-foot-4 or taller, topped out by 6-7 lefthanded reliever Elvis Araujo, who appeared in 40 games last season and didn't fall off the mound once. MacPhail said that to find five starters, you have to have 10 starters, and that putting together a full staff of 10 or 11 requires a couple of dozen applicants.

"The idea here is numbers," MacPhail said recently. "You just need to get as many as you possibly can and continue to work on it every day. Free agency in pitching is expensive. That's not where we're headed this year."

This is another MacPhail refrain that puts a crimp in our optimistic spring. The Phillies aren't going to be spending a lot of money on the major-league team, which, if you remember, is the one we have to watch on television every night. To that I say, pish posh, they'll be just fine.

Among the everyday players, an infield of Darrin Ruf/Ryan Howard, Cesar Hernandez, Freddy Galvis, and Maikel Franco holds a lot of promise for future contention, with the possible exception of Ruf, Howard, Hernandez, and Galvis.

In the outfield, the Phillies have brought in a number to audition, which indicates how many players it takes to replace Domonic Brown. As with locating their pitching depth, the Phils were creative, combing the waiver wire, using the Rule 5 draft, making little trades, signing fringe free agents.

It could be their starting centerfielder will be someone named Peter Bourjos, who had the poor fortune to be with the Angels when Mike Trout came along, and then was shuffled around by the Cardinals, who waived him after he hit .218 in 459 at-bats over two seasons. Bingo! Starting centerfielder! Put Odubel Herrera and Aaron Altherr on the corners and off we go.

Others may fret that this team has no power (not that hitting for average will be a strength, either), or worry that the pitchers who collected 32 of the team's 34 saves are gone. Putting Nola in a pressure-packed situation, without a legitimate ace around him, with only 242 professional innings to his name, is the sort of thing that bothers the faint-hearted. Counting heavily on the eventual arrival of catcher Jorge Alfaro, shortstop J.P. Crawford, and outfielder Nick Williams makes the odds of hitting on all three very slim, but that is the winter talking, not the spring. Don't listen.

We know what the cold voice of winter has to say. It says that patience is required and pain is unavoidable. It says that the snow will fall and the melting will be slow. But we also know that the grass is still there under the snow, and it will be back.

The man just won't say when.

bford@phillynews.com

@bobfordsports

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