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| Thursday, July 27 | |||||
| Unit, Schilling will take heat off each other ESPN.com | |||||
| For months, for years, he was the subject of more rumors than Monica Lewinsky. But finally, one of them came true. Finally, Curt Schilling is an ex-Phillie.
He's with the Arizona Diamondbacks now. And he and Randy Johnson give Arizona a 1-2 power saw unmatched in any other team's tool kit.
Meanwhile, the Phillies get four players, ages 22 to 28, who Phillies GM Ed Wade said have "improved the future of our ballclub." So have they? Let's take a closer look at this deal:
What Schilling does for Arizona First off, Schilling and the Big Unit become only the fourth set of 300-strikeout men since 1900 to pitch for the same team at the same time. (Nolan Ryan pitched briefly with J.R. Richard in Houston in 1980, then later teamed with Mike Scott; Steve Carlton and Vida Blue, both well past their prime, pitched briefly with the Giants in 1986.) So that's scary in itself. Now he and Johnson take some of the heat off each other. At the time of the deal, the Diamondbacks were playing .773 ball (17-5) when Johnson started -- and .500 ball (39-39) when anyone else started. But now they have a commodity only the Braves can match. They have two true No. 1 starters. Johnson and Schilling are the National League's last two starting pitchers in the All-Star Game. They've also won the last three strikeout titles. Johnson has averaged more strikeouts per nine innings than any left-hander in the National League. Schilling has averaged more whiffs per nine innings than any right-hander in the league. Compared to the Big Unit's unbeatability (175-91 lifetime), Schilling's career won-lost record (105-88) may not look too imposing. But he's played on just one winning team since joining the Phillies (1993) and his other numbers tell the real story. He's completed a higher percentage of his starts (60 of 230, 26.1 percent) than any starter in baseball. He has a better strikeout-to-walk ratio (3.43 to 1) than Greg Maddux (3.18). Of pitchers currently on active rosters, only Pedro Martinez (9.45) and Maddux (10.17) have allowed fewer baserunners per nine innings than Schilling (10.35). And only Pedro (.274) and Maddux (.284) have allowed a lower career on-base percentage than Schilling's .288. Granted, Schilling isn't the same pitcher he was in his 300-punchout days in 1997 and 1998. He regularly hit 96 to 98 on the fastguns in those days. He pitches at around 94 now. So he's had to be more wily. But since he's regained consistent velocity, he's gone 4-2 over his last seven starts with a 2.17 ERA. And even without his supersonic fastball, he has tremendous presence and feel for his craft. The only question will be health. And clearly, the Phillies must have been worried about it, after two major surgeries, or they wouldn't have been so quick to pull the trigger. But that's a long-term worry. And if the Diamondbacks can ride the Johnson-Schilling Express deep into October, they won't care much about life in 2004. What the trade does for Philadelphia For weeks, the Phillies had said they were trading Schilling only if they were overwhelmed. And in the end, Wade said he thought they were. Well, maybe. If Travis Lee turns into the formidable left-handed thumper he once appeared to be, if Omar Daal can figure out where it all fell apart and if Vicente Padilla evolves into a big-time closer, then the Phillies did great. Their lineup then would be deep in youth and left-right balance. Their rotation would have plenty of options (and three left-handers). And Padilla -- whose addition to the Arizona offer this week seemed to propel this deal toward completion -- would solve the Phillies' single most disastrous problem in recent years: inability to get those last three outs. At any rate, the Phillies got four legitimate players (Nelson Figueroa was the fourth). Which is fine. But when you trade a pitcher of the caliber of Curt Schilling, it would seem you would get at least one known quantity, one sure star in the making. And the Phillies can't make that claim. "To me," said one National League scout, "the one thing lacking on the Phillies' end is a No. 1-type player. Lee is a perfect second guy in the deal -- a guy who has a chance to be something. Padilla is a good No. 3 in a deal. But who's the No. 1, the guy you know is going to be great?" It also seemed as if the Phillies had a higher price tag for other clubs on Schilling's list than they had for Arizona. They are believed to have asked for J.D. Drew and Matt Morris from St. Louis. They reportedly turned down an offer of Richie Sexson, Jaret Wright and Enrique Wilson from Cleveland. They apparently thought Alfonso Soriano and Ramiro Mendoza weren't enough from the Yankees. And they never seemed impressed with any of the Mets' packages, even when they included hot outfield prospect Alex Escobar. So even if the end result helps them down the road, there will be lots of head-scratching in Philadelphia over the decision to make this deal for this particular group of players. Wade said that "in a deal for a guy like Curt, we couldn't come out of it saying we got four guys, 21 years old, pitching in A ball." And Arizona was the one club left on Schilling's list that was offering four players who were "major-league ready." So ultimately, they decided this package was good enough. But now they have to find out what the after-effects are of having no Schilling around to right the ship every five days. Remember, over the last two years, the Phillies were 11 games over .500 when Schilling started, 29 under .500 when anyone else started. And since the middle of June, when Schilling began pitching well this year, they were 20-15. They were 24-29 before that. Their rotation, thanks to Schilling, had the third-lowest ERA (4.41) in the National League at the time of the trade. But Schilling brought the Phillies something else: charisma. He was the single most compelling reason for people in and out of Philadelphia to pay attention to the Phillies. Now that he's gone, he leaves a promising core group of players (Scott Rolen, Pat Burrell, Bobby Abreu, Mike Lieberthal, Doug Glanville, Randy Wolf, etc.). But there's only one way for the Phillies to get any serious attention now: Win. So they desperately need this trade to transport them in that direction. Jayson Stark is a senior writer at ESPN.com. | ALSO SEE Jayson Stark archive Kurkjian: D-Backs bank on Schilling for October D-Backs acquire Schilling from Phillies Rumor Central | ||||