Phillies Looking to Plug Their Werth-Hole with Juan Rivera

So I’ve been slowly watching possible right fielders getting crossed off the list, and now that the Pirates grabbed asshole-stopping outfield hero Matt Diaz, the nauseous grips of what feels like an inevitable Francoeur signing tighten once more.Seriously, are they just jerking us around?  Do they want to have no other options?  I hope Ruben is cooking up something good, because a Francoeur-centric press conference would be enough to ruin my year.  And I’ve had a spectacular year.

Anyways.  I’d like to see them take a glean at Josh Willingham, since the Nationals apparently have their ears open as wide as their wallets.  But what reality is telling me is that the Phillies are a mite curious about the Angels’ Juan Rivera and also that you can’t purposely overdraw a bank account just to see how much money you can get away with.

As always, everything is connected to everything in the off season.  The Halos will be more welcoming to jettisoning Rivera if they lock down Carl Crawford, but since many teams in the league aren’t run by idiots, the Angels are far from the only interested party in Crawdaddy, which I assume is Crawford’s nickname because how could it not be.

Like some other people we know, Rivera was great in 2009 (.287, 25 HR, 88 RBI), and not in 2010 (.252, 15 HR, 52 RBI). The Phillies are familiar enough with the outfielder after flirting with him bunch in 2009, but any progress on that front was cockblocked by the signing of Raul Ibanez.

The key to remember here is that he doesn’t have to be as good, just better than Ben Francisco.  And then Ruben casually blurts out they’re thinking maybe Francisco/Gload in right, leaving Brown out entirely, which didn’t even occur to me or apparently anyone else in the universe.

“We won’t comment on rumors,” Ruben stated.  Why not?  It’s so much fun.