Ruben Amaro Wordlessly Consents to New Assistant GM in his Inner Circle

Says newest hire is “home run,” in odd moment of cheesy euphemism

Howard Smith-US PRESSWIRE

You can’t imagine what it would be like to be pulled into Ruben Amaro’s inner circle.  The powerful suits.  The dangerous women.  The back room deals.  The phone calls home at 3:30 in the morning to tell your worried mother that you won’t be home for Thanksgiving, again, because you and Ruben have a meeting with Jimmy Rollins’ people to negotiate the amount of hustle per year of his extension.

It’s a cold, slick world, where silence is killed mercilessly by the repetitive buzz of the phone in your pocket that you swore to your wife was turned off.

“We need you in St. Louis,” a voice says.  It’s Ruben. Somehow, he’s never unalert.

“We were just in St. Louis!” you exclaim, exasperated.

His condescending laughter ruins your day, and he tells you there’s a car waiting outside.  It was a crappy year.  You guys have a lot of work to do.

Not a role for just anybody, but Ruben has allowed a new Scott Proefrock-approved executive to penetrate his inner sanctum.  His name is Bart Braun, and at 61 years old, the former Pirates, Braves, and Rays scout will be tasked with taking a measuring stick to the Dominican and figuring out who will solve all of the Phillies’ problems.

"“We feel this guy is a home run as far as his ability to scout and contribute to the club.”–Ruben Amaro"

Unshockingly, Ruben does not expect many more changes to be made to the Phillies scouting team.  It takes a long time to establish trust, and most of this offseason will be eaten up by dramatic simulations that Braun thinks are real but are really just Amaro testing his allegiance and dedication.  We can only hope that Ruben remembers to sign players and improve the team in between phone calls to Braun’s house saying that Roy Halladay has wandered into the Amazonian jungle with a scimitar to “….finish this” and that they need an immediate solution.

Moves will be made, certainly.  Amaro bringing in another gun may be an indication that he is trying to cover more ground.  Or it just means they had an opening and Scott Proefrock knew a guy.