Ruben Amaro Calls Teams to Find Out if they like Cole Hamels; Giggles, Hangs Up

“Baseball insider” Jon Heyman of CBS Sports is saying that the Phillies are asking around to find out what people would give to have Cole Hamels on their team.  Though it’s difficult to believe Jon’s aware of anything seeing as how he’s apparently trapped inside of a baseball.

But, regardless, this seems to be what is happening.  No one has been traded yet, but Ruben Amaro is calling opposing GMs up just to hear them say large numbers.  Meanwhile, Cole sits across from him, and they have a fun little chortle every time somebody says “Am I on speaker phone?!” and hangs up.

And that’s it.  That’s all that’s happening.

The national beat writers report the ambiguous details of a thing, then the fans all react to the thing, and then the local beat writers write patronizing columns correcting everyone’s reactions.

So in the course of a few hours we’ve seen this process reach its end, and it’s kind of beautiful to know the baseball trade rumor ecosystem is still functioning, regardless of how polluted it gets with tweets and blogs and posts that go on and on and on for next to no reason because all of the necessary information has already been explained.  I’m sure Ruben Amaro will do something, it’s just a matter of how insane he feels when we wakes up in late July.

There is mostly a month before that magical July 31 square on the calendar after which no one can be traded.  Will Cole Hamels stay a Phillie forever and be a part of our gleeful resurgence or will he wind up the rental of a 2012 contender, only to be tossed aside when they’re done with him to be picked up by some division rival the following year or something?

That is the run-on sentence we will be screaming inside of our heads for the next 29 days as we walk around the city pretending to be sane.