Garcia's Injury Halts Lieber Trade

This is my second contribution to MLBTradeRumors.com and with this entry, I have yet to comment on a trade that might be happening.  So far, when it comes to the Phillies, it's been all about trades that aren't going to happen.

Yesterday afternoon, manager Charlie Manuel told reporters that Jon Lieber, the subject of considerable trade speculation since December, would begin to pitch exclusively out of the bullpen, not because of poor performance, but because he was the odd-man out on a team with six starting pitchers.  Later in the evening, Freddy Garcia was pulled from the first inning.  Besides suffering from numerous big hits by the Toronto Blue Jays lineup, Garcia's velocity was down and he reported experiencing tightness in his right biceps.

With this development, it's likely that for the time being, life will change very little for Lieber and he will slide right back into the starting rotation while Garcia's health problems are sorted out.  Lieber won't be traded anywhere any time soon.

Tom Goyne is the author of Balls, Sticks, & Stuff, a Phillies-centric site, and maintains the Phloggers' Pheeds page, a source for the latest commentary from around the "phlogosphere".

Comments

[boomshwa12]

adam eaton will probably be hurt by the time garcia gets back so lieber will most likely be a phillie for a while

[jonny]

perhaps a blessing in disguise for the phils? might they acquire an outfielder or bullpen help without trading lieber?

[PeteRose]

Lieber threw two scoreless innings in relief today and will continue to prepare for his role as middle reliever. Lieber also requested a trade when told he was moving to the pen, which is somewhat humorous.

[bravesbeast]

Garcia is already hurt, oh darn, i cant express how sad i am to see the phils already have question marks about their staff, what a dern shame, what to do to do, darn, why the phils, shoot golly gosh darn