No, not the City beat, nor the courts - baseball stuff.  Strange, I know.  And before I delve too deeply into this post, I appreciate the paradoxical nature of the poll I posted yesterday; visitors to the blog who answer “yes” are effectively saying they want to stop coming to a site… that they’re coming to.  Don’t get me wrong - I want the input, and I understand that there’s a segment of [cough] regular visitors that would like ottawalynxblog.com to go away for reasons having nothing to do with [cough] baseball coverage.

Anyway.

From scout.com:

Question: “Erik Bedard or Dan Haren would look good in a Phillies uniform. Do you see either of them coming to town in a deal?”

Answer: No and probably not.

The Phillies offered Baltimore Kyle Kendrick, Shane Victorino, Jason Donald and Zack Segovia for Bedard and were turned down flat. It’s simply going to take a LOT for a team to get Bedard away from Baltimore and the Phillies aren’t going to want to give up what it would take. They may be even further away from a deal to bring Haren to town, since the A’s would want a huge return in young players and the Phillies won’t sell out the farm to get one pitcher.

[Blogger - whoa.  Kendrick, Victorino, Donald and Segovia and still a no-go.]

The Phillies and Pirates could match up very well for a deal. Damaso Marte is signed for $2 million in 2008 and a $6 million team option for 2009 and would be a nice addition to the back of the Phillies bullpen. Marte has pitched well in a set-up role for the Pirates and could be dealt, but so far, the Pirates are asking for a lot in exchange. A step down would be John Grabow, a left-hander with decent Major League numbers for Pittsburgh. He would be a late inning option and a complement to lefty J.C. Romero to get left-handers out.

With Rowand out of the picture, the Phillies talked to Mike Cameron, but he wants multiple years and the Phillies won’t do it. That again shifted the Phillies to Pittsburgh where they found Nate McLouth. The lefty hitting McLouth has decent power (13 HR in 329 AB last season) and carries a small contract. Again though, the Pirates may want more than McLouth could be worth.

Don’t count out the possiblity of the Phillies putting Josh Outman or J.A. Happ at the top of a package for Pittsburgh to get McLouth and one of the relievers. The Phillies would bite the bullet and include some good prospects in the right deal.

[Blogger: Interesting to see the Pittsburgh connection taking shape.  Happ is a known commodity as far as John Russell is involved.  He would probably have a little inside information about Outman as well.  Add to that the fact that the Pirates also recently picked up the Phillies minor league hitting coordinator, Don Long, and you have the possibility of creating a similar dynamic as exists between Philadelphia GM Pat Gillick, and his former organization in Seattle.