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The Phillies have been amazing on the road this season and struggling badly at home. As you can probably guess, they are scoring more runs on their games on the road. The chart below shows how many runs they have scored overall, in their games at home and on the road and the total number of runs they would score if they produced runs at that rate over 162 games for each category:

And, as you have also probably guessed, they have been much better at preventing runs on the road than they have at home:

Clearly the Phillies have been better at both scoring and preventing runs on the road. One of those areas has been a much bigger issue than the other, though. To give you a hint, the thing where they’re scoring five runs a game at home isn’t so much a problem.

Not counting yesterday’s games, here’s how many runs the teams in the NL have scored per games this season (ordered by the number of runs they’ve scored):

The Phillies have been awful at home this season in terms of wins and losses. They’ve scored a run a game more on the road than they have at home, but they’re still scoring five runs a game at home. Five runs a game is a lot. There are 15 teams in the NL that aren’t the Phillies. Two of them have scored five runs a game or more this season. If the Phillies played 162 games and scored runs at the rate they are scoring them at home, they would score 810 runs. That’s more runs than they scored in 2008. In ’08 there was only one NL team that scored more than 810 runs for the season — the Cubs scored 855.

So while the Phillies may be scoring less runs at home than they are on the road, they’re still scoring a ton of runs at home.

The bigger problem is the rate at which they are allowing runs. Here’s the number of runs allowed by NL teams this season:

Again, 15 teams in the NL that aren’t the Phillies. Just one of them, the miserable Nationals, are allowing more runs per game for the season than the 5.55 that the Phillies have allowed at home. If the Phils allowed 5.55 runs per game over 162 games they would allow about 899. No team in the NL allowed that many runs in 2008. The Pirates allowed the most runs and they gave up 884.

Joe Savery is pitching well at Reading.

The Phils young guns got hammered by the Pirates yesterday as the team fell to the Pirates, 11-6. With the loss they fall to 1-1 in spring training action. Savery and Outman both got hit hard. Savery started the fourth with a 5-1 lead and allowed five runs in the inning, including a three-run home run to Nate McLouth. Outman, who unlike Savery is thought by many to be a legitimate candidate make an impact with the Phillies on the field this year, was charged with four runs in 1 2/3 innings.

Kendrick allowed a run on a solo homer over three innings. Rosario allowed a run on a hit and two walks over two innings. Early results on Rule 5 pick Lincoln Holdzkom are in and they strongly suggest you seek cover. Holdzkom wasn’t charged with a run in his 1 1/3 innings, but he walked three, hit a batter and uncorked a wild pitch.

Howard put the Phils up 5-1 with a three-run homer in the third. Feliz had two more hits, 2-for-3 with another double. Bruntlett saw some time defensively in center. He was 1-for-2 with a triple and an RBI in the game.

The Phils play the Pirates again this afternoon.

In the unlikely event you were wondering, the lone intentional walk that Chase Utley received in 2007 came against the Braves on September 4. Ruiz led off the second with a home run off of righty Buddy Carlyle to put the Phils up 3-0. Lohse popped out for the first out before J-Roll doubled, bringing up Utley, who was in the two-hole that day in front of Burrell. Carlyle walked him intentionally to set up the double-play, but Burrell popped to short for the second out. Howard drew a walk to load the bases, but Rowand struck out behind him to turn the Phils away.

So it worked.

Hamels and Kendrick are going to have to come up with some kind of agreement around the use of the expression “for myself” in interviews.

This suggests the Mets, Cardinals and Orioles may have interest in Kyle Lohse.

Despite the firepower of the Phillies’ offense, Ryan Howard continues to gather intentional walks at a tremendous pace. Howard received 35 intentional walks in 2007 after being passed intentionally 37 times in 2006. If you look at the single-season leaders in intentional walks, Howard has put his name in the top eleven of the all-time list in each of the last two seasons.

I wrote about Howard’s intentional walk rate last year as well. Howard was walked intentionally 37 times in 2006 and 35 times in 2007. Seems like the decrease should be good news, but you have to remember that Howard got fewer plate appearances in 2007. The rate at which he was passed intentionally went up.

One of the differences between 2007 and 2006 was that in ’06 Howard hadn’t settled in the cleanup spot. In 2006 just 351 of his 704 plate appearances, just under half, came as a cleanup hitter. In his time hitting fourth he was walked intentionally 28 times or about once every 12.5 plate appearances. In 2007, 633 of 648 of his plate appearances (almost 98%) came hitting fourth. In those 648 plate appearances he was walked intentionally 34 times or about once every 19 plate appearances.

So while he was walked intentionally more frequently overall in 2007, the rate at which he was walked intentionally as a cleanup hitter was much lower.

And that, no doubt, is because the Phillies’ five hitters were so much better in 2007 than in 2006, right? Here’s the problem with that if you look at what the Phillies’ #5 hitters did in 2006 and 2007:

The Phillies’ five-hitters sure look like they were better in 2006 than they were in 2007. And they were, but they were better because of Howard himself hitting fifth.

Here’s what the numbers for the five-hitters look like if you take out Howard’s plate appearances as a #5 hitter from 2006:

It’s still not as dramatic as I would have guessed, but at least the 2007 numbers for the five-hitters are better than the 2006 now. In ’07 Rowand got the most at-bats as a five-hitter for the Phils, posting an .874 OPS while hitting fifth. Burrell saw a lot of time there, too, but wasn’t as successful. He put up an .806 OPS as a five hitter but crushed the ball while hitting sixth (1.179 OPS in 118 at-bats), bringing the numbers down overall. In 2006 Howard got the most at-bats hitting fifth and Burrell was next, posting a .918 OPS in 148 at-bats in a much better season in the five-hole.

Brad Lidge had surgery on his right knee and it went well. He is expected to miss three to six weeks.

Lidge sounds a little tired of talking about the home run that Pujols hit against him in 2005.

The Phillies play a game tonight against Florida State. Joe Savery will get the start. Happ, Outman, Carrasco and Bisenius are also scheduled to pitch.

The Phillies signed left-handed pitcher Jared Locke and right-handed pitcher Charles Vartanian from a tryout camp.

This interesting article from over the weekend reviews Phillies’ outfield prospects. Everything’s just ducky until it suggests that in 2009 the Phils could put Jenkins/Werth in left, Victorino in right and Golson in center. That would be a really miserable outfield. I’d guess the chances of that happening are just about zero.

Given the choice of saving Victorino or the blueprints for revolutionary emissions-free technology from certain death, Utley would choose Victorino. I’d say chances are better than 50/50 that the described scenario never even develops. The same article says that the Phillies signed Kendrick, Dobbs, Brad Harman and TJ Bohn to split contracts. This says that the remaining unsigned players on the 40-man roster are Hamels, J.D Durbin, Mathieson, Rosario, Blackley and Victorino.

Charlie Manuel says he thinks Werth has 30-home-run potential in this article. Werth has 33 career home runs in 976 at-bats and was a fantastic hitter for the Phils in ’07 despite hitting just eight home runs. The Phils are going to have to figure out a way to get him at-bats this season — playing right field against lefties isn’t enough. I hope they let him see a lot of time in center as well, but that seems unlikely.

Brad Lidge limped off the mound today after catching a spike while delivering a pitch. Lidge says he’s day-to-day.

Joe Savery will start Tuesday night’s game against Florida State.

The Phillies have invited 19 non-roster players to Spring Training, including Joe Savery, Josh Outman, Carlos Carrasco, Lou Marson, Greg Golson and Val Pascucci.

Barring an injury, I don’t think any of the position players among the non-roster invitees have much of a chance. The pitching is a different story and it seems possible that Outman or his fellow non-roster invitees, including Vic Darensbourg, Gary Knotts and Brian Mazone, would have an opportunity to pitch themselves into the mix.

The article linked above also says that the Phils have agreed on a 2008 contract with Pete LaForest.

The IronPigs will play their first game in their new stadium against the Phillies on March 30.

Some of the early reviews on Ed Wade’s job in Houston are kind of brutal.

Matt Wise signed with the Mets.

Ryan Howard and Jared are apparently a good combination for Subway.

This article suggests that Dallas McPhearson and the Giants are not close to a deal.

Philliesflow will be seldom-if-ever updated until the first week of January.