Brown and Howard Continue to Impress

                The Phillies fell 12-5 to the Minnesota Twins this afternoon, and saw their Grapefruit League record drop to 1-3-1.  The Phillies pitching staff had an extremely rough afternoon.  Off-season acquisition John Lannan received the starting nod and had a mediocre start in his Phillies debut, pitching 2 innings while allowing 1 run.
After that however, the Phillies pitching staff completely fell apart, with the help of some shaky fielding.  Adam Morgan came on and allowed 4 runs in 1 2/3 innings although only 1 of the runs was earned.  Kyle Simon came on to finish out the fourth inning and allowed a three-run home run in 1/3 of an inning, but was only charged with 1 of the runs.  Next on the mound was Antonio Bastardo who threw one perfect inning, but after that things took a turn for the worst.  Justin De Fratus and B.J. Rosenberg each allowed 3 runs in one inning pitched respectively.  Mauricio Robles was able to stop the bleeding by pitching a perfect eighth  inning, but by this point the game was to far out of reach.  The pitching cannot really place the blame on anyone but themselves in this game, however extremely shaky fielding did not help their cause.  Three errors were committed on the day, one a piece from Freddy Galvis, John Mayberry Jr., and Yuniesky Betancourt.  While the fielding and pitching were nothing to smile about, it was a different story at the plate, where there were some positives that could be taken from the day.
               The Phillies collected 10 hits on the day.  Carlos Ruiz went 2 for 2 with 3 RBI's, while Ben Revere and Kevin Frandsen each were 2 for 4.  While these players had good games, perhaps what should excite the Phillies organization and it fans the most should be the continued excellent play from Ryan Howard and Dom Brown.  Each player went 1 for 2 respectively, with Howard walking once, and Brown walking twice and scoring 3 runs.  Howard and Brown continue to impress in the short sample size of Spring Training games so far.  Howard seems to have recovered fully now from his Achilles surgery in 2011, while Brown looks like a player who is finally ready to live up to expectations and is making a great case to start on Opening Day.  If Brown can continue to play like this he will finally find himself as an everyday starter in the big-leagues and getting a full-season's worth of at-bats, rather than being simply a role player.  So while the Phillies did lose today, we must continue to look at the silver linings, Brown and Howard have been extremely bright spots so far in a season in which the Phillies will look to regain the NL East crown.  The Phillies are back in action tomorrow against the Atlanta Braves at Bright House Field, with Cole Hamels getting the starting nod.  Go Phils!