Charlie Manuel

Charlie Manuel is the first to admit he's a players' manager. It's the connotation that comes with the label he detests. The term players' manager is not a euphemism for pushover. It doesn't mean the boss is a softie or that the inmates run the asylum. While it's true that Manuel prides himself in always having his players' backs, and that he would sooner share a milkshake with Howard Eskin than upbraid a player in public, he is not so much a players' manager because he (wholeheartedly)

IT WAS CLOSING on noon yesterday when I drove within a few blocks of Citizens Bank Park. Figuring we had more than enough people there for the Roy Halladay news conference, I made a quick detour to the Turf Club on Packer Avenue where I retrieved the scratches for the card at Parx Racing. I wasn't there long, but I was there long enough to hear some guy mutter under his breath about "lowlifes betting $2 per race. " I wasn't sure if he was talking about himself.   Who knew . . .   That WIP's Howard Eskin had a heart.

COME ON, ADMIT IT. When the Phillies hired Charlie Manuel instead of Jim Leyland, you were among those who howled. When he got here and appeared incapable of executing a double switch, you howled even louder. And that Southern accent? Where, you asked, did former general manager Ed Wade get this rube - plowing the North 40? It got personal and Manuel said so. In a story in the Daily News in October 2005, Manuel and his fiancee, Melissa Martin, looked back on their initial summer in the City of Brotherly Love with chagrin over just how very personal it got. "The ridicule is so unfair," Martin said then.

CLEARWATER, Fla. - When a team has success - for example, winning a World Series and getting to another one - the players command a certain kind of respect, even from their manager. We're talking about the Phillies, of course, and the way manager Charlie Manuel handled the lineup over the last six years. For all the talk and debate about Jimmy Rollins' hitting leadoff and Ryan Howard's struggles with lefthanders, Manuel generally turned in pretty much the same lineup card almost every day. He was managing a team that went to the World Series two years in a row and reached the postseason five years in a row. He is not managing that team now. Manuel is managing a team that went .500 last year.

Phillies skipper Charlie Manuel is the favorite to be the first manager fired this season, according to online sportsbook Bovada . Although Manuel was beloved during the Phillies run of five straight division titles, topped by the World Series win in 2008, he's now 69, in the last year of his contract, and the team's off to another slow start, falling to 6-9 after getting swept by the Cincinnati Reds. This morning, sports yakker Angelo Cataldi led a call for Manuel's ouster, saying, "We would really love it to happen," promoting a poll and getting lots of agreement from callers.

The Phillies' lineup that opened the season six months ago in Washington ended up being a lot like one of those early flying experiments that predated the 1903 work of the Wright brothers. The blueprint looked great, but the actual machines barely got off the ground. And now, as the Phillies prepare for their fourth straight trip to the postseason, the least potent offense of Charlie Manuel's six seasons as manager looms as this team's biggest concern. Manuel is acutely aware of his team's shortcomings offensively and he's not afraid to talk about it. "Our offensive production is definitely down," the manager said as the Phillies prepared for their final regular-season series against Atlanta Friday.

  As soon as Ryan Howard was ejected in the 14th inning late Tuesday night, Roy Oswalt stood up in the dugout and sprinted to the clubhouse. He put his spikes on, grabbed a first-baseman's glove, and ran back through the tunnel. Jayson Werth saw the grinning Oswalt emerge and stopped the pitcher. "No, no, you're not playing first," Werth said. After Howard was restrained by Placido Polanco and second-base umpire Sam Holbrook, manager Charlie Manuel stood on the field, seeking an explanation, and only began to contemplate what would happen next.

NASHVILLE - The last time Charlie Manuel arrived at spring training on the final year of a contract, his agent, Pat Rooney, negotiated a two-year extension with the Phillies. The final year of that extension is 2013, but there is zero indication the Phillies are interested in negotiating another extension with the most successful manager in franchise history. Manuel turns 69 next month, and this will be his ninth season as manager. Many believe the Phillies promoted Manuel's successor when Ryne Sandberg was added to the coaching staff after last season, but general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. denied that was the case in October.

CLEARWATER, Fla. - It starts anew for Charlie Manuel and the Phillies on Wednesday morning when pitchers and catchers go through the first official workout of spring training at the Carpenter Complex. Perhaps this is the beginning of the end for the 69-year-old Manuel and his aging core of players, many of whom are working on the final year of their contracts, just like the manager. Or maybe this is the beginning of something special, which is the word that best describes the most of the Manuel era. Only fools would say they know for sure.

CHARLIE MANUEL lives his life large. He's a big guy, with a big smile, and a big voice. At noontime Sunday, Charlie Manuel wasn't sitting big. He looked a little stunned. A little beaten. Chastened. His boss, team president David Montgomery, met with Manuel for more than an hour before Sunday's first-half finale. Afterward, Manuel took a stroll through the clubhouse, stopped for a bathroom break, then sat down behind the desk he hopes will continue to be his. "We just talked about the team and things," Manuel explained to the Daily News.