Disabled List

CLEARWATER, Fla. - Three of your four highest-paid players are on the disabled list and the only one who is not - Cliff Lee - has yet to win a game. Your team has been in last place for 43 straight days, the franchise's most prolonged stretch in the basement since 2002, which, coincidentally, is the last season the team finished below .500. For a brief period last week, your team slipped to 10 games out of first place and is still nine out in the middle of June. Welcome to Ruben Amaro Jr.'s world.

MINNEAPOLIS — These are the nights when you think back on all of the opportunities squandered earlier in the season, back when the Phillies' rotation was strong and healthy and performing the way all of us have come to expect it to perform. The 2-1 losses to Pittsburgh and San Diego and Washington and the Dodgers. The 1-0 loss to San Francisco when Cliff Lee pitched 10 scoreless innings. The 5-2 loss in which Roy Halladay held the Mets to two runs in seven innings while striking out seven.

BALTIMORE - Freddy Galvis' surprising rookie season could be in peril after a battery of tests revealed a possible fracture of his back. The Phillies will not know the severity of the injury until Galvis seeks a second opinion sometime next week, but assistant general manager Scott Proefrock spoke in grave tones after Friday's 9-6 victory over the Orioles. "It's serious," Proefrock said. "It could keep him out for a considerable amount of time. " The specific injury was described as a pars fracture, which occurs in the lower part of the back.

Jamie Moyer isn't ready for the rocking chair just yet. The veteran lefthander signed a minor-league contract with Baltimore on Wednesday and was assigned to triple-A Norfolk. Colorado released the 49-year-old former Phillie last month, a little over a month after he became the oldest pitcher ever to win a major-league game as a starter.   Surgery set Yankees closer Mariano Rivera said the blood clot in his right calf has cleared up, and he will have surgery on his right knee June 12. Baseball's career saves leader suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament and damaged meniscus while shagging fly balls on May 3.   Top pick to sign Astros owner Jim Crane said top overall draft pick Carlos Correa is expected to sign on Thursday.

This would be a chicken-and-egg situation, except the chicken is having an MRI on its wing and the egg is getting a second opinion from all the king's men. The Phillies lost another player - Jose Contreras - and another game Saturday. In the wake of another fruitless comeback attempt, the question remains unanswerable: Which came first, the Phillies' inability to get clutch hits in late innings, or the Phillies' inability to dress the players who used to make comebacks seem routine?

This would be a chicken-and-egg situation, except the chicken is having an MRI on its wing and the egg is getting a second opinion from all the king's men. The Phillies lost another player - Jose Contreras - and another game Saturday. In the wake of another fruitless comeback attempt, the question remains unanswerable: Which came first, the Phillies' inability to get clutch hits in late innings, or the Phillies' inability to dress the players who used to make comebacks seem routine?

MAX SCHERZER pitched into the seventh inning, Delmon Young homered and the visiting Detroit Tigers beat the Boston Red Sox, 7-3, Thursday night in an American League game. Scherzer (5-3) retired nine consecutive batters before Nick Punto led off the seventh with a walk, forcing the righthander from the game. He allowed three runs and seven hits in his third consecutive victory, closing out a strong May. Young hit a solo drive in the eighth to make it 5-3, then added a run-scoring single in the ninth.

FORMER PHILLIES starter Roy Oswalt agreed to a minor league deal with the Texas Rangers, who expect the three-time All-Star to join their rotation within a few weeks. Assuming Oswalt passes a physical Thursday, he is expected to go to Triple A Round Rock and make his first start Saturday. "He's been throwing for quite a while now, he feels good about where he is," Rangers president Nolan Ryan said. "I think he's been away long enough that he's excited about coming to the Rangers and getting back to pitching on a regular basis.

NEW YORK - For the second straight game, Phillies catcher Carlos Ruiz wasn't in the starting lineup because of a right hamstring strain. Assistant general manager Scott Proefrock said Ruiz had an ultrasound test on his hamstring Tuesday in Philadelphia. Ruiz was available as a pinch-hitter in Tuesday's game at Citi Field against the New York Mets. "It is a mild hamstring strain, and we wanted to make sure it wasn't anything more serious than that," Proefrock said before the game.

When Giancarlo Stanton was a rookie named Mike in 2010, he hit 22 home runs in the football stadium the Florida Marlins called home. Last season, he raised that total to 34 and pundits predicted he would lead the league in 2012 when the team moved into its new bandbox called Marlins Park. Both team and player were re-named for the move. Giancarlo Cruz Michael Stanton acknowleged his mother's wish that he go by his first name. The Marlins decided to be Miami's team in their new park.