June 26 -- SIGN STEALING? WADE ATTACKED?

So, as I recall, the Phillies played lousy in the final two games of their series last week against the Red Sox at the Bank, the start of a week-long, team-wide offensive malaise that prompted Charlie Manuel to make drastic overhauls to the lineup last night (more on that later).

Well, apparently, they couldn't have played that poorly without cheating.

According to the Boston Globe, an unnamed "major-league official" thought the Phillies were stealing Boston's signs, even though the Sox won two of three games. The Sox haven't filed a specific complaint with MLB, and GM Theo Epstein declined to comment on the topic. This reminds me of last season when, after being swept at the Bank in late August, the Mets accused the Phillies of stealing signs. MLB vice president of on-field operations Bob Watson even came to the Bank to investigate and found no misconduct. "They can check us out any time they want," Manuel said at the time. "When stuff comes up like that, it's no big deal. They can sit up there during the game with the [television] camera crew, for all I care."

During that situation, Manuel told me that then-Sox manager Jimy Williams accused the Indians of stealing signs during the 1999 AL Championship Series (back then, Manuel was the Tribe's hitting coach). Williams, now the Phillies' bench coach, was sitting nearby in the dugout and said that, eight years later, he still believes the Indians cheated. Williams told me about an elaborate system of sign-stealing that the Indians had concocted. Manuel, listening to all of this, only laughed.

Did the Phillies steal the Sox's signs last week? Who knows? It certainly didn't help.

***
Houston, we have a problem.

Astros GM Ed Wade, formerly the Phillies' GM, has suspended pitcher Shawn Chacon indefinitely for "insubordination to the club." But according to this story in the Houston Chronicle, Chacon threw Wade to the ground after Wade interrupted his dinner and asked him to go to manager Cecil Cooper's office. (By now, you'd think Wade would know that major leaguers don't like to be bothered while they're eating.) According to Chacon, Wade cursed at him and told him to "[expletive] look in the mirror." That's when things got, um, heated. Chacon, who signed a one-year, $2 million deal with the Astros, is 2-3 with a 5.04 ERA.

OK, discuss. I'll be back later with more on Phillies pitching prospect Josh Outman, whose struggles with his conversion from a starter to a reliever are chronicled today in The Paper.