Is Ben Francisco Stealing Domonic Brown's Secret Stuff?

Hear me out.

Phillies prospect Domonic Brown batted .327 last year between two levels, with an OPS of .980 and 20 home runs. He was, for a time, ranked the top prospect in all of baseball, and slated to take over for Jayson Werth in right field once he signed elsewhere. So Ruben Amaro called him up to the bigs once Shane Victorino went down in July and despite only 62 at-bats in three months, Brown stayed with the team while Ben Francisco managed 72 at-bats.

Figure it out yet? No?

Well, as you know, Dom was then sent to Winter League ball in the Dominican, a place where Ben is known to have frequented. Reportedly, the young lefty had no idea where to keep his hands on the bat, and I've heard he even had trouble picking up girls at the bar with the other prospects. He lost his coordination and had trouble tracking down balls in the outfield repeatedly. To me, the symptoms are clear as day.

Now that the two are in direct competition for the starting right field job, Ben has amped up the pressure. Brown is simply incapable of being on a baseball field. Some have declared his career dead. From the article: "Team medical officials were baffled, and insisted there was no medical reason for Brown's newfound inability to field, hit, or throw the ball."

Thanks to the 1996 mega-hit Space Jam, however, we now know the answer.

Ben has, like the Monstars from Space Jam, been stealing Dom's talent since they shared a bench in the late summer of 2010. Right behind Charlie Manuel's back, too, because Cholly was too busy playing his starters to realize what the bench guys were doing outside of his peripheral vision.

But it wasn't like in the movie when it all came out at once. No, that would be too simple for the malicious Francisco. He's been slowly extricating Brown's powers until all that's left is one big mass of potential and the hollow remains of his past tools. That's why Dom is 0-15 with 9 strikeouts in the Spring and Ben is mashing the ball with a .375 average.

Is there any other explanation? Absolutely not.

I expect the authorities to make a full inquiry into the situation, perhaps with the help of Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny. No doubt Danny DeVito is behind this somewhere as well. Charles Barkley, Shawn Bradley, Muggsy Bogues, Larry Johnson, and Patrick Ewing have all refused to comment -- obviously too scarred from their previous experience with situations like this.

While the baseball community weeps for the absence of Dom Brown's talent, the more hardened of us must press on and call Francisco on his actions. The success he is having is not fair, nor is it good for the team. Francisco's end game is unclear, but to hazard a guess, I think his master plan is for Dom to get traded to the Indians. That would be cherry on top.