Phillies: So Much For Those "Previews"

At the end of June the Phillies and Boston Red Sox played a three-game series at Citizens Bank Park. The media, fans, etc. hyped it as a "World Series preview."

The Phils took two of three. The Red Sox aren't in the playoffs after their mighty September collapse, capped off by last night's stunning 9th-inning loss at Baltimore combined with the Tampa Bay Rays' rally from a 7-0 deficit to beat the Yankees in extra innings.

At the end of July, and again in early August, the Phils and San Francisco Giants got together for the first time since last year's NL Championship Series. The matchup was hyped, again, as a "preview" of a possible playoff rematch.

The Phils took 4 of 7, including 3 of 4 out west. The Giants faded badly and finished eight games out of first place. They aren't in the playoffs.

At the beginning of September the Phils welcomed the Atlanta Braves to town

A Few Non-Phillies Baseball Thoughts

While we wait to see if Roy II (Oswalt) can live up to the performance of Roy I (Halladay) in Game 2 of the NL Division Series tomorrow, here are some comments on some of the other series...

Both Tampa Bay and Minnesota are on the brink of elimination already, both losing twice at home to fall behind 2-0 in the best-of-five series. And today, both teams' managers were ejected under similar circumstances.

At Tampa Bay, the Texas Rangers' Michael Young tried to check his swing on a 2-2 pitch in the 5th inning. The umpires ruled he did. On the next pitch he hit a 3-run homer to give the Rangers a 5-0 lead. Rays manager Joe Maddon (who was just shown in a vitamin commercial saying it's important he keep his focus, or something) went out to talk to his pitcher, yelled at the first-base ump who made the checked-swing ruling, and was thrown out of the game.

At Minnesota, Twins pitcher Carl Pavano thought he had the Yankees' Lance Berkman struck out looking in the 7th, but the pitch was called a ball, and Berkman then doubled in the go-ahead run. Twins manager Ron Gardenhire came out to talk to Pavano, and stayed until the home plate umpire came out to break up the gathering at the mound, and Gardenhire then said something that led to his ejection.

Just a strange coincidence, but both the Rays and Twins are struggling and the loss of composure needs to be solved if either team wants to make a miraculous comeback and prevent a Yankees-Rangers AL championship series.

2010 Division Series Predictions

I figured I'd better document these before tomorrow, when the baseball playoffs begin.


American League

Texas vs. Tampa Bay: Texas has Cliff Lee now but Tampa has playoff experience from 2008 and had a much tougher road to get into the postseason than did the Rangers. Rays in 4.

NY Yankees vs. Minnesota: Boy, would I love love love to see the Twins finally break through and beat the Yankees. Unfortunately, Yankees in 5.

National League

Atlanta vs. San Francisco: Braves staggered in September. Giants not only caught up to San Diego but held off Colorado as well. Low-scoring series. Giants in 4.

And, as always, saving the best for last...

Cincinnati vs. Philadelphia: The Reds are the Phillies...of 2007: an upstart division winner that goes out in the first round. The Phillies are the Reds...of 1976, the Big Red Machine that easily pushed aside another upstart division winner, the Phils. Phillies in 4.

Phillies Win Win Win Win NL East!

Editor's Note: I've failed in my mission to complete a blog post while inebriated after the Phillies clinch the NL East title. Like the New York Mets in 2007, I came close and then collapsed. Like Donovan McNabb in the Super Bowl, I came close and then threw up. (And unlike McNabb, I candidly admit it.) The following was written last night during the night, however:

Okayyyyyyyy...here we are again. But first, let's reminisce. First, let's go back to 2007, when the New York Mets had a 7-game lead in the National League East with just 17 games left in the season. After a few near-misses from 2001 through 2006, it looked bleak for the Phillies once again. Yet, they kept winning, and the Mets collapsed. The Phils and Mets were tied going into the final day of the regular season, and then the Mets fell behind the Florida Marlins 7-0 in the first inning before the Phils even took the field for their game. The Phillies finally broke through and won the NL East title. I had a bottle of "champagne" that was sitting since 2001, and on that day I opened it and drank. All of it. And then I wrote this post on the Outsports blog.

Let's move a bit forward. 2008. The Phils had been knocked out in the 2007 playoffs, but went back to work. On the next-to-last day of the 2008 regular season, circumstances allowed me to get a ticket to the Phillies-Nationals game at Citizens Bank Park, and I was rewarded. A spectacular stop by Jimmy Rollins resulted in a game-ending double play, clinching the second straight NL East title for the Phils. I went home and drank. And posted this.

(Okay, I'm kinda getting woozy now from the alcohol...gotta fight on and finish this!)

A Mashup Of Randomness

It's a lovely Saturday afternoon here, but it's windy and will be quite chilly tomorrow -- only in the upper 50s to around 60, after days and days in the upper 70s and 80s. My allergies are acting up a little more today but so far it's not intolerable. Here are a few unrelated observations...

• This may be proof that Twitter has jumped the shark: a new, badly named feature -- "Who's That Tweeter?" -- on Fox's baseball telecast. They display someone's tweet and then you're supposed to go to their website and choose which of four players made that tweet. There may be a contest involved. I don't care. I'm waiting for the day someone mispronounces "tweet" and has to apologize for an obscenity.

• Speaking of Twitter, here in Philadelphia "windy" is a trending topic right now.

• Three songs have been stuck in my head today at various times (one of which I tweeted about earlier) -- RuPaul's "Jealous Of My Boogie" (because of Freddy and Andrew from my softball team discussing it when we were at the batting cages earlier), Ke$ha's "Tik Tok" (because when I was reading the new Entertainment Weekly their "Bullseye" page mentioned the Simpsons' homage to it at the start of last week's show) and Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" (again because of EW, which provided the shocking news that she's collaborated on a song called "Murder My Heart" with
  
  

Phillies: Time To Panic?

There seems to be a new trend for the Phillies: injuries to pitchers' obliques. Clay Condrey has been out since the end of July and is seemingly less likely to return at all this season. Today it was reported that Ryan Madson was unavailable for the four games the Phils just lost in Houston, and may not be able to pitch tonight in Washington. Most alarmingly, rookie J.A. Happ was supposed to start yesterday but suffered his oblique strain on Saturday -- during batting practice, of all things.

In addition, there's some concern about whether J.C. Romero will be ready soon, and today there are Twitter posts from local beat writers that Scott Eyre, who's inherited Romero's lefty specialist role, felt a pain in his left elbow. He said he's not worried about it, as it was "sharp and quick." The rest of us will be plenty worried for him, though.

Jamie Moyer stepped in as an emergency starter yesterday and, as he did with his three previous bullpen outings since being removed from the rotation, did a fine job. However, the team has stopped hitting. They've scored 4 runs or fewer in their last 13 games. They were 5-4 in the first 9 thanks to strong pitching. Then came the mess in Houston. Cole Hamels regressed (again), Brad Lidge blew a save (again), Cliff Lee got smoked for the second consecutive start, and yesterday Chan Ho Park coughed up the game in the 7th inning.

Despite all of that, the Phils maintain a 6-game lead in the NL East (7 in the loss column). The question is, assuming a Mets-like collapse isn't in the offing (and it likely isn't, because their opponents the rest of the way aren't that strong and the Braves and Marlins have weak spots as well), will this team be ready for the playoffs? The Phils were knocked out of the first round in 2007 by a red-hot Colorado Rockies team. That was not deeply depressing at the time. A similar result this year, after their championship run last year, will not be taken with good humor.

MLB 2009 at the halfway point

Before the season started I previewed both the National and American Leagues on the Outsports blog. The All-Star break is the unofficial midpoint of the season, as teams have actually played a little more than half their games. The pointless (despite that crap about deciding which league gets home-field advantage for the World Series) exhibition game is now over and the season is about to resume. That got me wondering, how well have I done so far? Here's how I called each division, and how things have actually turned out so far:

AL East: Tampa Bay, Boston, NY Yankees, Toronto, Baltimore
The Red Sox and Yankees have the two best records in the AL, with Boston up by 3 games, thanks to a surplus of starting pitching and their 8-0 record against the Yanks. The defending AL champion Rays are in third, trying to recover from a poor start. The Blue Jays and Orioles are living up (down?) to my expectations, although the last-place O's are only 8 games under .500 -- probably because they gave up pretty quickly on Adam Eaton. Toronto is now contemplating trading ace pitcher Roy Halladay (to the Phillies, pleasepleasepleaseplease!).

AL Central: Minnesota, Cleveland, Chicago White Sox, Detroit, Kansas City
The Tigers are one of the AL's surprise teams and hold a 3 1/2-game lead over the White Sox and a 4-game bulge over the Twins. A win on May 7 gave the Royals an 18-11 record; since then they're 19-40. The Indians have been a big disappointment, falling to the cellar with the AL's worst record.

AL West: LA Angels, Oakland, Seattle, Texas
The Angels also got off to a slow start but now have a 1 1/2-game lead over the Rangers, who have unexpectedly gotten better pitching. Maybe even more of a surprise is that the Mariners are just 4 games out. The A's sit well out of the race, and presumably will trade Matt Holliday for prospects.

NL West: Arizona, LA Dodgers, Colorado, San Francisco, San Diego
Despite losing Manny Ramirez to a 50-game suspension because he was trying to get pregnant -- hey, why else would he take a women's fertility drug? -- the Dodgers have baseball's best record. However, the Giants (7 games back) and Rockies (9 out) have been better than expected and could make it a race if LA falters, or at least challenge for the Wild Card. The Diamondbacks have been the biggest flop, while the last-place Padres started well but quickly sank to the bottom of the division.

NL Central: Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Houston, Pittsburgh
The top five teams in the division (Cardinals, Brewers, Cubs, Astros and Reds) are within 5 games of each other. The teams aren't very far over .500, if at all, with the Cubs seriously underachieving. The Pirates were in the pack for a while, but what may be the worst ownership in baseball doesn't seem to give a damn about trying to win, as they continue to make bizarre trades, sending away talented players just headed into their prime for even younger, more raw and undeveloped players.

NL East: Philadelphia, NY Mets, Florida, Atlanta, Washington
It's been a bizarre season in this division. The Phillies had a poor home record and a stellar road record, their starting rotation was hideous early and only somewhat improved since; they then hit interleague play and hit a wall, only to return home and get hot against weaker NL teams. The defending world champs have pulled 4 games ahead of...the Marlins, who have a poor bullpen and shaky defense but otherwise have been strong. The Braves have the best starting pitching in the division but their hitting is severly lacking. Still, it's been enough to put them ahead of the Mets. The Mets' injury woes, shoddy defense and lack of power are making New Yorkers miserable. As for the Nationals, the worst team in baseball, well...just read this post on Outsports.

Phils almost phaded out of first

With tonight's 5-2 loss, finishing off a three-game sweep at the hands of the Atlanta Braves, the Phillies have now lost 14 of 18 games and are in a virtual tie for first with the Florida Marlins. They wasted a good 7-inning start by J.A. Happ, with Ryan Madson giving up 3 in the 8th for the winning margin. Madson's been a mess recently, even after returning to his setup role when closer Brad Lidge returned from the disabled list.

While the hitting hasn't been good lately (but hey, Jimmy Rollins got 2 hits!) it's the pitching that's been poor night after night after night. Some nights it's a bad start, other nights (like tonight) it's a lousy bullpen, some nights it's both. No trades are on the horizon yet as very few teams consider themselves out of the playoff chase and, thus, willing to be a seller. Even when that happens, lots of teams need pitching. The bidding will presumably be high.

The Phillies have to somehow stay afloat until some team makes a quality pitcher available, and the way things are going, the only reason to think they can stay afloat is that most of the National League is as mediocre as they are. The Phils are back home starting tomorrow night. Of course, now that they're losing road games maybe they'll win home games. (For those who don't know, this paragraph is an example of "grasping at straws.") The Mets are in tomorrow; they're only a game out of first place, and the Braves are now just two back.

Talkin' 'bout my Phillies

The first real post here (not that the first one isn't real, but...) just has to be about your defending World Series Champion Philadelphia Phillies. It has been a surreal season thus far. It began with all of the attendant pomp and ceremony commemorating the 2008 champs, which was tempered by the death of legendary broadcaster Harry Kalas. The starting rotation, a strength down the stretch and in the postseason last year, got off to a horrendous start. It's gotten better but was weakened by the likely season-ending injury to Brett Myers. The bullpen was strong at the start but stints on the disabled list by Brad Lidge and Scott Eyre (and, as of tomorrow according to reports, Clay Condrey) caused a cascade of role adjustments and a series of lousy performances.

The offense kept the team afloat for much of the year despite a season-long slump by leadoff hitter Jimmy Rollins. Raul Ibanez has been a godsend, putting up MVP-like numbers, but is now on the DL himself, and since then the team hitting has really taken a nosedive. Strangest of all, the Phils have a 23-9 record on the road, best in the major leagues, but are only 13-22 at home, second-worst in the majors (ahead of only the woeful Washington Nationals), after a just-completed 1-8 homestand, among the worst in team history.

Despite all of this, the Phils are in first place, 1 1/2 games ahead of the New York Mets in the NL East. It makes for a glass half-empty/half full debate: despite their many issues the Phillies are still in first place; or, despite all of their problems the Mets are right in the hunt -- and since both teams have struggled, the Florida Marlins and Atlanta Braves are not far behind.

With all of this going on, especially lately, it would be easy to be outraged. I've been more annoyed than angry, though. I guess coming off a long-awaited championship will do that. Besides, I've figured all year that it will come down to September, and we all know what's happened to the Mets the last two Septembers.

Next up for the Phils is a road trip (what a relief) that starts with a World Series rematch against the Tampa Bay Rays.