My Sports Tees And Miscellaneous Caps, Part 4

Time for another chapter. And something embarrassing if you get to the end. Let's start with caps. Other that the first cap, this entire post is an all-Phillies edition.

  

From the Hockey Hall of Fame. Pretty sure this was from my epic trip in August-September 2004 to Montreal and Toronto for the World Cup of Hockey (an Olympic-style tournament, won by host Canada that year), but possibly I bought it on a later trip.

This is old. The Phillies added the blue cap option to their uniforms for day games in 1994. The defending NL Champs lost their first two games wearing them and the players were up in arms. Some fans didn't take kindly to them, either, although they sold rather well. The compromise for the players: they'd only wear them on weekday "Businessperson's Special" afternoon games. I think it's a nice-looking cap, but the jinx theory (final record: 1-6) won out.

You can probably guess that this was a giveaway item.

Aaron Rowand will be remembered forever for this catch and his comment a day or two later in reply to a question about the famous Ricky Watters "For who? For what?" quote when Watters short-armed a ball to avoid being hit in his first game as an Eagle.

The Flyin' Hawaiian! And a rare Harry Kalas home run call in which he did NOT use his famous "Outta Here!" Victorino, no ka oi!

Just looking at the condition of this shirt, it's very old. Steve Carlton's first year as a Phillie, 1972, when he went 27-10 (including a 15-game winning streak) for a team that only won 59 games, was what got me interested in baseball.

Greg Luzinski. The Bull. What a hitter in the mid-70s. Then injuries and slumps took their toll, but at least he was part of the 1980 World Series Champions.

Roy Halladay! First of three. This one was something the MLB Players Association did to raise funds for the Wounded Warrior Project.

This one might have come from a store like Walmart or Kmart or something.

On this night, the Doctor was definitely in. In the middle of the glory days, when it seemed like multiple World Series wins were the Phils' destiny. Sigh...

...and speaking of World Series wins...

 ...and finally...the right pic turned out a little blurry. It commemorates All-Star games hosted by the Phils as well as some of the NL and WS championships through 2010.. I wanted it badly but it took a while to be marked down to a price I was willing to pay.

There is only one problem with this t-shirt:

I somehow ended up with TWO of them. The exact same shirt, even the same size. And I only discovered this the other day when I was choosing the t-shirts for this post. I have no idea how this happened!

My 2011 Phillies/MLB Predictions

Ignoring the fact that I still have to turn on my heat, and that areas to the north of the city might get a little snow mixed in with rain tomorrow night, it's spring. And tomorrow (in some cities) and Friday (in others, including Philadelphia), the 2011 baseball season begins. Here are my predictions for the division and wild card winners. Keep in mind that I'm going basically on what little knowledge of other teams I have in my head. I used to avidly follow every little transaction and study up on the teams and their prospects. That was before there was the Internet and a zillion cable television channels and the occasional real-life event to dilute all of the information I may try to gather. I can speak in some detail about the Phillies (and will do so below), but not much about other teams. So these are nothing more than very slightly educated guesses...

American League East: Boston
American League Central: Minnesota
American League West: Oakland
American League Wild Card: New York Yankees

And in reverse order...

National League Wild Card: Atlanta
National League West: Colorado
National League Central: Cincinnati
National League East:
5. New York Mets
4. Florida
3. Washington
2. Atlanta
...and the Phillies to win the division for the 5th year in a row.

That, of course, will take some things going the right way. While I'm amused that, from what I've heard, a lot of the so-called "experts" are picking against the Phils, I'm not surprised.

Phillies: The U Word Resurfaces

The end of the Phillies' season played out very much like most of the season itself: with a lack of offense. So often the team's bats went south this year that it shouldn't have been a surprise when it happened in the playoffs, especially against the solid pitching of the San Francisco Giants. And yet, somehow, it was. Because they told us all year long that when it really mattered, they'd be fine. After the three consecutive shutout losses against the Mets at Taxpayer Bailout Field. After losing three of four to the lowly Pittsburgh Pirates (the worst franchise despite the best ballpark). After losing 6 of 7 coming out of the All-Star break. After falling 7 games behind Atlanta in the NL East. After the four-game sweep at home against the also-ran Houston Astros. They always told us they'd turn it around.

And they did, for a while. The Phils roared to their 4th straight NL East title and the best record in the major leagues. And you couldn't ask for a better beginning to the postseason than Roy Halladay pitching a no-hitter in his first-ever playoff start. But during the entire postseason the team struggled to score, often needing subpar fielding from the Reds and Giants in order to get some runs. Their lack of hitting with runners in scoring position was excruciating, especially in NLCS Game 6, in which the Phils scored twice in the first, and Giants' starter Jonathan Sanchez was so shaky that he was removed before getting an out in the third inning. But they never scored again. They were 2-for-11 with RISP and both of those hits came in the first. Making things worse, the Phils' own fielding let them down at times.

And so I feel the need to use a word to describe this team that hasn't applied in a few years now:

Phillies: Same Old, Same Old, Sort Of

I sensed a bit of panic after the Phillies lost the first game of the NL Championship Series on Saturday night. I didn't actually see any online comments that were pessimistic and I didn't hear anything on WIP. Well, I actually didn't listen to the station at all. I just had a feeling that there was a little bit of worry setting in.

That's almost understandable considering our city's pro sports history. But anyone who's watched this Phillies team the last four seasons has to realize that they aren't beaten until they're actually beaten, and to panic prematurely is just silly. And after Sunday's 6-1 win, the series is tied at 1-1. Just like last year's NLCS. So they lost the first one instead of the second. Big deal.

Saturday night was actually hyped somewhere as the greatest pitching matchup in postseason history, with the Phils' Roy Halladay and the Giants' Tim Lincecum. But the final score was 4-3, not 1-0 with a no-hitter. Halladay gave up a pair of solo homers to Cody Ross, and those would've been the only runs he allowed, except that with two outs and a runner on first in the 6th, Raul Ibanez misplayed a deep fly by Pat Burrell into a double that made the score 3-1, with another hit right after making it 4-1. And while Lincecum was good enough to get the win, the Phils had some opportunities to score but didn't take advantage. So when Halladay pitches again, I'm sure he'll be fine.

Game 2 was dominated by Roy Oswalt, who (despite also giving up a home run to Ross) outdid both of the Game 1 starters on the mound and, with the Phils holding on to a 2-1 lead in the 7th, on the bases. He led off the 7th with a single, moved to second on a Shane Victorino bunt and scored on a Placido Polanco single, running right through the stop sign of third-base coach Sam Perlozzo. Unlike the first game, where the Phils' 3 runs all scored on homers, their 6 runs Sunday came without the benefit of the home run. That is a good sign for the next 3 games in San Francisco's AT&T Park.

The Phils need to stop giving up home runs to Cody Ross. If they do that, they'll be fine.

Phillies Are Oscar-Worthy

Websites such as Philly.com need to be a little more careful when they update their home page for breaking news -- or breaking sports, in this case...

Perhaps it was intentional, though. Tonight's comeback win would make for one epic movie. (No, not Epic Movie. God forbid.) Down 9-2 going into the bottom of the 8th the Phillies scored 4 runs in the 8th and had the potential tying run at the plate before the inning ended. After Danys Baez pitched a scoreless 9th (that's a shock in itself) the Dodgers brought in their closer, Jonathan Broxton. You may remember Broxton from such spectacular choke jobs as 2008 NLCS Game 4 and 2009 NLCS Game 4. Broxton proceeded to hit a batter and walk the next two to load the bases. Two runs scored on an error by Dodgers third baseman Casey Blake, and Carlos Ruiz hit a two-run double off the fence in deep left-center -- the only base hit of the inning -- to win it.

The Phils have now won 16 of their last 20 to move within 2 games of Atlanta in the NL East and 1 game of San Francisco in the NL Wild Card race (although a fourth straight division title is greatly preferred). Shane Victorino is back from the disabled list. By the end of the month both Ryan Howard and Chase Utley should be back as well. They still need better work out of the bullpen (Brad Lidge's recent resurgence is very important) but things continue to look up.

A Phillies Question

This started as a little "random musings" post, but I've decided to limit it to just one question...well, two, counting the follow-up:

Are the Phillies back on track? And if so, for how long? They've now won 6 in a row, cutting a 7-game deficit in the NL East in half, but they still have uncertainty on a number of fronts. The rumors keep flying about trades: getting Roy Oswalt, giving Jayson Werth, some combination of the two, or something entirely different. The Oswalt stuff swings back and forth hourly, it seems. The Astros won't trade him to St. Louis because they're in the same division! St. Louis is the frontrunner to get him! Oswalt's 2012 option for $16.5 million isn't a problem! He won't agree to any trade unless the team picks up the 2012 option! Oswalt doesn't want to play for the Phillies! The Phillies are the frontrunner to get him now! Thank heavens the trade deadline is Saturday because this is getting tiresome.

Meanwhile, they fired their hitting coach and the offense is still not consistent, although it seems to be picking up. Then there are injuries.

Are The Phils Finally Back On Track?

Interleague play has never been very kind to the Phillies (if you don't count the 2008 World Series, of course), but their recent swoon may finally be over as they've now won 3 out of 4 against two AL East powers. After a pair of drubbings by the Boston Red Sox to begin the road trip that ended tonight, the Phils got another strong start by Cole Hamels to win the finale at Fenway. Things looked bleak after the New York Yankees roughed up Roy Halladay on Tuesday. The Phils, losers of 15 of their last 21, have fallen into third place in the NL East and had Jamie Moyer and Kyle Kendrick starting the next two nights. Both struggled in their last starts, with the word "struggle" being an understatement in Moyer's case: 9 runs in one-plus inning.

But Moyer got early offensive support and pitched eight very fine innings as the Phils won 6-3 last night. Moyer allowed just three hits, two of them solo homers. Kendrick went seven tonight, allowing just one run in the 7-1 win, and in a way his performance might have been even more impressive than Moyer's. While the Phils scored all 6 of their runs in the 2nd and 3rd innings last night, tonight the game was scoreless until the 4th. The Yankees had two on with one out in the 2nd. Kendrick has shown a propensity to lose his composure at times like this, but he got out of the inning without any damage.

Calling For Requests Again!

Shortly after I started this blog, I decided to beg ask for requests. What I said at the time was: "I will blog about any topic you suggest. Anything. No subject is off the table. Just post a comment with your suggested topic or question. I can't guarantee that you'll enjoy what I have to say about your topic. Certain information may not be divulged (I won't, for example, divulge my ATM card's PIN number -- not that you'd get much of anything from my account at any rate). You may not want to suggest I blog about the Phillies, as I do enough of that already. I promise I will absolutely write something, though. The only thing I'd like to know is where in the world you are, whether or not you're Carmen Sandiego."

Now, this didn't exactly result in a flood of replies. Actually, it resulted in one. Since it's been a while, and I think my readership may have slightly increased since then, I've decided to ask again. Same rules apply, especially the one about where you're from. Don't be like that one anonymous person from my previous attempt...although I suspect I may know who wrote it...

As an enticement, and because pitchers and catchers have reported to Clearwater for spring training, here's a clip (from TheFightins.com) of Phillies outfielder Shane Victorino shirtless and swimming, while on a team-sponsored cruise in January 2009:

Jon And Shane Plus...?

As if the mohawk wasn't bad enough, Phillies outfielder Shane Victorino is now showing questionable taste in celebrity friends. TMZ.com reports that bad dad Jon Gosselin has flown to Hawaii to attend Victorino's wedding this weekend. Why, Shane, Why? Aren't there any MMA fighters you could invite instead? Hell, even if you invited A-Rod and his latest skank Kate Hudson it would be almost understandable...

Please, Phillies, no more Lidge in 2009!

This simply can't go on any longer. Brad Lidge can no longer close out games in 2009. If the Phillies continue to put him out there, this team is GUARANTEED to fail in the postseason. Charlie Manuel has to face the simple fact that this is a lost year for Lidge. Yes, he was perfect in save opportunities in 2008. But he also had some luck. Remember when he gave up what would have been the tying run in Atlanta, except Shane Victorino made a hellacious throw to cut down the runner at the plate? Whether it's due to injury or just dumb luck or whatever, clearly 2009 is a down year for Lidge and there's no reason to think things will magically turn around by the time the playoffs start.

Tonight Lidge was brought into the game at Florida in the 9th with the Phils hanging on to a 6-5 lead, and promptly gave up two runs to lose the game. Todd Zolecki (Phillies' beat writer for MLB.com) tweeted this stat: "Since Manuel pulled Lidge on Sept. 8 in Washington, he is 1-3 with an 11.57 ERA in five appearances. Opponents have hit .391 against him." Actually, he's not 1-3. In his first game after that Sept. 8 game he came in with the team down 8-2 and pitched a scoreless inning. He then picked up three saves -- but gave up runs in every game. So a more accurate stat is: including tonight, in his last 4 games Lidge has given up 6 runs in 3 2/3 innings. That makes his ERA 14.73 for that span.

The problem is, right now there are no good options. Ryan Madson hasn't been any better than Lidge at closing games. Brett Myers is now nursing a strained shoulder and isn't likely to pitch again until next week. The rest of the bullpen is either similarly injured or not experienced enough.

After winning 2 of 3 in Atlanta, the Phils lost 2 of 3 in Florida. They're still up by 6 1/2 games and the magic number to clinch the division is 5. They have 11 games left: 4 at Milwaukee, then 4 at home against Houston and 3 at home against Florida. It is still extremely unlikely the Phils won't be in the playoffs, but with Lidge as their closer, they won't be there for long.

Phils leave DC with bad game, bad hair

The Phillies finished a strange road trip with a 2-5 record. After the 4-game sweep at the hands of Houston the Phils won twice in Washington, but looked less than impressive. They finally started scoring runs, but most of them were on solo home runs, and Brad Lidge has finally lost his job as closer (at least for now) after another near-disaster. But last night they failed to finish a sweep against the worst team in baseball. Jimmy Rollins, who hadn't made an error in ages, made two last night. Joe Blanton, who's been stringing together quality starts for the last three months, reverted to his April-May form. The offense got two runs in the first and then were shut down until the 9th, when the woeful Nationals nearly let an 8-2 lead disappear.

An error, an infield hit and a walk was followed by a pinch-hit grand slam by Matt Stairs that ended two streaks. Stairs broke an 0-for-30 slump with his first hit since July (or, as a caller to sports-talk station WIP put it the other day: "The last time Stairs got a hit I had two kids and now I have three" since his wife gave birth recently). The Phils also had hit 17 consecutive homers without runners on base before the slam.

A Rollins single, a wild pitch, a Shane Victorino double and a Chase Utley infield hit later and it was 8-7 with the possible go-ahead run on first. But Ryan Howard grounded into a double play to end the game. The Phils' lead is now down to 5 games over Florida. They return home for 4 against the almost-as-woeful-as-Washington New York Mets.

Speaking of Victorino, what is he thinking with this hair?

Phils beat Cubs, fans

Be sure to go here and read what I wrote about the beer shower inflicted on Shane Victorino by a piece-of-garbage Chicago Cubs fan. As for the game itself, Pedro Martinez went 5 innings in his first start, allowing 3 runs and 7 hits, with 1 walk and 5 strikeouts. Pretty mediocre, except it didn't much matter as the Phillies scored 8 runs in the 4th to break the game open and eventually won 12-5. The Phils now lead the NL East by 4 1/2 games over both Florida and Atlanta.

A couple days of Phils stuff

Interesting developments...

• Shane Victorino was the winner in the NL All-Star Final Vote. Apparently he came up with the idea for the Phillies to team up with the Detroit Tigers, whose Brandon Inge was the AL winner. The "Bran-Torino" campaign apparently worked...except since I voted hundreds of times, including non-stop in the 2 hours before voting closed, it really was me who put him over the top.
• Jayson Werth is also going to the All-Star game; he was named as a replacement for the Mets' Carlos Beltran, who is missing the game due to injury. This is surprising, because I would've expected that LA Dodger Matt Kemp, the only other outfielder on the Final Vote ballot. But clearly NL All-Star game Charlie Manuel is playing favorites and rewarding his players, between this choice and that of Ryan Howard at first base. Must be good to be the king. (With Victorino and Raul Ibanez, this is the first time since 1972 that one team has had three outfielders in an All-Star game.
  
• Ibanez has been activated from the disabled list; in a very surprising move, catcher and author Chris Coste was designated for assignment to make room for Ibanez, and Coste was claimed by Houston.
• The Phillies are interested in free-agent pitcher Pedro Martinez. He's struggled with age and injuries in recent years; this year he pitched in the World Baseball Classic and has sat waiting since then. I don't know that he'd be much of an upgrade over the starters they already have. I'd much rather they trade for Toronto's Roy Halladay now that the Blue Jays have intimated that they might try and trade him.
• Oh, and they've now won 7 of 8 on this homestand after tonight's 3-2 win over the Pirates, with me in attendance (and I'll be there tomorrow also), and now lead the NL East by 3 games.