Wow.

Unbelievable. This is similar to what Arizona did a couple weeks ago. They scored 6 runs in the bottom of the 9th without recording an out to steal a game. Anyway, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. It’s great to see that we never give up. Taguchi, are you kidding me? The gods were smiling on us tonight, that’s for sure. The dreaded 100 pitch limit did the Mets in. Santana was cruising. Oh well, live by the book, die by the book. Hopefully, this will get in the heads of both teams. (in a good way for us and a bad way for them, obviously).

Helluva game tonight for the Phils. So many reasons why tonight was one of the best games of 2008 so far.

1. Charlie fired up the team by sticking it to the ump for blowing the call on what should have been the third strike in the at bad where Delgado hit a two run home run.

2. The defense kept the game close by throwing out Chavez at the plate twice and also when Utley made a nice diving catch with two outs and bases loaded.

3. The bullpen, did a great job, as they have all season and kept the Phils in striking distance. Lidge earned save #22 in as many chances.

4. And last, but not least, the offense shook off the funk and pulled of some magic off the Mets substitute closers. Also, it was nice to see the Phils win a game where they didn’t rely on the long ball to pull it out.

As a Philly fan, it’s nice to be able to go to sleep knowing tomorrow will be a good day instead of being depressed looking at the NL East stadings sitting 1 game behind the Mets and tied with the Fish.

i feel sorry for the mets fans; they must be feeling deja vu all over again. if myers is back to form and they win this game, it just MIGHT re awaken these phils but we’ll see. anyone could see they got lucky yesterday but heck part of that was them too so we’ll see. i think playing the mets is the BEST thing that could happen to them (instead of sweeping atlanta every day like local champions)
blanton was very unimpressive, maybe cold feet?, reserve judgment till september ppl

@ bski

Great rundown of last night’s performance–like the assessment! I am not high on Blanton–think he is a #3 or #4, I think everybody knows where I stand on that, but I am indifferent as to last night’s performance and will reserve judgement until he gets a few starts under his belt. I want to be hopefully optimistic!

TOMMY O: I am very concerned about Myers as well. I hope his positive results in the minors came from a change in his psyche rather than from pitching against inferior competition. I guess we will find out very soon.

You know, if the Phils decided on this course for Myers sooner, they could have boosted his confidence even more by having him pitch in the college world series. Better yet, if they wait a little while longer they can send his confidence into the stratosphere by having him pitch in the little league world series.

SONIDO: Thanks.

@ EVERYBODY-

Here’s Pat Gillick take on both Marson and Carrasco:

“So you can bet that everyone wants Carrasco and Marson, who are at double-A Reading.”

“Gillick said Carrasco is still a year away from the majors. He added that the 21-year-old righthander projects as a No. 3 starter.”

“There’s no way a future No. 3 holds up a deal.”

“Gillick is high on Marson, the catcher recently selected for the U.S. Olympic team. He thinks the 22-year-old Arizonan could be an every-day catcher in the majors in a year. Moving him might be risky, given the state of catching in the Phillies system, but the team is in a win-now mode – that’s why it made a play for CC Sabathia, finishing second or third in the sweepstakes behind Milwaukee.”

Hmmm- sounds familiar. As I have always suggested, we need to be more realistic with regard to Carlos Carrasco. Although, he is the top-prospect in the Phillies organization, it doesn’t automatically mean this guy is a future ace. Now, he can develop better then expected and ultimately be that ace, but let’s be more realistic with this kid’s potential.

Marson, on the otherhand, fills a NEED. Let’s try to keep him in the fold.

Speaking of making a play for Sabathia…that’s 4 starts, 4 wins, 3 complete games! Wish we’d of made a little bigger play…

OK, today I’m going to take on Brett Myers. Here is what he had to say about his start last night:
“I felt 10 times better [than before going to the minors],” he said. “I just wish I could have thrown my four-seamer better. I definitely think if I can locate that better in my next start, I’ll be fine.

“I felt like if that first inning hadn’t gone that way, we probably would have won the game and I would have gone nine innings. I felt that good.”

I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m not buying it. It sounds to me like he is trying to convince himself that somehow he will be able to regain control of his fastball. I think many of us have wished that he could throw his four-seamer better. I know I have. It’s just that now we are 2/3 of the way through the season and have still not seen any sign of it happening. Last night didn’t give me any reason to start believing it will either. I will give Myers credit for battling, keeping the Mets from doing any major damage, and for staying out there as long as he did, but I have no confidence that he will straighten out and give us what we need.

Here’s what I saw:

-Myers still does not have control of his fastball. I think it is mostly because he is overthrowing. He looks like he is trying to throw every fastball through the backstop.

- Since he has no control of it, he still has no confidence in it. Almost every time he needed to make a pitch he threw a curveball. He looks like he is throwing his fastball not because he believes in it, rather because that is what the Phils want him to throw. When I looked at his body language and his eyes, I saw a guy who was forcing himself to bear down with his fastball. Maybe he feels that by humping up and going all out on every fastball he can regain his confidence.

I think that Myers’ only chance at regaining control of his fastball is for him the adopt the Leo Mazzone philosophy: sacrifice a few mph for greater control. Mazzone is well known for saying when a pitcher gets in trouble, instead of thinking “throw harder”, he should think “throw softer”. It is the case for most pitchers that location is more important than speed regarding the fastball. Myers’ fastball topped out at 93mph. Most of them were right at 91mph. This certainly will not blow anyone away. If he would back off a bit, say to 87-88 mph, I think he could get better control. Jamie Moyer’s fastball tops out at 80 mph, yet he is able to get it by hitters. The differential between Moyer’s changeup/curveball and his fastball keeps the hitters off balance, allowing him to use his fastball effectively. As long as Myers doesn’t overthrow his curveball (he seems to throw everything as hard as he possibly can), his differential should do the same thing for his fastball, making it more effective.

Is that why Rollins was a late scratch? I was listening on the radio at work and I didn’t hear anyone give a reason.

Same old story today. Another left hander, another shut down. Now even Utley looks lost. Hitless in the series, 3k today. Just awful.

It is really hard to believe that the same guys who gave us gritty, gutsy, solid team baseball last year could be playing this badly for this long, with no end in sight. Obviously Tuesday night was a fluke. You’re right. No way you can possibly have any confidence in them.

I’m glad to see that someone else agrees with me about Myers. Over on the Zo Zone several posters were saying things like, “The Mets didn’t hit him hard” along with other ridiculously weak defenses. I guess they’re just trying to be supportive, but come on. For me, it goes beyond the walk-a-thon, as you called it. The biggest thing is the lack of confidence he has in his fastball. There was an at bat last night, by Easley I think, where Myers was down in the count 3-1 with a couple of runners on. Myers threw a curveball, of course. The problem is that he wasn’t pitching backwards or trying to get Easley out in front so that he would hit a pop up or a weak ground ball. Myers threw the curveball because he needed a strike in that situation and it was the only pitch he was confident he get get over the plate. He did the same thing several other times as well. If he can’t command his fastball, he is worthless. He got lucky last night. The reason the Mets did not hit him was because they had no idea when he would get a pitch anywhere near the plate. They were not swinging because they didn’t need to. The only times Myers kept the Mets hitters off balance was when he surprised them by throwing a strike.

Happ may not be a long term answer for us in the rotation but, without a doubt, we will get more from him than we will from Myers for the rest of this season.

bski, for one thing, I’m still reading that Baseball Prospectus book. Before I delve in here, I’d like to know more about what I’m talking about.

For example, according to what they researched, the three things that are most correlated with winning in the postseason:

1. Great fielders
2. A lights-out closer
3. Great pitching

So because of that I’m considering changing my stance on the Phils needing more offense. It’s kind of hard to do when they’re putting up ~3 runs a game, but according to the book, once they make it to the postseason, they should be a favored team because they have 2.5 of those 3.

The “Wow.” article by Pete was a bit premature. Again, something I’ve learned from that Baseball Prospectus book is that baseball has really wide variances, and that things tend to go back to normal after an event that strays really far from what a team or player typically does. Again, this bodes well for the Phils, right? I think everything is setting up for a great postseason run. Their pitching quality has been consistent all year long, and we’re seeing very few extreme highs and lows. Their hitting, on the other hand, has definitely experienced those highs and lows, and believe it or not, because of this volatility, it gives them a great chance to score a lot of runs in the postseason.

About my baseball posting frequency – I just feel that basketball needs more attention in this city. I get tons of Phillies talk from the radio, there’s lots of baseball talk on ESPN, and philly.com covers it like the Phils are the Eagles now. I’m not a huge fan of Bill Conlin’s and Jim Salisbury’s work. I miss Jayson Stark, I thought he was great reading, no wonder ESPN stole him away. A lot of Philly sports blogs cover the Phils. Frankly, I get sick of it, just like I get sick of Eagles talk in the fall and winter. But Sixers talk, I don’t hear anything all day long. If I wanna read basketball talk, I have to go search high and wide for it. I often go to other cities’ newspapers just to get my fill.

If we’d started chatting 3~4 years ago, I’d definitely have more to say, because even in the summer, people would mostly talk about the Eagles (this city is nuts). But now, EVERYONE! has an opinion, it’s really hard to escape the Phillies chatter. Trust me, if on my drive to and from work every other call on 610 or 950 was about Elton Brand, and my friends suddenly discovered a love for the NBA and wanted to discuss the finer points of the signing of Royal Ivey, I’d be talking lots of baseball here.

This is what makes this site so great, Pete, you, The Duke, this new guy sonido… so very different from what I hear everyday. But despite that, I only wanna intake so much, you know what I mean? Plus, I’ve got some stuff to prep before I head off to Chengdu, where that earthquake was a couple months ago. I go out to the field about twice a year.

testing

ZACK: Fair enough. I can understand that.

You know, I am laughing while I’m typing because you have suggested some kind of major shakeup with the Phils, like trading Rollins, several times and I have disagreed and told you over and over that it was a bad idea. Well, as of now, I have had enough of them. I was planning on coming on here and putting up a post to you saying that maybe you were right all along. Then I see that you’ve put up a post that calmly, logically states that, according to your research, the Phils could be set up for a great post season run and how they should have a great chance to score a lot of runs in the post season. Kind of ironic, huh? It’s like we’ve switched positions. I still can’t stop laughing.

Rollins-related posts arrive to the site late, then ground out to end the game.

PS I actually did have issues trying to post yesterday two seperate times. Third time was the charm though.

Ian, thanks for the levity.

Duke, I don’t know what’s up with San Fran, they seem so random with their player movement – so I think it’s worth a shot, you never know. While we’re at it, let’s get back Aaron Rowand for Jenkins, can we get a free agent that would be better than Rowand this offseason?

Regarding my last post, Rollins salary is only $8 million a year. Realized I accidentally put $13 million when I read the post again.

here is the one thing i do not understand about the rollins situation and maybe someone can enlighten me: how and why did he have a car at their manhattan hotel? i mean seriously, this makes no sense. why would he drive to queens? i am fixated on this issue rather than the actual issue itself.

i have not had any problems posting. though they have seemed to take longer to be submitted lately. in addition, if you write a long post, i would recommend highlighting and copying it all right before you hit submit so just in case, you can just re-paste and safe yourself quite a bit of time.

OK, I am back! I just got off the phone with Verizon. I had to unplug my modem and router to recycle them. I plugged them back in, restarted my computer, and bingo, a connection! I have some lost time to make up for so look out. I’m coming back with a monster post.

PART II: As far as Manuel goes, I have a few questions as well. Even if he handled the Rollins situation appropriately, it begs the question why these things keep happening. Manuel spoke about the lack of execution the other day. He was stand up about it and included himself, saying that it was up to him to get the team to execute. Again, the question is why are they not executing, especially considering how poorly they have been playing for well over a month now. What will it take for them to realize they need to put it all together? These are professional players who are 2/3 of the way through the season, yet they need the manager to get on them to make sure they execute. Why is that exactly? Where is the personal pride, determination, grit, focus, whatever to pull out of this mess?

For me it brings up the tired argument between having a player’s manager and a disciplinarian. Charlie is a player’s manager. He keeps the guys loose and relaxed. But are they too comfortable? They say Charlie has not lost the clubhouse. If that is so, then why can’t he get them to play sound baseball with any sense of urgency? The players all still say how much they love playing for him. Thank God because I cannot imagine how poorly they would play with a guy they despised, like Bowa, on the bench.

Something has got to give here.

Mr. “‘Scuse me while I kiss the sky” is behaving and playing to a much lower standard than expected following a career year. If Phillies are to reclaim first, or even grab the Wild Card, Rollins has to help lead the way with a turnabout in his attitude and approach. Batting slumps are one thing; me-focus, lackadaisical play and chips on shoulder are cancerous. He’s smellin’ himself too much right now. Jamie Moyer should independently and firmly remind him that last year is last year, that no one can rest on laurels; it MIGHT work. “Nostradamus” Rollins, as Daily News columnist Bill Conlin recently and humorously tagged him, is besmirching his reputation as a seer too; “100 wins” is a distant dream at this stage. A well-placed bunt, especially when batting from the left side, can do wonders in igniting an offense, including one’s own. Why is he averse? Never mastered the fundamental? Or ego? The leadoff batter role: GET ON BASE, ANY WAY YOU CAN. If something is bothering him, he needs to clear the air, and then get on with the business of playing top-notch TEAM baseball.

Got a couple minutes here…

jjg, funny stuff, as usual…

bski, you want venom? There’s a website called Phillies Nation (philliesnation.com), run by some guy named Tim Malcolm. I dislike the name though, I don’t like copying other teams. When Mets fans come down to crow, that’s where they go. I’m not trying to get you away from this site, this is a good site. Honestly, Pete’s analyses are better, IMO. But that’s where people hang out. A lot of it is Zo Zone-type of chatter, but a decent chunk is in-depth discussion.

About today’s game – that was awesome, that’s the kind of offense that will win you postseason games. It seems like the guys aren’t swinging for the fences as much anymore, they seem to be okay with just driving the ball, instead of slugging it. If the Phillies were a stock, I think now would be the time to buy – the fundamentals are looking really good right now. I fully expect them to be in first place by the time I get back form China (end of August).

About J-Roll, I agree with jjg, he’s been WEIRD this season. I still can’t believe he’s leading off. And I thought about what you said before, how he’s not comfortable unless he’s in the leadoff spot – that’s a huge negative for me. For example, let’s say we put two of our higher OBP guys, Victorino and Werth, in the 1 and 2 hole, which I think is basic baseball. So we move J-roll down to number 5 or number 6, but he’s only comfortable in the #1 slot, so that means when we move him down there he’s gonna bat a lot worse than he’s batting now. So we’re stuck with him at #1, and it deprives us of some flexibility that would be worth a couple more wins a year.

BTW, I’m off the trade Howard train, of our big 3, he’s clearly the best right now.

Crazy stat – the reason Burrell’s agent is asking for a lot of money is because he’s one of the best road hitters in the game right now:

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/stats/batting?sort=onBasePct&split=34&league=mlb&season=2008&seasonType=2&type=reg&ageMin=17&ageMax=51&minpa=200&hand=a&pos=all

Also, I wanna run an idea past you – you wanna do a running diary of a game some time?

ZACK: I don’t like to keep harping on Rollins because he is not the only issue on the Phils, but he is what’s happening now. As far as his productivity goes, it’s the same old lamentations. He’s too impatient, swings at too many first pitches, has too much of a homerun swing, doesn’t hit line drives or ground balls, hardly ever bunts, doesn’t draw enough walks-especially considering he’s our leadoff hitter. There is nothing new here. It’s who he is. Even in the face of this he still is a productive player. A little while back, Pete threw out one of my all-time favorite illustrations with regard to our perception as to whether or not a guy is a good hitter. We view a .250 hitter as poor, while .300 is the mark of good hitter. Well, the difference between a .250 hitter and a .300 hitter is 1 hit a week! (based on 500 at bats). It doesn’t seem to make sense, but do the math. This shows that the gap we perceive between a good hitter and a poor one is a lot more narrow than we realize. Anyway, when Pete used the example he said that the difference between a .275 hitter (which is right where Rollins is now) and a .300 hitter (where we would like Rollins to be) is 1 hit every 2 weeks. He is not very far off and, as much as I would like him to change his approach, I can live with his offensive production.

My whole problem with Rollins centers on his attitude. Check out this exerpt from Bob Ford’s article:
“And the team needs to get Jimmy Rollins’ situation settled.

Rollins blew off reporters again yesterday. (“What a game. That’s my quote,” he said as he left the locker room.) But that’s the least of it. Since being benched for getting to Shea Stadium late on Thursday, Rollins has made a point of showing up just in time to beat the manager’s arrival deadline, and he affects a body language that indicates he doesn’t much care what anyone thinks of it. If his teammates aren’t tired of the act, you can be sure the front office is. It doesn’t take much to mess up the mechanism of a baseball team. Rollins could do it all by himself.

That is a combustion for another day, however. The Phillies are letting it simmer now and hoping the heat dissipates. Good luck.”

This tells me that my earlier assessment of Rollins was correct. I realize that he is not the only difficult player in the league (or on this team for that matter). After all, we don’t have to deal with Manny Ramirez. I’m just hoping the situation doesn’t turn cancerous, because that would be devastating to our chances.

Regarding Howard, I have not moved from my original stance. I do not WANT the Phils to trade Howard. I also don’t think he is worth either $20 mil per or an 8 year commitment. My position is that if they know they will not or cannot re-sign him, they should trade him and get as much in return as possible rather than just letting him walk. Sooner may be better than later, since he’s in a situation like Blanton is with 2 years of arbitration left. We might be able to get more if the other team knows they’ve got him for at least 2 more years.

By all apperances Burrell will be gone. The same goes for him. I would love to keep him, but I don’t want the Phils to overcommit to him in terms of years and/or dollars either. I’m sure somebody out there will give him a longer deal for more money.

A running diary of a game would be fun. Since there are more guys on these baseball topics, maybe we can get a few of them in on it also.

Can we discuss this: http://www.nypost.com/seven/07272008/sports/yankees/moving_mann__121756.htm

What would the Phillies actually have to give up for Manny? I am assuming that Burrell would have to be included in any deal. I mean, Manny plays right field and there is no way the same outfield can have both Manny and Pat. Shane would have to cover wayyyyyy too much ground. Manny is certainly an upgrade over Burrell and would look great inbetween Chase and Ryan. It is very intriguing to think about and discuss. If we get the Manny of old, then we have a great consistent hitter in the middle of our lineup. That is the one thing we are currently lacking, a guy who consistently hits over .300 (Chase, I’m looking at you here).

I don’t want anything to do with Manny either. He is a nightmare and a cautionary tale. He really has the Red Sox by the short hairs. He has a guaranteed contract, so they have to pay him whether he plays or not (due to injury?). Also, as a 10 and 5 player he can veto any trade, so they can’t just ship him somewhere to get rid of him.

That’s another fear you have when you sign a guy to a mega contract. In addition to worrying about whether or not you will get your money’s worth in productivity, you also need to worry about the long term commitment you are making. A no trade clause is common in these mega contracts. Plus the extra length of these contracts leaves you open to a Ramirez-like situation, should things deteriorate.

I am not suggesting that this would happen, but consider the Howard situation. What if we did sign him to an 8-year, $160 million contract with a no trade clause? If we continue to stay in the 86 win territory year after year, it is certainly conceivable that Howard would eventually get fed up. Would we be in store for Rollins-like petulance or maybe something beyond that? Then we would be stuck with an unhappy, 10 and 5 player with a no trade clause. Just something to think about.

As for the Manny talks, check out http://pcpsports.com for my thoughts. Just launched a couple days ago and could use a few visitors.

OK, two quick (which is different for me) things this morning.

1) Bill Conlin’s article today kind of sums up what I’ve been saying about Rollins over the last few days. Here’s the link

2) Paul Hagen’s article makes me think the Phils might have a deal in the works. J. A. Happ was removed from his start yesterday after just 2 2/3 innings and he was getting high fives from his teammates in the dugout. It appears as though he is coming back up to us. The question is, who will he replace? It could just be they will put someone on the DL. We’ll see. Anyway, here’s the link to that article

The Phils have been Happless lately (sorry, couldn’t resist). Am glad to see him back. I’m not saying he’s a savior or anything but he did outpitch a couple of guys while he was here. He’s definitely earned another look.

One thing I really feel strongly about: I do NOT want to see Shane Victorino included in any possible trade. I know that on paper his numbers are modest and that there are other outfielders with better stats. But the package of speed, defense, super arm, intangibles, and incredible heart aren’t easy to replace. When he clapped after hitting that 3-run homer yesterday he wasn’t applauding himself. He was genuinely psyched that the homer had tied the score. He really wants to win. In this era of prima donnas and Manny being Manny, a guy like Victorino doesn’t come around often.

Eaton demoted, Happ back on the roster. Finally!