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Sports Complex
The sports world is exploding over news that Cliff Lee has struck a deal to return to the Phillies, and for fewer years (reportedly five with a vesting option for a sixth) and less guaranteed money than was being offered by either the Yankees and the Rangers.
And for the record, ESPN's resident Philly homer Jayson Stark predicted this on Twitter 8 hours before it happened, after SI's Jon Heyman tipped everyone off to the "mystery team" still in the running.
Ruben Amaro, in one bold stroke, has just guaranteed himself a lifetime of free drinks in this town.
Relatedly, to clear salary, Joe Blanton could be on the move, meaning the Phils' 2011 rotation could line up something like:
- Doc
- Lee
- Oswalt
- Hamels
- Kendrick/Worley/Jamie Moyer's disembodied arm, because at this point, who really cares who takes the ball on the fifth day?
Yankees fans are not happy. Phillies fans are.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Philly City Paper, Lou Perseghin and Natalie, Philly News Now. Philly News Now said: Cliff Lee to return to Phillies: The sports world is exploding over news that Cliff Lee has struck a deal t... http://bit.ly/foS0tN [...]
GGGGGGRRRRREAAATTTT!
While the image of The Big Piece (no relation) watching strike three — and the Phillies 2010 season — cross the plate will be the bitter, indelible image most of Phightins Nation carries with them from this star-crossed season, it shouldn't be.
Dave Cameron over at Fan Graphs — the best baseball analysis site going these days — has an excellent post up today addressing what I've been engaging in way too many Facebook and Twitter arguments about: "The Phillies lost in spite of Ryan Howard's performance, not becauseof it."
âHere's Ryan Howard, who does not yet have an RBI in the series.â
You could count on one hand the number of times the Fox crew said his name and failed to mention his series RBI total. So, when Howard took strike three on a nasty slider from Brian Wilson in the ninth inning, the narrative was confirmed, and Ryan Howard has now become the reason the Phillies lost the series.
There's only one problem â besides Jayson Werth, he was the only guy who did anything offensively against the Giants.
...
Howard led the team in batting average, on base percentage, and extra base hits in the NLCS. And yet, because he didn't knock in a run, Fox decided that he was struggling at the plate. Usage of the statistic like this is why the sabermetric community has spent so much time working to explain its faults â if it was put in context, it's not the worst proxy for offensive prowess, but too often it is used to tell a story that is simply not true.
Essentially, contrary to popular opinion, Howard — although he did have a few high-profile whiffs with runners on (but tell me who on the team didn't) — was actually one of just two Phillies (along with Jayson Werth) to show up at the plate. Howard's gaudy .318/.400/.500 line (7 for 22 with 3 walks and 4 doubles) suggest that Howard was far from a zero. That no RsBI thing everyone keeps bringing up is, yes, a function of him not coming through in the clutch, but also a function of his teammates not being on base all that much ahead of him.
It will be popular to pin this season's shortcomings on The Big Man — a bull's-eye comes with the big contract — but it will also be wrong.
There are a lot of guys in that clubhouse who should be taking a hard look in the mirror:
- Shane Victorino for choking with the bases loaded and ahead in the count against a rookie.
- Ben Francisco for, with a runner on third and one out, swinging from his heels when just putting the ball in play probably plates a run.
- Charlie Manuel for not recognizing the depressed run environment of the series and thus not having his players prepared for the situational hitting that could have eked out an extra run here or there.
- Sam Perlozzo for not sending Rollins home on Ryan Howard's Game 6 double.
- Chase Utley for some of the sloppiest fielding we've seen from him in some time.
- Jimmy Rollins and the entire coaching staff for not recognizing that a lefty pitcher intentionally walking a righty with a runner on third would be as big a gimme steal of home as you could ask for.
- Charlie Manuel for trusting Jose Contreras to pitch the seventh inning only sometimes.
- and so on.
There's a lot of blame to go around — and some of it should go to Howard — but definitely not all of it, and nowhere near what the growing consensus seems to be heaping on.
You are so right! To win a world series the stars have to align for you and they did not do so for the Phillies this year. Anything that could have gone our way didn't! Clearly, the inconsistent offensive production must be addressed in the offseason. But in the mean time, everybody get off Ryan's back!
Amen to that!
Could not agree more. Let's talk more about the mistakes of our fans. 1 assuming a win against a two time Cy young winner, a no hitter pitcher, two young up and coming pitchers and a great bull pen. 2 thinking that you will get to the series every year.
First it's a Ryan Howard witch hunt, next thing you know it's a *Brian* Howard witch hunt. That's why I'm against witch hunts.
"Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something.â — Pancho Villa's last words.
As the San Francisco Giants jumped up and down on the same mound that Brad Lidge collapsed onto after recording the final out the 2008 World Series, the Phillies quietly sulked back a clubhouse without champagne, and complained.
âIf you are going to make the call, make the call,â Ryan Howard said bluntly, just moments after he left a bat on his shoulder and let home plate umpire Tom Hallion decide his season. Hallion had made the call, of course, and the call ended the Phils season.
After making his name on proclamations like âjust get me to the plate, boys,â and the pinch-hit walk-off grand slam, the 30-year-old, $125 million first basemen, took a big step towards soiling it when the third strike of his 30th K in his last 56 postseason at bats passed him looking (and according to both FoxTRAX and PitchFX it was a strike), and finished a series where he didn't produce a single run.
It was a fitting end. Now, for the first time since 2007 the Philadelphia Phillies' season is over before the World Series kicked off, and you can't say the Home Team didn't deserve it. They put up just 3 runs a game, and for an entire NLCS were legitimately worse than a West Coast team led by two waiver wire pickups and the two fattest third basemen since Bobby Bonilla. In a series featuring names like Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, Jimmy Rollins, and future Red Sock Jayson Werth, it was Juan Uribe who had the biggest hits, Cody Ross who won the MVP, and Matt Cain who had, without hyperbole, infinitely more RBIs than Ryan Howard. The Phillies earned their offseason.
The loss was a team effort, at least from the offense. Chase had as many bad defensive plays as base hits, and Raul Ibanez's .226 postseason average was actually the second best among regulars. Shane Victorino summed up the series best: With the bases loaded in the bottom of the fifth inning, Shane jumped on Madison Bumgarner's second pitch for a weak ground ball out. This was the type of big situation that a poised, experienced team like the Phils is supposed to come through in. Instead they reached at a bad pitch early in the count against a rookie.
As the last few innings wound down the Phils turned to full-fledged âwait for the long ball mode,â and after the game Brad Lidge told reporters that he was âshockedâ at the outcome, and âfelt like we had the best team in baseball this year, and it just didn't work out.â If their play was any indication, Lidge spoke for the team. They didn't execute when they needed to, and looked like they thought that they'd get to the World Series simply for showing up — a birthright, instead of a Red Badge. Problem is, it isn't the team that Brad Lidge believes is the best who gets the Commissioner's Trophy, it's the team who wins the games, and for at least this year, that team wasn't the Phils.
Notes â¦
- Now that he's done with the Phillies, I wonder if Cody Ross is going to realize he's Cody Ross
- Freddy Sanchez will forever be the 2006 batting champion. If that isn't enough to tell you we need some new stats, I don't know what to say.
- Peace, Werth. Enjoy Boston.
- Cliff Lee will start Game 1 of the World Series
- I had plenty of notes to on the âfightâ that was started when Jonathan Sanchez summed up his night in the word he shouted at Utley, but I think I'll scrap them all for now. Not in the mood for jokes, and the fact that the benches cleared over that was certainly a joke. I will say this tough, I'm disappointed HLHIII and Pat Burrell didn't find each other in the midst.
- This one was more about the Phils than it was the Giants, but credit where it is due: the Giants pen pitched a hell of a series, Tim Lincecum showed a lot going to the pen on one-day rest, and Buster Posey isn't even a little bit of a fluke.
- Finally, the upshot: It would be hard to argue that the Giants didn't find some holes while the Phils found gloves. The baseball playoffs can be a crapshoot, and the best team doesn't always win. That can work against your favorite team (2010) or for them (2008). Heading into next year, your Home Team could be doing a lot worse. They will be the oldest team in the majors (again), but they'll have frontline pitching and in a league where frontline pitching matters, and a lineup that should still be seen as competent, if no longer dominant. They should be good enough to get back to the playoffs, and, as both the Phils and the Giants proved this year, anything can happen when they get there.
- Phils in 2011
Did anyone else see how long it took them to show the Fox trax for the last pitch. It seemed a little fishy to me that it was right on the line. A little too convenient when to the naked eye it was clearly low.
This was a team effeort, all right - Utley and Victorino repeatedly came up small. And much will be said about Howard's taking that final called strike, but know this: he couldn't have hit it, anyway. Pitchers with decent control have been consistantly getting him out with that low & away borderline pitch for the better part of two years, and if they don't make a mistake in the heart of the plate, Howard will do most of the work himself. In 2009, the Yankees easily solved Howard in this manner, and it's what you can expect whenever he faces a good team's post-season starters. Ryan Howard is completely and utterly incapable and unwilling to alter his approach to hitting in any way that interferes with that big, Dave Kingman-like swing that got him to the majors - he's made a fortune from the Phillies' foolish contract, and even a 50% post-season strikeout rate will not cause him to ponder the situation. Hell - he's on record stating that he doesn't see *any* difference in outs - "an out is an out", according to The Big Piece. Now, where do you start with someone like that?
@Matt: whether or not that pitch was a strike, it was a pitch that was close enough that you have to at least try to foul it off with two strikes. And I say foul off because @anonymous is absolutely right: Brian Wilson made the pitch he needed to make; Howard knows he can't hit that pitch so he hoped he'd get the call rather than whiffing or hitting it weakly fair. The best reasonable outcome for Howard swinging at that pitch is a foul ball, but Howard hasn't really demonstrated an ability to even put his bat on that pitch. As to some of Anonymous' other points, I don't know that I agree with your assessment about Howard's strikeouts vs. other types of outs. Yes, he struck out 50% of the time, but he also had a .400 on base percentage in the NLCS which means he reached base at a better clip than anyone else on the team. And his four doubles gave him a slugging percentage (.500) second only to Werth's (.611). Regarding your comment about Howard refusing to change his approach, I think that the hallmark of a great player is the ability/willingness to work toward improving, which is a trait Howard's demonstrated in many facets of his game (defense, baserunning and, yes, he even cut down his Ks this season). But I find the assumption — that any flaw in a player's game is something that can be fixed simply by wanting to — to be problematic. As if NOT every player wishes he could hit like Ted Williams and only a lack of wanting it bad enough or working hard enough for it keeps/kept them from it. We're talking about a zero-sum game, and one in which its players have already reached the 99.99999999th percentile of all humans who can play it. They are at a point where there are some things, some flaws, that simply exist and an inability to improve upon them is not evidence of a character flaw or even evidence that they haven't tried to improve them, but merely evidence of a physical limit. Ryan Howard, like every other player who's stepped on a baseball field anywhere, is an imperfect player. And one of his imperfections is a hole in his swing that makes him susceptible to pitches on the low-outside corner. And yes, he should take the many millions of dollars he will make from the Phillies through 2016 as a covenant to try like hell to patch that hole. But we shouldn't be surprised if he can't.
[...] [...]
Matt, "Fishy" is an understatement! I felt insulted. Do the folks at Fox think I can't notice the difference between the obvious placement of the pitch as clearly shown in the video and where they so conveniently placed the little white dot. What a farce! Did you notice during the "pitch by pitch" recap of the final at-bat that they cut away to another image when they got to the last pitch! Once they had time to relocate the dot, they showed the final pitch. Here I was thinking this was some sort of sophisticated contraption, but it is apparently just someone tapping a screen after each pitch. Finally, it seems like it would have been in their best interest to show it correctly, out of the strike zone, which would have led to a lot more for their announcers to talk about (after the game and the next day).
Feeling confident about the Phils? You're not the only one. Pushed by active betters (presumably, a few of them local) over the course of the Game 5 of the NLCS, the Sportsbook betting odds for a Phillies' World Series Championship started to drop. At +500 at the start of the game, the line dropped to +400 sometime after the 3rd, +300 in the 9th, and +200 before Ken Rosenthal had finished his postgame interviews with two men who appear to be giants.
By the time you read this, it'll probably be even money. Admit it, even that number might seem low — why shouldn't the Phillies be the favorites?
After taking care of Giants and ace Tim Lincecum in the final game in San Francisco, the Phils head back to Philadelphia needing only two hometown-fueled wins from former NLCS MVPs to raise their NL third pennant in three years. Considering that your Home Team has yet to put together a single complete game, in the sense of firing on all cylinders, it is quite a testament to talent they've assembled.
It must be the talent, because throughout the series it hasn't been the play. The Home Team's bats, gloves and arms have taken turns looking impossibly raw. Marred by errors — mental and otherwise — the Phillies haven't acted like they're in the midst of their annual postseason run; they've acted like they just got off the bus in Clearwater at the other end of the season. Game 5 started off looking like it would not be an exception. Doc opened the day by issuing his first leadoff walk of the year, and then let the runner come around on a botched ground ball from the normally unflappable Chase Utley.
After taking the lead in a bizarre third inning that you've surely heard about roughly 640 times by now, the Phillies merely settled in and hung in for their second win in five tries. Actually, no one was ever settled in, and it wasn't the Phillies as a whole who wasn't doing the settling — it was Roy Halladay, who continues to establish himself as a local legend.
After throwing the National League's first ever playoff no-hitter in the NLDS, and not having his best stuff in Game 1 of this series, no one really knew exactly what to expect out of Halladay. So, when his velocity dropped, he started hanging breaking balls, missing locations and laboring through innings, many started to assume to perhaps he had finally hit his innings limit, or maybe just maybe tonight wasn't one of those nights. Both theories were incorrect — not only did Halladay still hold the Giants to two runs in six innings pitched, and not only did he put up that line despite a less-than-mediocre defensive showing behind him, but it turns out that he did it after pulling his groin in the second inning (or, at least it is being reported as the second; Dubee visited him in first, which I can't recall ever happening in the regular season). Seriously, despite not being able to properly push off, the Phils' ace refused to take himself out of the game, and still got a playoff win. That's like climbing K2 without a shoe, or playing golf with a shovel. I'm not sure how exactly the Phillies blogosphere can step up their Doc-trust, but rest assured, they'll find a way.
You know, I guess this is funner.
Onto the notes â¦
- Coming into the series a popular narrative was developing: the Giants stink at D. It's true, but it didn't really show itself until tonight, when a series of bizarre miscues cost the San Franciscans big.
- A cannon isn't strong enough, Werth has a Gustov. I hope Cody Ross learned a valuable lesson about playing with it.
- With Cody Ruth's monster series continued. He had another RBI double last night, brought his OPS is up to an even one million.
- Despite the power outage (never words you want to use to describe your $125 million power hitter), Ryan had actually looked good this series. No more. No. 6 ended the game with a sombrero and an error.
- Maybe it's a product of the San Fran offense, but the Madson-Lidge combo is looking 08-esque.
- Phils in 7
First, the positives: If we throw out the Phillies last regular season game â a meaningless 8-7 loss where Oswalt and Hamels combined to throw just three innings â the Phillies were 37-3 in games where (1) one of their three aces started and (2) they scored at least four runs. If the Phils' feast-or-famine offense wakes up even a little bit a comeback isn't out of the question at all.
In fact, it would probably be hard to find a team better suited to make it back from 3-1: once Halladay wins game 5 by sheer force of will, all the Phils need to do is win two home games started by former NLCS MVPs against the Kung Fu Pandas of the world. Will it be easy? Not as easy as it should have been, but maybe.
On top of all that, there is a clear precedent â the 2007 ALCS. After falling back 3 games to 1 to an inferior Indians' team and despite facing two guys in the top 5 of the '07 Cy Young voting (C.C. Sabathia, who took home the award, and Fausto Carmona, who finished fourth), the Boston Red Sox demolished the Tribe in 3 straight by a combined score of 30-5. In baseball, sometimes the better teams win, and despite what we've seen this week, the Phils are still better.
Now, with that out of the way, let us talk about the negatives. If you're going to pin last night's loss on one man, the man you pin it on is Uncle Cholly. After starting Joe Blanton over presumed Cy Young winner Roy Halladay, Charlie pulled Blanton in the middle of the fifth with men on first and second, two outs, and a rookie at the plate. For the record I'm not buying the logic that we just don't know what would have happened if the Phils had pitched Halladay instead of the remaining half of the Redneck Wrecking Crew. We all what would have happened: The Phillies would have won. So, if you're going away from the Phils' ace, you better have confidence that what you're going with can handle the job. Bailing on his gameday starter before the guy could prove him right, it was clear Charlie didn't. If you have faith in Blanton to start a NLCS game, you have to have faith in him to actually pitch it.
In his place he opted for Jose Contreras, one of the few reliable relievers the Phillies have had all season, and asked the Big Truck to get one and only one out. He did, but in doing so he left the Phils (18th best bullpen ERA in the majors) in a matchup of the pens with the Giants (2nd best bullpen ERA). Not surprisingly, this didn't turn out as planned. Four innings later, now out of bullpen arms he trusted, Manuel was forced to hand the ball to Roy Oswalt in a situation in which he's patently out of his comfort zone. Obviously, it did not work out well.
Moving forward, it didn't get prettier. In the 8th inning Charlie left Ben Francisco at the plate instead of pinch hitting Ibanez and forcing a move out of Giants' head man Bruce Bochy, who would have gone with a lefty. Even if Raul would have K'd (plausible), you'd have had Chooch at the plate against a left handed reliever, or Brian Wilson entering a tie game in the 8th inning, both excellent options. It was an obvious move at the time, and it is a more obvious move now.
What Manuel does well â and does it really well â is create an atmosphere where his star players are comfortable, and where they can thrive. It isn't a fluke that guys like Chase, Ryan, Jayson, Jimmy and Shane have all emerged into legitimate top level talents underneath him. But when those guys aren't hitting, Manuel is a negative. This postseason, Howard is looking for his first RBI, and Victorino's .214 average tops the rest of those four. They aren't hitting. I hate to say it, but game four on Cholly.
Onto the notes â¦
- Bumgarner definitely balked on Jimmy's âcaught stealing,, but Jesus Christ he has a pickoff move. There is no way to pick him up.
- When Ryan Howard got paid, both sides of the debate made strong points. The con said you should never set the market for a one-tool player. The pro side? They said Howard always came up big when it matters. Well, it matters.
- I know it didn't work out, but Chooch trying to punch the ball out of Posey's hand at his play at home was a great catcher-move
- For a guy who doesn't tend to show much emotion Joe Buck was pretty shocked that Pat Burrell made it first-to-third on a double.
- Wally Bell had a pretty colorful strike zone last night. Not a good thing.
- From the guy who brought you âPhils in 5 or 6â, a new prediction: Phils in 7.
A good analysis and you are right to invoke the 2007 ALCS for a blueprint of how to best proceed. Right now the press, nationally at least, have their obits pretty much ready to go, but the funny thing is the Phils haven't actually failed yet. Where some see disaster others see opportunity (see: 2007 Red Sox). It's like Animal House: "this could be the greatest night of our lives but you guys are letting it be the worst." Spot on about the eighth inning last night -- I also thought Werth might have stolen third to encourage a Billy Wagner type meltdown.
Growing up religiously following local sports, I developed a serious pet peeve: namely, sportswriters' obsession with the home-town team. By this I don't mean overcoverage — that, I love — but rather the apparently sincere belief of every last member of the local media that everything that happened on the field/court/ice was the product of their team. Win 6-0? Your ace shut the other guys down. Lose 6-0? Your guys couldn't get hits when it mattered.
In the world of sports writing, nothing ever happens to your team; local players always enact their will on opponents, for better or for worse. I'm bringing this up now, in the wake of the San Francisco Giants' 3-0 victory over the defending National League Champion Phillies, because today that logic is exactly correct.
Despite Giants' starter Matt Cain's gaudy line — 7 innings, 2 hits, no runs — he wasn't dominant. At all. The Phillies managed just eight balls out of the infield, including lazy flies, a bloop hit, and a grounder that went through. Through seven innings Cain had thrown 50 balls, and yet had only three walks â the Phillis OBP might have tripled if they had just kept the bats on their shoulders. This start wasn't about Big Daddy Cain, it was about the Phils' offense, and the fact that offense should start be seen as a real problem.
A lot of people around here (me included) have assumed the Phils will cruise to the World Series on the backs on pitching and defense. It may be true, but the assumption has blinded us to the fact that Phils' offense might not be world-class anymore. It's true. This year the Phils hit 58 fewer home runs than they did in 2009, and scored nearly 50 fewer runs. Worse, come money time, it has noticeably declined. So far this postseason the Phillies have had back-to-back hits once. I remember when it would be a problem if they had only had back-to-back homers once in two weeks. For the second season, the Phils are hitting .203 overall (though the Giants have the same batting average and a lower OPS) and just .141 when a runner gets on. I know the Giants' rotation is legitimate, but those numbers can't keep up.
Except, you know, they might. Chase has been on a steady decline since 2007; Ryan has battled but looks like he's up there to hit singles; Ibanez is getting dangerously close to turning those âRaaaauuullllllâ chants into actual boos; Jayson Werth is acting like he's focused on which AL East team he'll suit up for next year; and the Jimmy Rollins we see now is probably the Jimmy Rollins we're getting going forward. The majors' oldest roster is playing like a bunch of old men.
Look, I'm not backing off my prediction that the Phils win this series (or that they win in 6, the Giants scrap-heap offense makes the 2010 Phillies look like 2008 version), but right now the Phillies are swinging their bats like they need Mick Billmeyer to unsheath his binoculars. That has to change.
Notes from the game â¦
- Forget the made-up sports agent stats, that was a quality start Cole Hamels just threw
- Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe all of Ryan Howard's hits have been to left or left-center field. Kudos to the man for going with the pitches — lord know he's at his best when he's working the entire field — but Rube didn't give him $20 mil to be a mid-season Ibanez.
- Bad news Chase Utley, you're only allowed to do one of the following:
- (1) rock your cool-guy sunglasses flipped upside-down on the brim of your cap during a sunny day, or
- (2) botch ground balls. Choice is yours.
- The Giants lineup today and the Giants lineup opening day had just three of the same starters (Renteria, Rowand, & Huff) and no one in same spot in the lineup. The Phils? Exact same starting 8.
- Phils in 6. And relax about Blanton starting tomorrow, the bullpen is fully rested.
After an opening game that saw the Phillies K 13 times, leave 7 men on base, not get a single hit with runners in scoring position, and look generally sloppy and complacent, your hometown team appears to have righted the ship.
Led by the ViceRoy, Roy Oswalt, who looks like he's gunning for his second career NLCS MVP, the Phils came out sharp and assertive. They were patient at the plate, aggressive on the basepaths and the mound, and looked like the champions we're all assuming they'll be. Better for Phils fans, nothing about this game (fine, nothing but Jimmy's first hit) was a fluke. The Giants' error was the product of a determined running game, all the Phils runs were worked for, and this is the Oswalt you should expect to see.
In his start against the Reds, Oswalt seemed to dance and play with his opponents. His fastball was his best pitch, but he refused to stick with it, instead watching slider after slider get pounded by the Cincinnati offense. Last night? The exact opposite. Nearly 70 percent of his 111 pitches were either two- or four-seam fastballs, and most of the off-speed stuff he did throw came late. He kept it simple, made the Giants try and hit his heat — âhere, Andres Torres, get those 37 ½ ounces around on 93 up and awayâ — and dominated. Even Charlie followed his lead: The manager approaching the mound, talking to his second ace, and letting him finish the inning was a classic âour best beats your bestâ power move.
It is a move Manuel can pull because his best does beat Bruce Bochy's best. Watching these two teams play, it's hard not to believe that we're looking at a mismatch. More and more, this series is starting to shape up like last year's World Series — with the Phils as the Yankees. In both, the road team stole game 1 from a superior but unfocused opponent, and in both the road team was simply outmatched in game 2. It has become clear that if the Giants are going to beat the Phils, they're going to have to either play over their heads, or have the Phils play under theirs. What you saw tonight was two teams showing who they really are, and you saw who is better.
Onto the notes â¦
- Thought Oswalt was impressive before? Check out the strikezone he was working with. Not too many freebies there.
- For years we've all seen Chase as the prototypical #3 hitter, but unless his power comes back (and given all the nicks and bruises he takes, it might not) it may be the 2-hole that suits him best. Utley has a great eye that he isn't afraid to use, fantastic bat control and is as smart a baserunner as there is in the majors.
- I know the Zoo with Roy bandwagon is getting pretty crowded, but THIS is straight up brilliant. Check it out.
- Ryan Howard had himself a ballgame at the plate. He was disciplined, took good cuts, and didn't bail out once against a guy who has owned him before. All of that is good, because if he had looked bad against Sanchez you'd be reading about 14 different op-eds about how he let down the team by appearing at the Birds game in the afternoon. It was a stupid angle, and good on the Big Piece for putting it to bed.
- You can argue all day over whether Jimmy Rollins' big hit shows that he's back and ready to contribute, but what isn't debatable is how much fun he is to listen to when he's happy and confident.
- One warning in regards to Game Three: Throughout his career, Cole Hamels has been a significantly worse pitcher during the day than at night. My guess? It doesn't matter. Phils should win big.
This morning, almost assuredly, you're going to hear someone tell you about the meaning of last night's Phillies loss. You're going to hear about what last night's game âmeant.â
You may hear about how it shows that the Phils are susceptible to the Giants' pitching, or maybe how the win is going to let the Giants play loose. Maybe it will be about how the game shifted the momentum, definitively proved that the Phillies need to re-sign (or not re-sign) Jayson Werth, or about how now â as opposed to 24 hours before now â San Francisco believes it can win. Maybe it will be more meta: how the fact that suffering their first game one loss in their last eight tries is the signal for the decline of the franchise, or maybe you'll just hear about someone â the talker â knew they were going to lose all along. All of this will be wrong.
Here is, in a word, what last night's game means: nothing. Actually that isn't wholly correct: last night's game means that for one night an average outing from Giants' best weapon was slightly better than an average outing from the Phils' best weapon. That's it. Both teams played hard, neither made any game-changing decisions, no one was hurt. If they replayed it 10 times the Phils probably win six, which means that they would also probably lose four. This was one of those four.
So no, the Giants don't own the Phils, the Phils aren't in any serious trouble, nobody's backs are against any walls, your home team is still going to win the series, and it still isn't going to take them seven games to do it. They're a better team who, for one night, was outplayed by a worse team.
Sometimes a game is just a game.
Onto the Notes â¦
- You want something to be encouraged by? Look at the Phils' performance against the Giants' closer. The Phils made Brian
- Charlie Manuel is obviously a quote machine, and last night was no exception. Re: the Phils offense:
âYou know, I think, yeah, I think we need to hit better. We gotta hit better and we have to score more runs, of course.â
Of course. On how he's going to plan for Sanchez:
âGet more hits. Score more runs.â
I know I'm supposed to remain impartial about guys I'm covering ⦠but Charlie's fucking awesome.
- Tweeted this last night, but it's worth mentioning here as well: In four postseason go-rounds Jimmy has never hit over .237. He's at .067 in 2010.
- Playoff experience might not matter â I'd argue it does, but I at least understand the counterpoint â but playoff baseball is definitely a different ballgame. Managers manage differently, players push harder and the crowd actively tries to affect the outcome in a way they just don't for the first 162.
- Jesus Christ does Bruce Bochy have a dome on him. It isn't just the size (enormous, obviously) either, the thing looks like it's made out of concrete and carbon steel. It's like a Stonehenge block with eyes. If Bochy were born in a different era he would either be immediately hailed as a king, or the cavemen who slayed him and began using his head as a weapon would be able to wield it to rule all of Berrengia. Very impressive up close.
- For all the time and energy we spend worrying about personnel decisions, sports sure can throw us some curveballs. The two most important Giants players in last night's game â Pat Burrell and Cody Ross â both were picked up off the scrapheap.
- There was a lot of talk about the strike zone last night â congrats Derryl Cousins, you're famous â but per Brooks Baseball's fantastic site, it was at least consistent.
- Fun Derryl Cousins fact #1: Cousins was Jim Joyce's crew chief. Joyce is, of course, the Armando Galarraga game ump.
- Fun Derryl Cousins fact #2: That is actually how you spell his first name. It's ridiculous.
- More fun facts: When a relatively obscure player has a breakout game you'll often find out new and exciting information about him. Today's example? Cody Ross grew up wanting to be a Rodeo Clown.
- When the Phils first started making the playoffs, the grounds crews really stepped their game up with new and interesting designs in the grass. Now? Nothing. Almost makes me not want to buy Scotts Miracle-Gro.
- Finally, a selfish one: The baseball season is way too long. I'm writing these notes outside after the game and it has to be a million degrees below zero out here (update: After consulting the website google.com I've come to understand that the aforementioned number may be slightly inaccurate).
Back for game two tomorrow.
[...] NLCS Game 1: The Game is the GamePhiladelphia Citypaper (blog)Fun Derryl Cousins fact #2: that is actually how you spell his first name. It [...]
Coming into game one of the Phillies' annual appearance in the National League Championship Series, conventional wisdom seems to agree on two things
- We're destined for an epic, life-changing, game-one pitchers' duel, and
- The Phillies are winning this. Easily.
And while the contrarian in me wants to argue, nit-pick, and predict a second-inning Halladay/Lincecum collision that takes out both pitchers ⦠I kinda agree with both.
To the first point, the rarity of this matchup really can't be overstated. In Halladay and Lincecum we have the two best pitchers in the National League, the last two Cy Young winners (Everyone cool with assuming Roy takes home the hardware this year? Yes? Yes. Good) and the owners of two of the best pitches in the majors â per fangraphs and common sense, Doc has the best cutter, The Freak the best change. Better, coming off last week's everything-you-can-I-can-do-better pissing contest, they're both red hot. Out of the eight pitches they throw, only one â Linc's curve â isn't plus or plus-plus. Tonight's game is, on paper, without hyperbole, the best postseason pitching matchup you've ever seen. So yeah, the hype is legit.
Unfortunately for the Giants, the second part of that conventional wisdom appears correct as well: this one shouldn't be close. The Phils pitch, hit, run and defend better. Their manager is bigger in Japan, their fans are drunkee, and they have an extra game at home, where their advantage is greater. Madison Bumgarner might trump Joe Blanton, but with Kung Fu Panda held out of the Giants lineup for sucking, a coherent argument can be made that the Phillies have an advantage at every position, and each of the top three starters. The pitching matchup makes the series a must-watch, but the drama does not.
Of course, as Mo Udall once mused, âIf you can find something everyone agrees on, it's wrong.â Game on.
Notes from the pregame:
- The Phils lefties - Ryan Howard & Ibanez â spent a lot of their batting practice working the opposite field. Look for them to be intentionally late tonight.
- They put me outside in the aux box, where I have to weight down my notes with my computer cord, notebook, and voice recorder. It may have died down a bit by gametime, but rest assured, tonight's wind is going to be a factor tonight.
- Despite not making the NLCS roster Greg Dobbs was out early taking grounder after grounder at 3B. Doubt it'll matter, but thought you should know.
- Here is a fun fact: Ken Rosenthal is about 4'2â. He was interviewing Werth pregame and barely came up to the future-former-Phils' shoulder.
- I'm sure our local plethora of Phillies blogs have covered this one nearly to death ⦠but Brian Wilson's beard really is tremendous.
- Forget about Lincecum being a product of Candlestick (I call Pac-Bell Park âCandlestickâ, now and forever), he actually has slightly better splits on the road.
[...] NLCS Game One: Why Everyone Is Right About Everything :: The Clog … [...]
[...] NLCS Game One: Why Everyone Is Right About Everything :: The Clog … [...]
All but lost in last night's Cole Hamels domination/Reds sweeping/Oswalt troll-facing in the Phils NLDS-clinching 2-0 win was TBS announcer Brian Anderson using the most baffling idiom we'd ever heard. In the fourth inning, after Scott Rolen broke his 0-for-the series with a single, Anderson said:
"Rolen gets the skunk out of the box."
It is, honestly, a befuddling thing to say. Our drunken smartphone Googling produced unsatisfactory results, a bunch of stuff related to literally getting a skunk out of a humane trap. While I can imagine that finding oneself with a boxed skunk would indeed be an unpleasant situation, this struck me as far too on-the-nose an explanation for such a colorful euphemism. More extensive Google research today (adding quotes, expanding the search to "got the skunk out of the box") reveals that the saying gets heavy (but not exclusive, witness this account of the poor Lomira, Wis.,high school girls volleyball team whose victory over Omro was described as such by the Fond du Lac Reporter) usage on fishing message boards(!?). Which makes no sense to us (we don't fish).
Can anyone, anyone at all, help us with the etymology behind "got the skunk out of the box"? What on earth does it mean?
If "the box" is a desirable place to be, then presumably one would not want to share it with a skunk. In other words, the once the skunk is out of the box, it will still stink like a skunk but at least it can start to air out a bit. In other words, breaking the 0-for with a single won't fix Rolen's average, but at least he's not 0-for anymore. In fishing, maybe sportsmen use this idiom as a way to blame a faulty tacklebox for their lack of fish. Their bait, in other words, stinks. This is 100% conjecture.
i like your thinking, Ambiguator. I hadn't really considered that Rolen was in the box with the skunk. The "literature" such as it is on this and with regards to the humane traps suggests that a skunk cannot spray unless it's standing on its hind legs. However, a box that could accommodate both a skunk and a human would obviously be big enough for the skunk to stand and spray, making it indeed unpleasant for, in this case, Scott Rolen.
The fact that the phrase was used on fishing message boards made me think of my co-worker, call him Lyle, who dabbles in the semi-pro fishing circuit. He was away on his honeymoon during the series, but he returned to the office today and told me all about the phrase. According to Lyle, if you've been out in your boat for hours, it's getting late, and you haven't caught anything, you're, "getting skunked." A boat that is getting skunked can also be said to be, "flying a skunk flag." Clearly, nobody wants to get skunked. But, if at the end of a long, fishless day, you finally catch your first one, you have, "gotten the skunk out of the boat." You no longer have to worry about getting skunked - you can concentrate on just catching some fish. So, credit where it's due: TBS announcer Brian Anderson used the phrase well. As BH noted, Scott Rolen hadn't gotten a hit in the series before the at-bat in question, in which he finally got that elusive first hit. But, while the phrase was used appropriately, Anderson may have overestimated the percentage of the audience that would recognize the phrase. According to Lyle, the phrase is a fishing thing and kind of a southern thing. So, if you live in a place where the Civil War is referred to as something other than The War of Northern Aggression and you're not a serious fisherman, you probably didn't know what the hell Anderson was talking about, either. References: http://3.ly/C2tM http://3.ly/ws5V
This is my favorite skunk-related blogpost of all time.
[...] NLDS: About âÂÂgetting the skunk out of the boxâ :: The Clog :: Blog … In fishing, maybe sportsmen use this idiom as a way to blame a faulty tacklebox for their lack of fish. Their bait, in other words, stinks. This is 100% conjecture. by ambiguator on October 12th, 2010 at 11:36 am ÷ Reply To This Comment … Jan 01, 1970 12:00am [...]
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