Back in Baby's Arms

Remember Chase "World Fucking Champions" Utley? Tonight, Chase makes his season debut after a long recovery from patellar tendinitis in his right knee. Maybe the Red Death is finally over. Bring on the hitting renaissance!

Chase will be batting second in the lineup against the Reds who, like half of the National League, have been outslugging the Phillies since April. Had Chase been out much longer, he could have been elected to play in the MLB All-Star Game without ever playing in a regular season game. This actually wouldn't have been that strange considering that a dead man was elected mayor of a Tennessee town last year and Frank Rizzo almost ran as a write-in candidate for mayor of Philadelphia last week.

Like most fans, I can't wait to hear the crack of Chase Utley's bat after Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir" blasts through CBP's speakers again. However, this little diddy might be just as appropriate entrance music for Chutley's return:

He's back where he belongs, back in baby's arms.

Sweet, Sweet Fantasy, Baby

Happy Opening Day! Or, as my friend Rob put it, the only day this season when the New York Mets will be tied for first! For some of us (the city of Philadelphia, me, other people who are in love with Cliff Lee), the excitement of baseball season started with a bang way back in December. Even before spring training began, the fantasy of what the 2011 season would hold was so sweet. Now Opening Day itself feels rather anticlimactic. What are you doing to get yourself in the mood?

2011 marks the first season that I will be participating in a fantasy baseball league. I drafted my team (newly christened "The Sunnydale Razorbacks") last night and am proud to report I have one Fightin' Phil. And it's Joe Blanton! Don't make me sad, Joe. :(=

On that note, I wonder if I should try to invent a Sad Chase Utley emoticon as well. Is there a way to draw a sad little blue bench under a sad face?

Poor Chase. Left unpicked through round after round, until finally you were auto-drafted by someone who didn't even want you. Poor Chase. I can't possibly imagine your life without baseball in it. Poor Chase. I hope your wife didn't really cheat on you with Jayson Werth. Poor Chase. Did you have a good relationship with your father? Me neither. Poor Chase Utley. Is second base cursed?

With the first real game of the season just one day away, let's hope that the 2011 Phillies have avoided all curses: Sports Illustrated cover-related, William Penn-related, and otherwise. And let's all hope that my Sunnydale Razorbacks have far fewer fatalities than The Sunnydale Razorbacks.

The Red Death

Patella tendinitis. Biceps tendinitis. Fractured hamate bones. Overextended elbows. Oh, how the mighty are falling.

Chase Utley's sidelined "indefinitely", Lights Out Lidge's arm went out, and Placido Polanco hurt his elbow swinging a bat in yesterday's win against the Toronto Blue Jays. This is looking all too familiar to the injury plague of 2010. Now that the oldest team in baseball has tacked on another year, it's just a matter of time before more hips and backs are thrown out. Even young and once hopeful prospect Domonic Brown hurt his wrist in his first spring training hit against the Pittsburgh Pirates, a team that makes money off of losing. The season hasn't even started yet, and the Red Death seems inevitable.

At least Life Alert, the "I've fallen and I can't get up!" company, might have found itself a valuable new market in the 2011 Phillies:

All Philadelphia Phillies should have Life Alert.

On second thought, maybe there needs to be a system in place that contacts Phillies fans every time a player gets injured - you know, to keep us all grounded.