Jimmy Mack, Are You Coming Back?

Holiday shopping's in premature full swing again this year, and every mom out there's setting up camp for an All-Star shortstop. It makes you wonder. Who will be getting a 32-year-old Jimmy Rollins come winter? The Giants? The Cards? The Brewers? Can you picture J-Roll going into "beast mode"? Me neither. What about the Phillies? Unless Uncle Ruben takes a second job wrapping gifts this holiday season, chances are that Jimmy's not going to get that five-year contract he has his heart set on. If only regifting Ryan Howard was a viable option! After all, National Regifting Day is just 23 short days away.

What will Ruben Amaro do? The man's full of surprises. I didn't expect Cliff Lee to return to Philadelphia within a year of leaving or for Hunter Pence to be chilling on a dirt road anywhere outside of Texas right now. I also didn't expect Madson to be traded for a slightly more expensive Irish step dancer that refers to himself as Cinco Ocho. Okay, okay. Maybe I'm just drinking the Haterade which, thankfully, is what Papelbon's alter ego "fuels his engines with", or maybe I just hate change. Heck! I don't know what I want. The only thing that's really certain is how it's hard to picture Jimmy Rollins playing short anywhere else, and almost impossible to imagine who would replace him.

What The Ph?!!

Too heartbroken to blog: that's how I've been feeling since Friday night. It's taken days just to start thinking about it. Who would've thought it could end this way? Who would've thought that a team like this—once favorites to win the 2011 World Series—would be knocked out in the first round of the playoffs? I'll tell you who: any Philadelphia sports fan. Given Philadelphians' congenital penchant for pessimism in regard to all things (but especially sports), the Phils' steady regression since their magical 2008 championship season (lost the 2009 World Series, 2010 NLCS, and now 2011 NLDS), and the true meaning of "homefield advantage" in division series that go five games (here's a hint: the home teams usually lose), I doubt most of Philly was all that surprised. But that doesn't mean our hearts didn't break.

So what the Ph happened?!! Cliff Lee and Roy Oswalt couldn't get it done. Our bullpen (with the exception of Ryan Madson and maybe Brad Lidge) was revealed for the farce it was. After getting our hopes up that his postseason power had returned, Ryan Howard assured us we were mistaken, then ended the season in, quite literally, a crumbled heap. The squirrels of St. Louis put a curse on our bats. Someone really needs to tell the Phillies that there's no honor in playing hurt when "playing hurt" means grounding out to shortstop four times (cough cough, Placido Polanco).

Most of all, Tony La Russa and his hair solidly out-managed Charlie Manuel and his gut. Charlie played game five like he had plenty of time to spare; the Cardinals played every inning like it was their last. Charlie continued to let aging, aching players make fools of themselves at the plate while John Mayberry Jr. stood in the dugout, looking like he was about to burst into tears. As much as we love Charlie, I have to admit it would've been satisfying to wake up Saturday morning and hear he'd been fired.

The four aces may have carried this team to the best record in franchise history, but they couldn't win us a best-of-five series against the hot-hitting, Phillie-killing Cardinals. (Especially when our own pathetic offense couldn't manage to score any runs.) I can't help but think: what if we could just go back in time and lose the last game of the season to Atlanta? Did we do this to ourselves? Did we break our own hearts? And why are we going to do it again next year?


Maybe the postseason—at least in its current structure—is just a bad gauge of the actual abilities of a baseball team. Our 102 wins should be able to speak for themselves. Not that telling ourselves that is going to make our hearts any less broken.

Chin on the Ground? Gettin' Low? Back to the Wall? Feelin' Bad?

Dear Philadelphia,

Pick your head up. Friday's just around the corner. Game 5 with Doc on the mound- you know, the one in which Doc saves the season. How's that for a storybook ending before a storybook ending before a storybook ending? We have our dreams!

Let's come out swinging. Let's go out swinging too. Pray for no squirrels and more baseball.

High apple pie in the sky hopes,

Lauren and Nadine

Lance Berkman Totally Looks Like Shrek

Of all the things I'm sick of already about the St. Louis Cardinals (Tony La Russa, cheerleaders, Albert Pujols...), I'm mostly sick of looking at Lance Berkman's face. Let's hope Roy O and the Phillies send this troll back to his swamp tonight! Game starts at 6:00 EDT.

I Leave My Heart To Ben Francisco

It's bound to go by the end of this series if you keep this up, Fightins. Thank you, Ben, for coming through with RISP and for not being Ross Gload in the top of the seventh. Thank you, Cole, for bringing your game face. Thank you, Mad Dog, for finally getting Ryan Theriot to ground out to end the ninth. I'm halfway to a heart condition and it's only round one. This tune probably best describes the strange trip the Phillies took me on in the last three innings of their nail biting 3-2 victory over the Cards:

What a game! What a birthday present for Tony LaRussa. Let's just hope that it won't be Charlie's turn to cry anytime soon. Some dude in a bar probably said it best when he said, "October? That's when the whole city will start inhaling and exhaling together."

It's time to exhale. Have a beer. Put on some Hall and Oates. Whatever works. We've got an important game to win tomorrow.

World Series Or Bust

102 wins in a season, a new franchise record. 646 wins by a manager, another new franchise record. Roy Halladay. Cole Hamels. Clifton Phifer Lee. Clifton Phifer Lee's June and August. The Hunter Pence trade. Wilson Valdez doing his best Babe Ruth imitation. Chase Utley's inside-the-park home run. In/glorious Antonio Bastardo. "Let's go eat." USA chants. This. Three all-star starting pitchers. Vance "The Vanimal" Worley for Rookie of the Year. John Mayberry Jr.'s walk-off in game one. Everybody gettin' 'dricked. "Free Shane." Setting the 2011 MLB attendance record. Five-time National League East champions. The best team in baseball. The best fans in baseball. Now, onward to the postseason. World Series or bust, right? Right.

Share your favorite regular season moments and postseason predictions in the comments.

Is That All There Is?

What a long, uncomfortable trip September's been. The Astros. The Cardinals. The Nationals. Outside of clinching the NL East, sealing the deal with Raul's nice-a grand salami, it's been a rough couple of weeks. The Phils dropped their sixth straight and final home game of the season last night to the Nats. They were only able to put a couple of Choochers on the board as the Natty bros broke out the brooms. I know that the Phillies are the best and all, but to quote Charlie Manual quoting Ric Flair, "to be the best you gotta beat the best," which has the built in assumption that you've already beaten the worst. To win against either, you need things like offense, hitting the ball with runners on base, as well as defense, which is the opposite of letting balls roll through your legs, overthrowing third base when's it's a close game, and colliding with fellow teammates and Polish sausages. The Phils even made LA channel his inner Harry Doyle this week as he muttered, "Is this season ever going to end?" on air during Tuesday's day game against the Nationals.


I know, I know. Don't freak out. Charlie hasn't jumped off the Walt Whitman just yet. These games don't mean anything. Better now than later. If we had our regular lineup in, everything would be different. Wait, what? It's not just Bowker and Kratz? The A-Team's not really doing much? Well, who cares? They'll get it back. Wait until the postseason. Yeah, we'll get 'em then. It's only gonna get funner. It has to get funner. I can't wait to go paradin'.

Well, I'm still freaking out. It's just too close to the postseason not to think about what happened to the Phillies last year. I think about it every time runners are on the corners and nothing happens, every time there are two hits on the board, and every time that third strike is called. It's just all too familiar. If we lose to the Muts tonight, I don't even know what!

I just hope we'll be hungry enough to go eat again once this terrible hangover's over. Hey, the Indians won at the end of Major League. They didn't start off their season as the best team in the baseball, but you have to admit that there are a lot of striking similarities to the Phillies of the past two weeks. That is, if you have been listening or watching at all.

Feel free to get it all out in the comments.

Radio, Radio

Click on Uncle Wip for
a history of 610 WIP

On my drive into work this morning, I was startled by a loud and crystal clear Angelo Cataldi screaming at me through the FM dial. What followed was a cheesy sound collage, mixing clips of Vance Worley striking out Braves with Survivor's "Eye of the Tiger." Rookie Vance Worley strikes out Chipper Jones looking! and Bump... Bump! Bump! Bump! It's the eye of the tiger. While Angelo's raspy voice and Rocky-inspired montages of the Phillies beating the Braves normally make sense with my first cup of coffee, something was missing. Where was the glorious crackling of that AM static?

610 WIP made the move over to the 94.1 FM the day after Labor Day, replacing classic rock station 94 WYSP with sports talk radio 94 WIP, trading the annoying Danny Bonaduce for the annoying Angelo Cataldi. While it's undeniably awesome that WIP's expanding its reach to a bigger and younger audience, I'm glad that it still has a place on the AM dial for old souls like myself. "This just isn't right," my boyfriend turned to me and said as we listened to people call into the soundless void, applauding Vance Worley's greatness. (He is pretty great, now 11-1 after leading the Phillies to their 14th consecutive win with him on the mound last night.)

After switching back and forth between 94 WIP and 610 WIP about ten times, I eventually settled on the imperfect static that was there with me the night the Phillies won the World Series and the morning Cliff Lee was signed. Call me old fashioned, but there's just something comforting about that static.

Tropical Storm Lee to put a damper on Labor Day for Atlanta

It hasn't been the best weekend for the Phils in rainy Florida. Back in April when Greg Dobbs pinch-blogged "Can the Phillies win without Greg Dobbs?", urging the Phillies to get the old band back together, maybe he had this weekend's series in mind. While Greg Dobbs has, in fact, put up pretty good numbers against the Phillies this weekend and this year, homering against Herndon to seal the deal Saturday night and going 0.371 vs. the Phillies and 0.500 vs. Halladay, yesterday's loss cannot be blamed on Greg Dobbs.

That is, unless Greg Dobbs strategically planted those Phillies "fans" in the bleacher seats to interfere with Hunter Pence's hit in the sixth out of spite. Potential double, home run, or caught ball, we'll never really know how yesterday's 14 inning marathon would have ended due to a couple of ignorant fans that reached over into Bryan Peterson's glove. Wasn't that one fan aware of the rule that says that if you choose to use your cap, protector, pocket, or any other part of your uniform, it is not a catch anyway? How about the rule that says you shouldn't interfere with baseball because it might later cause your team to lose by walking a batter with the bases loaded in the 14th? The only marathon that I was more pissed watching while stuck to a couch was the final season of the Sopranos. It produced a similar reaction of "WTF!?!??! Is there something wrong with my television? Seriously? That's it."

I doubt that the Phillies' protest will take back yesterday's loss, but don't stop believing, folks. Plus, we've got another game today and I've read more than once that Tropical Storm Lee is set to put a damper on Labor Day for Atlanta. While he has posted his worst numbers against the Braves this year, 1-3 with a 4.98 ERA, keep in mind that Sir Clifton's coming out of a 5-0 August with a 0.45 ERA, some hits, and a couple of RBIs. He's a true Renaissance man. Let's just hope that today's weather report is right for once.

Replace "El Nino" with "Cliff Lee" and tropical storms with "baseball players", and it all makes sense. The magic number's 18. The Phillies are a comfortable 7.5 games ahead of the Braves. Lee has a chance to make those numbers even better at CBP tonight by bringing all tomahawk chops to a halt as he goes for his 16th win and 200th K.

The War of the Broses

The magic number is 22. With an 86-46 record and just 31 games to go, that eight ball that J-Roll shook up that read, "Yeah, we'll win 100 games," back in March might have been right. Another number that's worth calculating at this point is the probability that the Phillies will make it past win 101, the most wins the Phillies have ever had in a season. They reached 101 in 1976 and again in 1977. While the fat lady isn't singing yet, if she was, she'd probably be singing this right now. To the most lovable bros in all of baseball:

Speaking of lovable bros, Vance Worley is probably rolling out of bed right now to take the mound at 12:35 PM. As I recently learned over at the700level, he stays awake until the sun comes up the night before he pitches and sleeps until game time. He even snored through that rare earthquake that shook the entire east coast last week because he had to beat the Mets later. Another thing I learned about the Vanimal recently is that he's been cooped up in some hotel since he joined the big leagues. Who knows? Maybe his strange sleep patterns are actually due to watching Prince's "Purple Rain" so many times on the hotel TV that his life mantra has become that message that appears after the credits roll: May u live 2 see the dawn. Just a theory.

Whether or not he worships in the house of Prince, Vance still needs a place to kick it. I think I've found him the perfect spot- that is, as long as he can pass the drinking tryouts:


On second thought, this pad could be the perfect home for a lot of Phillies bros. The term "fratting hard" brings Michael Stutes to mind as he's been recently donning that pink boa and backpack full of goodies for the bullpen, while "hot chicks" brings Kyle Kendrick's inexplicably hot wife to mind. Plus, bromances, defined on Wikipedia as "a form of homosocial intimacy," have basically fueled this team to its current position in the standings. Just think about it: Rollins and Howard, Utley and Howard, Utley and Pence, Lee and Pence, the Let's Go Eat T-Shirt and Pence, and the greatest bromance of all time, Halladay and Chooch. The options are endless!

Let's just hope that 9-1 Vance Worley continues to "kill it at life" today, bringing us one step closer to a division title and upping the odds for Worley Goggles and Mohawk Night at the Ballpark becoming a thing.

Yeah, bro.