Kuzul

Maybe it was poetic justice, or simply baseball justice, that the Phillies fought back to win a game for their ace tonight. After all, it was Labor Day Saturday, and the man often mispronounced as Roy “Doc” Holiday was clearly laboring tonight.

The Phillies offense picked up Halladay tonight, allowing him to notch his 17th victory in a season that he has pitched well enough to have already garnered 20—a milestone that he reached twice as a Toronto Blue Jay. Indeed, baseball justice was served in the 5-4 win that allowed the Phils to remain just one game back of the Atlanta Braves, who won a 2-0 pitchers’ duel versus Josh Johnson and the Florida Marlins.

The box score will tell the tale that Halladay, who had only yielded 17 homers in his first 28 starts, gave up four of them in just seven innings—a relatively short night’s stint for the workhorse. In fact, this was the first of Doc’s 316 career starts that he ever served up four gopher balls in one game.

The longballs came in pairs: two in the top of the second. One to beefy Prince Fielder (his 29th) and another to skinny Alcides Escobar (his fourth). The other pair were offered to the same guy, Corey Hart, who took Doc deep in the third and again in the seventh, forcing Halladay to the showers on the wrong end of a 4-3 score.

The silver lining in the cloud of homers was that all four were solo shots. Not to worry: The Brewers are an aggressive team that swings for the fences, and Halladay had one of those nights where he just could not find his spots. It did not help that home plate umpire Mike Estabrook was not giving any pitchers the corners, and the strong winds were gusting all night.

Offensively, the Phillies played a little “Brewers Ball” and a little, um, little ball in coming back to capture the victory in the bottom of the seventh—just in time to get the “W” for Halladay. They tied the game at 2-2 in the bottom of the second on back to back dingers by newly resurgent sluggers Ryan Howard and Jayson Werth.

If you’re keeping track of encouraging signs, that’s two home runs in the last three games for Howard (who always seems to heat up in September) and four in the last eleven contests for Werth, who is also regaining his power stroke. Chase Utley knocked in another run—nine rbi in his last four games—and Carlos “Chooch” Ruiz sprinkled in three more hits.

Having said all this, a case could be made that tonight’s hero was backup Wilson Valdez, who drew a walk in the bottom of the seventh to load the bases. After Rollins grounded out to third baseman McGahee who threw home to prevent the tying run, up stood Placido Polanco with the bases still loaded and one out.

Polanco lofted a fly to medium left field that Ryan Braun had time to set up and make a strong throw home. His throw was on line but not particularly strong and catcher Jonathan Lucroy seemed to want no part of a potential collision with Chooch who was motoring in from third. The throw skipped by the reluctant catcher, and Wilson Valdez kept on coming beating Lucroy’s lackluster tag off a throw from reliever Zach Braddock.

Valdez’ hustle would produce the final run, as the bullpen—featuring a rare one-two-three close by Brad Lidge—shut the door on the Brewers.

What does all this mean? The Phillies are at a season-high 20 games over .500, and pending results from the Left Coast, three-and-a-half games in front of the Giants for the wild card lead.

For Halladay, he won a game he night have lost and notched his 17th win with (most likely) five more starts in the regular season. Clearly, Doc would trade a 20-game season and a possible Cy Young Award for the opportunity to see the first postseason action of his illustrious career.

But why not take all three?  With the way the Phillies are starting to jell, and with the way Halladay usually controls opposing batters, is it unreasonable to predict 20 wins, a Cy Young award and a major part of an NL East title for the team ace?

On this Labor Day Halladay weekend, the above seems perfectly reasonable.

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With only one month left in the 162-game marathon that decides who makes the postseason, it’s time to examine and rank the starting pitchers that each of the National League contenders summon to the hill.

For our purposes, I have evaluated and ranked The Big Three (if you will) for each of the nine teams that are over .500 coming into September.

As baseball is a game of nines, nine teams qualified—even if I would not wager big money on the Dodgers or Marlins or the ever-befuddling Cardinals these days.

Why only The Big Three in these days of five-man rotations?  I’m glad you asked.

I’m thinking about this with the premise of each team making it to the postseason.  Although many teams still go with a four-man rotation in the playoffs, The Big Three of any team will pitch six out of seven games of any series that goes the distance.

In ranking The Big Three(s), I considered the pitchers 2010 statistics, their track record and their playoff history, or playoff cred.  I assigned each pitcher a score from 1-10, and posted a composite score for each three-man staff.

This is more art than science, and while assiduous research was done, no lab rats were injured in the process.

So, see where Halladay and Co.—-or your favorite team’s staff—-ranks, and then let the debates begin!

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Now, Cole Hamels can be considered the best 8-10 pitcher on the planet. 

After completing a masterful six-hit, no walk shutout on the road against his hometown Padres, the lanky lefty snapped his improbable eight-game winless streak to lead the Phillies to a 5-0 win.

Let the record show that the Phillies rode all of four hits—although two were homers by Mike Sweeney and Jayson Werth—to sweep the Padres, and keep pace with the Braves who staged a dramatic comeback against the Marlins.

Game accounts may also reflect that the Padres’ defense—and I use that term lightly—committed four errors in a performance that would have been booed in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

(In case you were wondering, Japan edged the youngsters from Waipahu Hawaii, 4-0 to take the Little League World Series.)

But, today’s game was all about Hamels, who notched his first win since July 11th. An examination of the box scores for those eight games shows that Hollywood could have, and should have, won five or six of those games.

If only…

One has to wonder if anyone else was singing the following baseball nursery rhyme to console young Cole during his personal ordeal:

Hollywood Cole was a tortured young soul
And a tortured young soul was he
He called for the ball, and he gave it his all
But the Phillies played crappily. 

Ditties aside, during those infamous eight starts, Hamels went from 7-7 to 7-10, with five no-decisions, yet the Phils did win four of those games.

A look inside the numbers will reveal that:

• Hamels pitched well enough to lower his season ERA from 3.78 to 3.47.
• After today’s masterpiece, his ERA is a tidy 3.31.
• In six of the eight starts, Cole pitched at least seven innings, and he yielded two or fewer runs five times.
• The flashiest gem of the bunch was the July 22nd game in St. Louis, when Hollywood gave up no runs—on one hit—in eight innings. For good measure, he struck out seven and walked only one. The Phils decided to score their only two runs after Hamels left, winning 2-0.

For the eight games as a whole—and these are numbers worthy of an eight-game winning streak— Hamels pitched a total of 54 innings (almost seven innings per start).

• The lefty gave up a total of 44 hits, leading to 17 earned runs, for a tiny ERA of 2.83.
• Oh yeah, he struck out 63 batters and walked 11.
• Any baseball fan will tell you that his k/bb ratio of 5.72 was ridiculously good.

Baseball has a way of evening things out over time, and Phillies fans must feel good about the future of their 2008 World Series hero, who has now overcome a forgotten 2009 campaign and this bizarro streak from Hades.

If the baseball gods were punishing Cole for his lack of maturity in the playoffs last year, one would hope that they will stop testing him.

Job had an easy life compared to the last seven weeks for Hamels (I know that Job’s salary was a little less, but work with me here).

And if the Phillies bats ever wake up and the big three of Halladay, Oswalt, and Hamels continue to resemble Maddux, Smoltz, and Glavine in their prime, can anyone blame Phillies Nation for dreaming about a third straight World Series appearance?

I can hear it now.

Cole and Doc and Roy Oswalt—no shock
Are as happy as they can be
The Fall Classic is back, and the Phils are on track
Thanks in large part to their Big Three.

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A great outing by Roy Oswalt, and a three-hit, two-run night for Jimmy Rollins highlighted the Phils’ 3-2 win over the Padres in a wild 12-inning affair at PETCO Park.

The win—combined with losses by the Giants and the Braves—left the Fightins two games behind the Braves in the NL East and a half game in front of the Giants in the wild card shuffle.  That’s the easy part. The hard part is putting this game, itself, into words and perspective as there were enough twists and turns to satiate the psyches of optimists and pessimists alike.

Encouraging News No. 1:  Oswalt was brilliant, yielding only six hits and no walks in eight innings.  He looked every bit the ace, and having thrown only 102 pitches—while retiring the last 13 Padres—one can easily make the case that he should’ve been out there in the bottom of the ninth.  More on that later.

More Good News: Rollins looked like the spark plug the Phils will need down the stretch to earn a playoff spot.  He took two pitches to start the game and then slapped a single into left.  He started a two-out rally of sorts with a seeing-eye hit up the middle in the third, and he pulled a double down the line to start the 12th, scoring with a great slide on Placido Polanco’s single.

One more:  Hanging Chad Durbin pitched a strong final two innings to earn the win. It wasn’t his fault that Oswalt wasn’t rewarded with a “W.”

Bad News No. 1: The offense looked flat again, and I daresay Latos-intolerant.  Okay, inspired puns aside, at least their inability to do much against a great young pitcher like Mat Latos can be somewhat justified.  The 22-year-old ace showed why he came into the game leading all pitchers in baseball in both WHIP (walks plus hits per innings pitched) and BAA (batting average against).  Of course, the Phils also looked completely overmatched against closer Heath Bell, who pitched two full (non-stressful) innings for the first time this season.

More Bad News:  Ryan Howard is struggling and maybe he’s saving it all for one of his patented huge Septembers.  Let’s hope so. He went 1-5 with a walk, but also struck out four more times (three of them looking), and left five men on base.

Open question:  Did both Utley and Howard return to the lineup too soon?

And Then, there’s Lidge:  One hates to beat up on such a good guy, but you had to feel for Oswalt when Lidge blew the game in surreal fashion for his erstwhile Astros buddy.

During the wild bottom of the ninth, Lidge threw 25 pitches, but it felt like 55.  Old friend Matt Stairs greeted him with a solid single to right before being replaced by the requisite pinch runner, Jerry Hairston. Pesky David Eckstein bunted Hairston over to second. Lidge appeared to panic, and bobbled the bunt but regained just enough composure to get the out at first.

Miguel Tejada—one of very few known quantities in the Padres anonymous lineup—grounded out to Polanco for the second out.  The fun was just beginning.  The Phils elected to walk the dangerous Adrian Gonzalez with the base open, and Lidge promptly crossed up Ruiz by almost throwing a strike on the first free toss.  Ruiz made a great catch, and there was no further drama on the next three lobs.

From here, it got downright preposterous.  Although many of Lights-on Lidge’s offerings did not have enough bite to chew oatmeal, he started Ryan Ludwick with two apparent strikes that the former Cardinal fouled weakly down the right field line.  Of course, with two outs and an 0-2 count, Lidge promptly hit Ludwick in the wrist with another fastball that tailed in. 

With the bases full, Lidge threw two balls to Chase Headley, then battled back to a 2-2 count before..are you ready…committing a balk that was so obvious that the Phillies did not emit a murmur of protest.  With the bases still full, Luis Durango (who should be fined for swinging at the first pitch) hit a grounder that almost ate up Ryan Howard at first.  But alas, the game went into extra innings.

Give the Phillies credit for keeping their heads and rallying to win a game that felt like a must-win on the heels of a humiliating four-game weep at home at the hands of the lowly Astros.  Perhaps, with 34 games left to play, they will regain their mojo and look once again like the best team in a flawed National League.

Whether they can do so with an inconsistent lineup that desperately needs Utley and Ryan to be themselves is questionable. 

And whether they can do so with a closer capable of  throwing away a great outing by Oswalt with a sequence of intentional base on balls (the first throw almost a wild pitch), hit batter, and balk is highly debatable.

These questions will get answered in the next month or so.  For now, Phillies fans can savor the end of their losing streak and life precariously atop the wild card standings.

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INTRO: THE BEST EVER CROP OF FIRST BASEMEN

As a bit of a stats geek (though I can’t quite hang with the elite), I’ve been amazed at how first basemen now dominate the offensive stats in both leagues. No other single position can boast close to the combined production of the first sackers. 

I wonder if any one position has ever so dominated the game.

Yes, the AL of the 1930s featured three Hall of Famers with seven MVPs between them—Jimmie Foxx, Lou Gehrig, and Hank Greenberg. 

The 1950s gave us Willie (Mays), Mickey (Mantle), and the Duke (Snider) lyrically mastering center field in New York.

But while there may not be a similar big three today, there are more than 10 first basemen this season who are absolutely tearing it up.

Let’s visit the top 10 MLB leaders in various offensive categories. HRs? Six out of 10 are first basemen. RBI: 5; BA: 3; Runs: 4; Slugging %: 5;  OPS: 5. If Justin Morneau weren’t on the shelf, you could probably add one for each of those categories too!

Here’s my premise: If I were picking a first baseman to anchor my infield next season, here are my picks—in ascending order. Find out where Ryan Howard and others rank, and let the debates begin!

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(Sports Irreverence from The Other Tip of the Goldberg)

All of us Phillies fans should have been happily dusting off our Whitey Ashburn impressions and laughing at the madcap turn of events of last night’s 16-inning bizarro thriller versus the Astros at Citizens Bank Park. Only, the game did not end happily—a 4-2 loss to a mediocre team at home is not my idea of a happy ending.

Now, there are only 37 games left to either catch the Braves or to hang on to our precarious wild card lead (now at .001 percentage points) over the Giants. So, now…

Many Phils fans might be channeling their disgust and dejection in Harry the K’s voice,after (the now-retired) Craig Biggio took Billy Wagner deep here in an ill-fated pennant race a few years back. They say you can watch a million baseball games and still see something new on the million-and-first, and who am I to disagree with that proverb? 

And, one day we’ll even laugh about this one. Is this the day?  In the meantime…

Let’s hope that Uncle Cholly can get us a better 16th inning cleanup hitter than Roy Oswalt.  Chase is struggling, and needs more protection than a career .158 hitter with (ready for this baseball geeks?) a .176 OBP, a .370 OPS, and an unheard of OPS-plus of minus-2. 

I got cut from my high school baseball team (still pissed about that, but) and my OPS-plus is two points higher than Oswalt’s.  On the plus side, Oswalt can flat out play left field, and I’m now struggling to make the long throw from third in a Jewish men’s softball league.

Looking at the remaining 37 games, I would keep Ibanez as the all-important fourth-string first baseman.  He made a great play in the 15th, beating Bourne to the bag—and the umps even called Bourne out this time. 

Yes, keep him behind Howard, Gload, and Sweeney on the depth chart, but don’t let any of those September call-ups drop him to fifth on the depth chart.  Can’t afford to entrust that key role to a rookie.

Polanco looked great starting that 5-4-3 double play.  The only problem  was that both runners were safe, and the winning run scored.  Seems like every 16-inning loss at home to the stinking Astros features one of those.  Just as every 16-inning loss at home to the stinking Astros  features:

• Ryan Howard going 0-7 with five K’s, five LOBs, and an ejection for thinking about murdering a replacement ump.  Howard’s awfully lucky that he has a rookie-of-the-year, an MVP, multiple All-Star appearances, and gazillion power stats under his belt, or I’d call for his release today.  Every 16-inning loss at home to the stinking Astros  is attributable to his choking—and his vicious temper.
• Can Hollywood Hamels please win a game for us?  Yes, his ERA is low, but we scored him a run this time.   No excuses; what does he expect? Can’t stand prosperity.

I repeat that, in time, we’ll all laugh about that crazy game that ended in the wee hours of August 25, 2010—if we make the playoffs, that is.  You know, if Oswalt were any good—and worth the millions that Houston left for us to pay him—he would have taken that Jeff Fulchino (What the Fulch?!) deep with a three-run jack to win this thing.

Should we have traded Happ for Fulchino instead?  Although he’s listed at a more-than-svelte 286 pounds, I’ve heard that’s deceiving. I’ve also heard that he plays a mean 18th-inning center field.

And can’t you just hear Harry the K—with those majestic, mellifluous pipes—saying, “And, a great shoestring catch by that Jeff Ful-chi-no.”  After chuckling, he’ll hand it off to his co-icon, Whitey, for the all-time Phillies rejoinder:

“Hard to believe, Harry.”

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