Posts Tagged ‘Philadelphia Phillies’
I try not to use photos that I don't have permission to use but when I saw this photo of Jose Lima I thought it was the perfect way to remember him. Photo taken in Spring Training in 2005 by Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images (and used without permission)
Well we, apparently, had nothing to fear from Roy Halladay yesterday but Tim Wakefield left the Phillies shaking. Wasn’t that nice?
The pitching matchups for the entire weekend gave most Red Sox fans pause when looking at them on paper. John Lackey, well let’s not talk about him right now. Both Daisuke Matsuzaka and Wake far exceeded most expectations. I’m sure the Phillies are still shaking their heads wondering what the hell happened. But it wasn’t all just pitching. On Sunday, Pedroia, Hermida and Wake were the only starters without a hit and Ellsbury and Scutaro were the only ones without multiple hits. The hitters attacked Halladay and Wake went after the Phils. It was a nice way to spend a Sunday that was topped off with the Mets winning THEIR series against the Yankees- on national television no less.
So right now the Red Sox are 2.5 games behind the Yankees (and a game and a half behind the Blue Jays…a Toronto win couple with a Yankees loss pushes the Yankees to third place). I bring up the Yankees because I believe in small steps. Get settled into second place and the worry about the rest. Right now, getting settled into second place doesn’t seem so impossible to do.
The one bit of sad news we got Sunday was that Jose Lima died from a “massive” heart attack at the age of 37. I know that people tend to speak well of the dead only once they’re gone but from the things I’ve read online from his past teammates and others who have worked with him, it seems like there were a lot of people who just genuinely liked Jose and I’m so sorry for them and for Lima’s family today. It is never a good time to lose someone you love but as someone who has passed that age, 37 seems mind-shatteringly young. So heartfelt thoughts and prayers to all of those mourning the loss of Lima Time. Ben Shpigel of the New York Times wrote, what I think, is a truly beautiful tribute to the man which briefly remembers Geremi Gonzalez as well.
No day off for the Sox…tonight they’re at the Trop where Clay Buchholz goes up against Wade Davis at 7:10. Let the winning streak continue!
Mike Cameron gets another start in Portland today. Come back soon, Mike! Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.
I started with a couple of tweets just before the game began last night, and as it began I had to go offline for a while. Come around the fourth inning and I decide to go online when I realized that Daisuke Matsuzaka hadn’t given up a hit yet. That’s when I made the decision to keep doing what I was doing and not go online. Why mess with the mojo? 
It was about the 7th inning that I got this nagging feeling that he wouldn’t get his no-hitter. Something just didn’t feel right (and none of that was his pitching or the defense behind him). Maybe it was being in Philadelphia? Or that the national broadcasters were calling the game not our Jerry and Don? Whatever it was, when he lost the no-hit bid in the 8th, I was still disappointed but also still so proud. Over the past four games, three of our pitches threw 8 complete innings. For any team this is great but it’s especially important and impressive for the way the Red Sox pitching staff has been going. Daisuke, someone who gets the wrath of many Red Sox fans and is the topic of many nasty emails sent my way from opposing fans, really came through and showed everyone what he was capable of. He might not have gotten his no-hitter, just yet, but he definitely made folks in and around MLB stand up and take notice.
I had a discussion online not too long ago with someone who said that the Sox got hosed when the picked up Daisuke and he wasn’t worth his money. When I countered that, in my opinion, his first two seasons alone with the Sox were definitely worth the money (one of those seasons was the championship 2007 season and the other was 2008 when he had 18 wins), the person still disagreed with me. I’ll say it again, in terms of “baseball” money (read: money I don’t have and can pretend to spend any way I like) and for what he has contributed, I still think Daisuke was worth it. Doesn’t mean that I don’t sometimes get fits when he’s on the mound, but I think the fits, at times, can defitely be worth it as well to see the end result. Injured in 2009 and off to a late start in 2010 – we still haven’t seen everything he’ capable of. Also, he pitched this one-hit game against possibly the best hitting team in baseball. That is pretty damned impressive, no?
Also, props need to go to all the defense last night, but especially David Ortiz if for no other reason than he made a couple of really good plays that finally got the Fox broadcasters to shut up about how he was going to fail at first because he never plays the position.
With Josh Beckett on the dl, today Tim Wakefield pitches the rubber game against Roy Halladay at 1:35pm. Both NESN and TBS are carrying the game because TBS, unlike Fox, doesn’t screw up everyone else’s baseball viewing pleasure just for their own greedy selves. Last night was a travesty in that there were actually people in MASSACHUSETTS who couldn’t watch the Sox play because their local Fox station decided to show the Mets/Yanks game. Absolutely ridiculous Fox. Good God when is that horrendous contract over?
Some folks have been using the new message board to in-game chat either in threads or in the built-in chat room so go on over if you’re so inclined! Tuesday night live chats (and at some point maybe more) will still be held here – can’t mess with that magic yet!
Jonathan Van Every was designated for assignment to bring back Jacoby Ellsbury. While I'm thrilled that Jacoby is back, I'm sad for JVE. I hope he clears waivers and ends up back with the organization. Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.
If Papi had hit that grand slam last night I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to speak today.
But he didn’t. And the Sox lost 5-1 in their first interleague game of the season and I’m, oddly, not really troubled by that.
I AM troubled by John Lackey. I was thrilled when the Sox signed him and I don’t think his troubles right now are a true indication that the signing was bad but he is struggling and it’s almost John Smoltz-like painful to watch. I don’t know what’s wrong, don’t know if he knows what’s wrong, but it needs to be fixed fast. To see two of our pitchers go into the ninth inning and then watch Lackey hit 107 pitches in five innings is like being in a speeding car that suddenly smashes into a brick wall. And I don’t want to spend the rest of the season speeding along and hitting that brick wall every time he pitches.
Instead of Saturday afternoon baseball, because MLB thinks we really don’t enjoy that, we get 7:10pm baseball – on Fox. Lovely. I’m thinking tonight is one of those nights when the volume goes off and the radio goes on (although with the subway series in New York there is a good chance we don’t get McCarver and Buck – there’s always hope!). And at least now we all get to go out and enjoy the beautiful day without concerning ourselves with baseball for a little while.
Daisuke Matsuzaka takes the mound tonight. If he’s having a bad game every other game…we get a good one tonight, yes?
He's coming back soon!!!! (Photo taken by Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net on Monday in Pawtucket and used with permission)
(Feeling a little bit rambly today!)
So a week ago who would have thought two of our starting pitchers would go into the ninth inning? This week we had two of them do it and Lester got himself a complete game in the process. The sun shines a little brighter after a game like that.
You know what’s nice? I have, a bit unconsciously, stopped reading the sports sections at boston.com and bostonherald.com. Every so often something sneaks through when either someone sends me a link to a story or I happen upon one while glancing at a paper, but for the most part I really haven’t been reading them. It gives a whole new feeling to the fandom. Unfortunately, with Twitter and Facebook it’s impossible to totally ignore all of it (and it IS good to keep on top of the current events of the team). I don’t need the media to tell me Papi was struggling or that fans weren’t happy – I saw the games and heard the boos, but I did find Papi’s comments on “The Big Show” encouraging in that he seems to get those boos came from a cranky minority:
After all that you’ve done for the fans since 2003, how do you react to fans who abandoned you during your slumps this year and last year?
It’s not the fans. It’s not the fans that come out with that. It’s the media. It’s the media that’s the one that thinks they’ve got everything figured out. You’ve got guys sitting down out there that have never played the game ever before, talking about how they think I’m supposed to leave, that you are done, that you can’t hit any more, that you can do this or you can do that. You never hit before in your life ever. You know nothing about that. … I’m right here, working hard, doing my thing. I’m not paying attention to any of their crap anymore.
There were plenty of boo birds at the park this year when Papi was struggling. His quote here, though, tells me that he gets it. That he knows there are more people behind him, supporting him, than there were idiots at the ballpark.
On a side note, Papi mentions “The Laser Show” as well. Click the link. It’s worth checking out.
In 2005, I took a road trip with a friend to Philadelphia to catch a weekend series between the Sox and the Phillies. I remember our being heckled by Phillies fans at the hotel, telling us we were going to get swept. I also remember thinking, after the Sox won the first game, “Okay, they won one. At least we got one out of it.” and then after they won the second game my friend said “Okay, they won two…it doesn’t matter what happens on Sunday as long as we get an exciting game”. The Sox swept. There was no better way to spend a weekend in an opposing park. (And we got our exciting Sunday game. The scores, up to that point, were 8-0 and 7-1, Sunday’s score was 12-8!) That weekend the pitching matchups were Tim Wakefield/Jon Leiber, Matt Clement/Vicente Padilla and David Wells/Brett Myers.
Any time the Sox play in Philly, the weekend trip comes back to me and I hope that this weekend will be as fabulous as that one was – even though I won’t be in Philadelphia to enjoy it.
Pitching matchups this weekend are John Lackey/Cole Hamels, Daisuke Matsuzaka/Kyle Kendrick and (dun dun DUN!) Tim Wakefield/Roy Halladay. The Sox are riding high right now but the Phillies…well the Phillies are damn good. But the Sox just took 3 out of 4 against two damn good teams so, really, I have a good feeling here even if the pitching matchups make me a little twitchy.
For those interested, there is a message board up here. You sign up, get approval and voila, you’re in. There are some guidelines and trolling is strictly prohibited but come and join us if you’re up for it. I keep saying this is an experiment and I’m not sure how long it will last (I think it depends on you all and how much we all like doing it) but given the responses I received, I thought it was worth a shot.
7:05pm it starts…interleague play. Whoopee. Seriously, my biggest hope for the weekend is that our pitchers all come out of it uninjured.
Tim Wakefield (with Scott Schoeneweis) can finish off the series with a sweep! Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.
Maybe the Blue Jays are just cranky about their own front office selling them out and giving the Phillies three home games in June that should have been theirs?
Before I gloat about last night’s game, honestly, could they have found a worse way to screw their fans and their team? I’m sorry but the fact that they’ll use American League rules and that statistically the games will be considered Toronto home games does NOTHING to change the fact that 1) they’ll be playing in front of a Phillies fan base instead of their own and 2) the Jays fans get hosed out of being able to welcome Roy Halladay back. (Also, the team hosed the fans AGAIN but not giving them refunds but VOUCHERS for another game. This isn’t like a rain out. THEY made the decision to move the game and the fans shouldn’t have to be penalized for it.)
Photo of Cole Hamels taken by Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.
Well last night was pleasant enough, eh? Seeing Burnett leave before even getting three innings under his belt was sweet but seeing Chase Utley tie Reggie Jackson’s World Series home run record was sweeter. All Utley has to do is hit another home run before this series is over and we can say goodbye to “Mr October”. I approve greatly of this.
EDIT: Well, I have to take back the whole Brett Myers being an asshole rant since the story is coming out that it didn’t happen. Of course that could be spin so’s not to make Myers look like the ass I believe him to be (regardless of whether the confrontation happened)…oh well. It was fun typing out “Brett Myers is an asshole” a few times, anyway!
In spite of the assholiness of Myers, I’m still holding out hope that the Phillies can pull out two more wins. They need to just take them one game at a time and focus on the game at hand, right? No getting ahead of yourself and thinking about game 7. Game 6, with Pedro pitching again at Yankee Stadium against a short-rested Andy Pettitte is quite enough to focus on right now.
I know it’s a long shot but I still think they can do it. And, because baseball keeps pulling me back in, I’ll definitely be watching tomorrow night!
