Finger Food

Phillies, Braves on a collision course

The silly, old adage with Major League Baseball is, “it’s a marathon,” and as a veteran of 14 competitive marathons (not bragging or anything), I would call the 162-game baseball season with its spring training and month long playoffs, the much more grueling sport to play and cover. For a good marathon a person is investing three to four months of focused training and then two-and-a-half to three hours of running on race day.

Plus, when broken down, running is just moving forward… one foot after the other. It's kind of simple when looked at that way.

Baseball is like that, too, only the training period never really ends. Sure, a lot of ballplayers will try to rest up during the month of November, but typically start working out for spring training and the season around Thanksgiving. Not including all the games, the travel, the sitting around and waiting and all of the late nights and early mornings, the self-respecting ballplayer and ballscribe look as if they have been put through a meat grinder when the playoffs roll around. Considering all the bad flights, bad food, lousy sleep patterns and no true semblance of a “real” life while friends and family are off enjoying the summer and vacations, the baseball lifers earn all those Marriott points they rack up during the season.

Respect? Well, someday… someday.

Nevertheless, over a 162-game season it often gets tough digging up a story idea. Sure, the news of the day always prevails, but with so much competition and so many different people disseminating it, a fresh angle is always the goal. So the search for an obtuse or acute angle brought us to the second game of Monday’s day-night doubleheader[1] led a lot of us to the same spot…

The race for the NL East is going to come down to that last weekend of the season in Atlanta.

Hey, it was a long day. Besides, sometimes the best story is the most obvious one. Other times it’s best to give credit to the schedule makers. After all, the past few years the Phillies had a way of wrapping up the season at home against Washington or Florida with a few days to rest the team’s big guns. In fact, last year, the Phillies had things sewn up with four games remaining in the season to reinforce the accepted fact that there is nothing worse than meaningless September baseball.

Obviously, the converse of that is also fact. There is nothing in sports more exciting than meaningful September and October baseball and it appears as if the Phillies and Braves are headed for a collision course.

“If I had my way we’d get a lead and be four up with three to play before we went in there,” manager Charlie Manuel said. “I don’t know, but it’s kind of traveling that way. It’s like a hurricane they’re predicting to go up the coast with the track it’s going to take.”

Yes, two hurricanes headed for the same spot at the same time. Meteorologists say this can’t happen in nature, but it seems as if the Phillies are resigned to let it happen. At least that’s the conventional wisdom. Publically, however, the ballplayers are still in the play-them-one-game-at-a-time mode. That makes sense considering the Phillies are at the most crucial stage of the marathon, well past the point where glycogen stores are depleted and the dreaded “wall” is staring them right in the face.

With a clubhouse full of seasoned, playoff veterans, the Phillies aren’t sizing up the Braves and calculating how it will go down during the final weekend of the season.

“Let’s not look too far ahead,” Shane Victorino said. “We’ll just keep playing. We worry about ourselves. We’re not worried about what [the Braves] are doing. We control our own destiny. We’ve got to go out there and play our baseball.”

Logically, Victorino is correct. If the Phillies keep winning ballgames a trip to the playoffs for a fourth season in a row is a virtual lock. The numbers crunchers at Baseball Prospectus put the odds for the Phillies to win the east at 29 percent, the wild card at 40 percent and a berth at the playoffs at 68 percent. Interestingly, the BP formula has the Phillies going 11-12 the rest of the way and a match up against the Cincinnati Reds in the NLDS with the Braves pared with the winner of the NL West.

Still, like in any marathon a mile in the beginning of the race logically carries the same importance as the last miles. But we know better. So too do they Phillies and every other ballclub in Major League Baseball. The example I like to cite is the end of the 1982 season where the Milwaukee Brewers went to Baltimore for four games in the final three days of the season. The Brewers needed one win to clinch the division, while the Orioles had to sweep all four to complete the improbable comeback to win the AL East.

The Orioles cruised in Friday night’s opener, 8-3, highlighted by a three-hit game from Rich Dauer and 2 2/3 of one-hit relief from closer Tippy Martinez. Storm Davis tossed a gem in Saturday’s first game as the Orioles rolled 7-1 and swept the doubleheader with 18 hits in an 11-3 laugher.

So with the season coming down to one final game on the last Sunday of the regular season, and aces Jim Palmer and Don Sutton on the mound, the Brewers regrouped to clinch the East with a 10-3 victory. Not only did the Brewers save themselves from the indignity of blowing a three-game lead with four to play, but the last game served as a signature game for 1982 AL MVP, Robin Yount, who led his team with two homers, a triple and scored four runs.

Not a bad afternoon, for Yount or the Brewers. For the Orioles, the one game proved to be the lasting image of the 1982 season.

And that’s what the Phillies (and every other team) is up against.

“I think our team will be remembered by how we finish,” Manuel said, astutely. “We’ve hung in there. Our starting pitching has kept us in there. We’re sitting in a good place, and now is a good time for us to pick it up and start putting some runs on the board consistently.”

As it shapes up now, Cole Hamels, Roy Halladay and Roy Oswalt (in that order) will pitch in the final series. The Braves will have Derek Lowe, Jair Jurrgens and Tim Hudson ready to go, too.

How can it not come down to that last weekend?

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[1] The doubleheader, especially the day-night doubleheader, is a phenomenon foreign to every pro sport aside from baseball. Yes, the physical tolls of the games on its participants aren’t as foreboding in baseball, but think about the scribes. Most folks got to the ballpark for Monday’s day-nighter before 10 a.m. and did not leave the park until after 11 p.m. That’s a long day no matter what the task.

Oswalt turns Cliff Lee into a fond memory

I haven’t counted, but I’m willing to bet that the player I wrote the most about during the first half of the baseball season was Cliff Lee. Some of the reasoning behind this deduction is obvious because for about seven months after Lee was traded to Seattle on a whirlwind December day in which the Phillies got Roy Halladay, he was the lightning rod we all fired strikes at.

The Phillies would have been better with Cliff Lee, we reasoned, not wrongly. Worse, general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. never offered a reason for dealing away Lee that we would accept. Oh sure, we got it, but we didn’t like it.

The constant harping about Lee always got back to a couple of main points. For one, there was the money thing. It wasn’t our money and as a public trust that has sold out 108 straight games in the relatively brand-new park, the team ought to spend, spend, spend. Then, there was the idea of the Phillies going down the stretch with a starting rotation that featured two guys who won Cy Young awards, and another who was MVP of the NLCS and World Series. Would any team want face a team that went Halladay, Lee and Hamels in three straight games of a playoff series?

No. No way.

But a quick perusal of the archives of this little site shows that Lee’s name hasn’t been mentioned since July 29. That date—two days before the annual trading deadline—not only is the anniversary of Lee’s arrival in Philadelphia where he wore the Phillies’ pinstripes for approximately three months covering just 17 starts, including the postseason, but also it’s the date of Roy Oswalt’s arrival to Philly. It kind of makes sense now why Lee hasn’t been mentioned all that much anymore.

In his first seven outings for the Phils, Oswalt is 4-1 with a 1.89 ERA with 41 strikeouts in 47 2/3 innings. No, Oswalt hasn’t won the Cy Young Award like Lee, but he has won the MVP in the 2005 NLCS with the Astros. Better yet, Oswalt says he pushed through the usual “dead arm” stage of the season that seems to strike high-innings pitchers late in the summer and certainly will see his workload increase the rest of the way. Manager Charlie Manuel hinted as much on Friday afternoon when he alluded to the experience Roys Halladay and Oswalt have with pitching on short rest. If that’s not planting a seed of thought, nothing is.

Regardless, Oswalt’s arrival has made us stash Lee’s name away into the attic of happy memories after he posted the greatest statistical postseason by a Phillies pitcher since Grover Cleveland Alexander in 1915, which only makes sense. Still, after pining for Lee into July, some have gone into a full-out sprint in the other direction by wondering if all the carrying on was wrong. Maybe trading Lee away wasn’t such a bad idea after all, went the reasoning, especially when one considers that Lee missed the first month of the season, got traded to Texas, slumped a bit and now is struggling with some back discomfort. Since being traded to the Rangers, Lee has gone 0-3 with an 8.26 ERA during the past month and just got an anti-inflammatory injection for his back this week.

That’s a far cry from what Oswalt has done in his seven starts with the Phillies, or even what Lee did in his first seven outings with the Phillies last year at this time. Lee had a 3.37 ERA and 47 strikeouts in 48 innings when he first joined the club last year.

So yes, statistically Oswalt has been better. Moreover, because Lee might be injured Oswalt is clearly the more valuable pitcher right now.

See, trading Lee wasn’t such a bad idea after all… right?

Well, yes and no. The yes should be obvious because Oswalt is healthy, happy and pitching well. Before he was traded to Philadelphia there was concern that Oswalt, a quiet and private man from Weir, Mississippi (population 553), might not fit in well in a hardscrabble northeast city. Sometimes, athletes in Philadelphia are judged more by emotion and personality than talent or results. Not exactly the most demonstrative man on the mound and straightforward and soft spoken with the press, it’s understandable if Oswalt was apprehensive.

Yet by all accounts, Oswalt, like Lee, has fit in quite well in Philadelphia. Of course the excitement of a pennant race has something to do with that, but that’s kind of the whole point… right?

“I can tell he’s happy here,” said Brad Lidge, Oswalt’s teammate from their days in Houston. “You can see that extra pep in his step. I think he feels the change in energy and he’s enjoying being part of this as opposed to just another season going by. You can see him thinking about trying to achieve that ultimate goal.

“And he’s throwing great.”

Conversely, the move to get Oswalt before the deadline is an admission that the Phillies needed a pitcher of high caliber. Lee’s contract status might have spooked Amaro into trading him, but that never changed the desire to have three horses at the top of the rotation.

And now that he has them, Manuel hopes they are ready to run for the next month-plus.

“The best part about that is Halladay and Oswalt have pitched on short rest,” Manuel said. “They have that experience and that becomes very big.”

That’s down the road, of course, but for now the best part about Halladay and Oswalt is that they made folks forget about Cliff Lee for a little while. Besides, Oswalt has a no-trade clause and a contract for 2011. Looks like the Phillies are stuck with him.

PODCAST EPISODE NO. 16

So we’re headed for the stretch run. This is the time of year that could make or break a season. No, the games don’t count any more than they did in April, but they mean more. They carry more weight. They’re heavier.

This is the time of year where legends are made, or, even more heroically, it’s the time legends define their legacies. And yes, the past sentence was written in the John Facenda-voice font. 

Nevertheless, we have much admiration for the guy who refuses to simply play out the string. That’s where the Nationals’ Nyjer Morgan comes in, because even though his team is a good 21 games out of first place and headed for their fifth last-place finish in the last six seasons, Morgan has not given in.
It’s like Updike once wrote about Ted Williams:

“For me, Williams is the classic ballplayer of the game on a hot August weekday, before a small crowd, when the only thing at stake is the tissue-thin difference between a thing done well and a thing done ill.”

For a couple of nights that was Nyjer Morgan of the lowly Washington Nationals. Not only was he running over catchers and swiping bases with his team down by a dozen runs, but when the Marlins tried to drill him a second time for perceived insults, well, that was too much for the man to bear.

And so he started a brawl.

We want to be known as the audio show that barrels over a catcher in a late-season game when there is nothing at stake aside from the final score. Maybe we did that this time:

 

AWESOME 16

Was this the “tissue-thin difference between a thing done well and thing done ill?”

Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, we’re giving you, the listener, you’re moneys’ worth…

Wait... it’s free. OK, never mind. 

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Howard and Utley bring the chicken soup

Who doesn’t like a little baseball wisdom?

All it takes is one…

Take two and hit it to the opposite field…

The key to winning baseball games is pitching, fundamentals, and three run homers…

Oh yes, the three-run homer. Is there anything it can’t cure? It’s like penicillin or chicken soup, and oftentimes it just takes one to make everything feel better. Knowing how troubled the Phillies’ offense has been this season, it seemed as if a little three-run homer for the soul is exactly what the team needed.

Actually, if it were Ryan Howard to provide some of the medicine, even better.

Ryan Howard and home runs have kind of been strangers lately. In fact, Howard hadn’t hit a homer since July 27, a span of 13 games. Add in the 16 games he missed because of his injured ankle, and it seemed like forever since The Big Piece hit a homer. Worse, the homer drought was sort of a microcosm of his post-DL production. Going just 4-for-36 with no extra-base hits, one RBI and 16 strikeouts was just as ugly to watch as it was to read.

“You see it. If you watch the games you can see I’m not comfortable in the box. I’m just trying to get it back, get a good pitch to hit and go from there,” Howard said last week. “It’s tough when you’re on the DL and you get out of that rhythm it’s kind of like going back to spring training all over again.”

Apparently, the problem was nothing more than finding that rhythm. Knowing that Howard and Chase Utley were like bombs waiting to explode, manager Charlie Manuel may have put his guys back into the lineup sooner than he should have. But that’s the thing about explosives—there’s a lot of patience involved. You have to wait for the reward. Obviously, Manuel was willing to put up with the bad in order to get to the good.

“We wanted them back, but the people who saw them play [said they were ready] and they wanted them to come back,” Manuel said. “If we would have left them down there longer and let them get a few at-bats, yeah, they would have benefited from it. But where we were at, we wanted them back when they were healthy.”

Clearly it has to be a little more than a coincidence that the Phillies scored eight runs in a game where Howard belted a three-run homer. Truth is the Phillies hadn’t scored more than eight runs in a game in two weeks until The Big Piece hit his three-run bomb to left-center field on Tuesday night. Better yet, Howard’s homer was followed by a long double in Wednesday’s finale and five more runs to take two out of three against the Dodgers.

“I wasn’t happy about hitting a home run,” Howard said. “I was just happy to get a hit.”

Looking for something to highlight for the moment when the Phillies got it going? It just might turn out to be the Aug. 31 game at Dodger Stadium where Howard hit that three-run homer. In the two winning games against the Dodgers, the Phillies scored 13 runs which is nearly as many as they scored in the six previous games.

Howard hit the long ones and Utley… well, he just hit. Certainly that was a welcomed change considering the other big bat in the middle of the order went 5-for-9 in the two games against the Dodgers with three doubles in Wednesday’s finale. A 5-for-9 offsets a 2-for-21 jag pretty nicely.

“When we’re clicking it seems like everyone wants to hit with him,” Manuel said. “Like if Howard and Utley are hitting, everyone else does too. They want to be along with it.”

The good part about that is it’s time to hit. The Phillies have been winning games despite their offense. It’s almost as if the pitching staff has decided to carry the load alone since there has been so little help from the hitters.

Howard is a monster in September. In exactly a season’s worth of September games—162 in the month during his career—heading into Wednesday’s tilt, Howard has clubbed 52 homers and picked up 141 RBIs to go with a .314 batting average. When other plays slow down as the season dwindles, the big man heats up. With the benefit of 16 extra days off, Howard should be quite ready if he has his mojo working.

And maybe that will be the tonic for Utley, too. Notoriously a slow finisher, partially because he has played through injuries, Utley has the benefit of 46 games off. Time spent on the disabled list should rejuvenate Utley down the stretch for a change, which was the silver lining when the injuries hit.

So now that the offense is hitting back, it’s just a matter of the Halladay, Hamels and Oswalt maintaining to the finish line. Oh yes, that’s the first part of the perfect remedy. If the three-run homer is the chicken soup, the pitching is what ties it together.

The chicken soup might make the Phillies feel better, but they can’t survive without H2O.

No rhyme or reason to the no-hitter

So the Phillies nearly were no-hit again on Monday night at Dodger Stadium. This time it was Hiroki Kuroda who flirted with blanking the Phillies until Shane Victorino came through with a solid single to right field with one out in the eighth inning.

For those scoring at home, there have been 19 one-hitters in the big leagues this season and the Phillies were involved in four of them. There also have been five no-hitters—excluding the no-so perfect game from Armando Galarraga—the most since 1991 when there were seven no-hitters, which was the dawn of the so-called steroid era.

Can the level field between pitching and hitting be as simple as improved drug testing?

That's a question that will be answered in time. For now, however, we have to figure what can we make of this and why the pitching has caught up to hitting.

Either way, there is a rebirth of extraordinary well-pitched games. Of the 20 perfect games (21 if you count Galarraga), three of them (four if you count… you know) have come since July of 2009. That’s 15 percent of all the perfect games in history happening within a 10-month span.

It also means that after being one-hit three times this season, the Phillies are about due for the ol’ no-no…

Doesn’t it?

Well, yes and no. Historically, no-hitters have existed in a vacuum. There were no hints or warnings that they were going to happen. For instance, before the White Sox’s Mark Buehrle threw a perfect game against the Rays in July of 2009, there was no event that gave off a warning sign that it was about to happen. In fact, before the perfect game, the Rays had won four of six and were 5 games off the pace in the AL East. If there were candidates of teams to be no-hit, the Rays were hardly at the top of the list.

But since that perfect game, the Rays have been involved in three no-hitters. One of those was a perfect game by Dallas Braden in Oakland, followed by an eight-walk, 149-pitch no-no in Arizona by Edwin Jackson.

Despite the fact that the Rays (81-50) are tied for the best record in baseball with the Yankees, they also have been one-hit twice and two-hit twice this season. In fact, the Rays have been two-hit, one-hit or no-hit at least once every month this season. With September to start on Wednesday, the Rays are due again.

It appears as if the Phillies are in the same boat as the Rays only without the perfect game out in front. Since April 16, 1978 when the Cardinals’ Bob Forsch threw a no-hitter against the Phillies, the team has not been beaten by an official no-hitter. Yes, there was the rain-shortened, five-inning no-no by the Expos’ Pascual Perez in late 1988, but that doesn’t count in the official records.

Better yet, the Phillies have been so resistant to extraordinary pitching that since Forsch threw his no-hitter, they had been victims of a one-hitter just 11 times heading into this season. Yes, that’s just 11 one-hitters in 31 seasons.

So clearly the Phillies are making up for lost time. This season they have been one-hit three times (Daisuke Matsusaka, R.A. Dickey, Kuroda) which is the exact number of times the Phillies had been one-hit since 1994. Plus, if we figure that the Rays were coming off a season in which they got to the World Series and had only been one-hit or no-hit four times in their entire existence (going back to 1998), the Phillies are ripe for the taking.

Then again, who knows with these things. Before 1978 it seemed like the Phillies were the easiest team to throw a no-hitter against. From 1960 to 1972, the Phillies came up on the zero end of things in the hits category eight times, including two in the same season (1960) to the Milwaukee Braves. Meanwhile, in the World Series era, Philadelphia pitchers have tossed just 13 no-hitters, with eight of those coming from Phillies pitchers.

Perhaps the only thing we’ve been able to determine through all of this is no-hitters and Philadelphia don’t go together all that well. Adding in the fact that the New York Mets have not had a single no-hitter in their history and the Dodgers have had 20, these are events that occur totally at random.

And with a lot of luck.

Strong finish could result in playoffs, cool trophy for Halladay

If we’re ranking the off-season deals around baseball, the one that brought Roy Halladay to the Phillies just might be the best one. The truth is Halladay has been everything as advertised for the Phillies and maybe more. Of course the final analysis cannot be completed until Halladay pitches in the playoffs (IF he pitches in the playoffs), but so far there isn’t anything to complain about.

As a result of his performance, Halladay is right in the mix to win his second Cy Young Award along with Tim Hudson of the Braves, Adam Wainwright from the Cardinals, Ubaldo Jimenez from the Rockies, and the Marlins’ Josh Johnson.

Interestingly, four of the top 10 pitchers in wins, ERA and strikeouts come from the NL East, which shows how well pitch Halladay has to pitch in every game. Moreover, since the Phillies play the Braves and Marlins 13 times in September, Halladay will have to dial it up for his final half-dozen starts.

But that shouldn’t be a problem. After all, this season Halladay leads the league in ERA (2.22), innings (207), complete games (8), shutouts (3) and strikeouts (186). He also leads the league in WAR, walks per nine innings (1.1) and could move into a tie for the league leadership with 17 wins if he beats the Dodgers on Monday night.

The Phillies have not had anyone win the pitching triple crown (wins, ERA and strikeouts) since Steve Carlton in 1972, a 20-game winner since 1982 (Carlton) or a Cy Young Award winner since 1987 (Steve Bedrosian). In fact, the Phillies haven’t had a right-hander win 20 games since Robin Roberts did it in 1955.

With those milestones also comes the perfect game in Miami where Halladay retired all 27 Marlins in a 1-0 victory against Johnson. So yeah, as far as resume fodder goes, Halladay likely will have it all.

“I think he should definitely be in there,” manager Charlie Manuel said a couple of weeks ago. “There are some guys having some big years, but he’s definitely right in there with complete games and our team has definitely been in contention, so I don’t see any reason why he shouldn’t be there. He has a chance to pull that off if you guys vote for him.”

Yeah, there it is. Will the voters go for Halladay if he has a bad, relatively speaking, September? Halladay is just outside of the top 10 in losses, which is hardly his fault given the Phillies’ streaky offense this season. Though Halladay has a 4.87 ERA in his nine losses and has allowed 13 of his 16 homers in those games, the Phillies have scored three runs or fewer in eight of those games and zero or one in four of them. Even in his no-decisions the Phillies didn’t give him much support, either. One of those resulted in a 1-0 victory for the team and the other turned into a 4-3 defeat.

In fact, in six of Halladay’s 16 wins he received either one or two runs of support.

Sure, these superlatives are fantastic, but they don’t really answer the question…

Can Halladay win the Cy Young Award?

Well, that all depends. Counting Monday night’s start at Dodger Stadium, Halladay will make seven more starts this season. But even if he wins them all and the Phillies fall out of the playoffs, he could have a tough time winning the Cy Young. See, BBWAA voters are a fickle bunch and they seem to put a lot of stock in winning. Even still, it will be very difficult to deny Halladay.

Better yet, considering Halladay has never gone into September with his team within 10 games, this should be an exciting time for him. Actually, the reason why he wanted to join the Phillies was to get a chance to pitch in meaningful, late-season games. It also didn’t hurt that he would not have to move from his Florida home since the Blue Jays and Phillies train next to each other in Dunedin and Clearwater.

Nevertheless, Halladay said he wanted to pitch in some big games and it looks like he got his wish. Starting on Monday night and going to the last regular-season game in Atlanta on Oct. 2, every start will be a big deal.

“Obviously it’s been a while since I’ve gotten to this part of the season and been on a team that’s been knocking on the door, so yeah, I’m definitely looking forward to it,” Halladay said a couple of weeks back. “We have a couple of guys coming back and it’s going to be fun. This is the biggest reason why I wanted to come here and to give ourselves a chance is pretty important.”

So if Halladay comes through in September not only will he probably get a cool looking plaque, but also it should put the Phillies into the playoffs.

George Brett's 'freak-out' still sets the standard

As far as angry moments go, Ryan Howard was right up there last week when he was thrown out of a game by minor-league substitute umpire Scott Barry during the 14th inning of the Phillies’ loss to the Astros at Citizens Bank Park. In fact, just the sight of the 6-foot-4, 250-pound slugger running out onto the infield to confront Barry and his bad call is one that will be etched into some folks’ minds forever.

Think about it… Howard is as laidback and affable as they come. He’s living the good life and appreciates it. He likes to laugh and have fun and hit baseballs really, really far. What’s not to be happy about that?

But even the nicest guys can only be pushed so far. Barry blew the check-swing third strike call and then exacerbated the situation by tossing Howard out of the game for nothing more than displaying emotion. The ump did the same thing a few days before when he threw out the Nats’ Ryan Zimmerman from a game for being upset at himself for striking out. Get this—Zimmerman swung at a pitch, missed and was angry with himself so he chucked his bat and helmet. To Barry, apparently, this is a major offense.

But we never heard Barry’s side of things. We also never heard from umpire Greg Gibson, who made an undecipherable call against the Phillies in the opening game of the series, which directly lead to the Astros’ game-winning runs. If that wasn’t frustrating enough, the acting crew chief Sam Holbrook claimed there was a rule from Major League Baseball that prohibited the umps from speaking with the press.

Or maybe they just didn’t want to be held accountable. Clearly Jim Joyce, the umpire who blew the call in Armando Galarraga’s near perfect game in May, missed that memo.

Obviously there were times in the past where the umpire talked about a specific call in a game. However, upon looking back at one of baseball’s most famous incidents where a player ran to an umpire to confront him, curiously, there are no post-game comments from the game officials.

Oh yes, I’m talking about the Pine-Tar Game.

Remember that one? At Yankee Stadium on July 24, 1983, George Brett hit what appeared to be the go-ahead home run off the Yankees’ Goose Gossage with two outs in the ninth inning. However, citing a rule that was mostly used during the Deadball Era, Brett was called out because his bat had too much pine tar on it. When umpire Tim McClelland signaled that Brett was out, one of the all-time greatest freak outs in the history of sports occurred. Brett stormed out of the dugout with arms flailing and mouth running before being restrained just as he reached McClelland.

Here’s how it looked:

In the moment, McClelland’s call was correct because according to the way the rule was written (Rule 1.10b), a player cannot use a bat with a foreign substance more than 18 inches from the handle. However, as interpreted by American League president Lee MacPhail, the rule was put into the books because pine tar ruined baseballs at a time when they still retrieved them when they landed in the stands. In 1983, the pine-tar rule was antiquated almost the way certain laws to translate to modern times.

Nevertheless, it was tough to find any comments from McClelland about the incident in the direct aftermath or in the decades to follow. However, in a report from The New York Times on the 25th anniversary of the incident, McClelland was disappointed that the call was overturned.

“We’ve got to rule on the letter of the law, and the letter said that we should call him out,” McClelland said. “But if I’d have gone to Billy Martin and said, ‘Hey Billy, you’re right by the rules, but come on’ — who knows what Billy would have done?”

“When the rule was originally made, it was actually for the protection of the hitter, because if the pine tar would get on the ball, then the pitcher could grip the ball better and snap off curves and stuff like that,” McClelland said. “So, really, it’s kind of funny how the rule was made for the protection of the hitter, but the penalty was on the hitter.”

Long known for his unemotional demeanor, his slow and deliberate strike calls as well as a bunch of really poor calls, i.e. Matt Holliday scoring the winning run in the NL West tiebreaker in 2007 and the play in the 2009 ALCS where Nick Swisher was called out for leaving a base too early which came before the negated double play where two Yankees’ players arrived at third base at the same time and were tagged while not standing on the base.

McClelland spoke to the media after those calls, but not after the Pine-Tar game. As a rookie ump, crew chief Joe Brinkman handled the media, which is the common protocol. However, in Philadelphia when requests for comment were made to Gibson and Barry, those requests were denied.

Regardless, it’s tough to compare Brett’s freak out with Howard’s slow dash through the infield. Sure, having Howard angry with you is probably scarier than George Brett, and there was plenty of pointing, gesturing and the always dramatic, hold-me-back posturing, but it didn’t quite grab hold the same way. Perhaps in 1983 we weren’t used to seeing ballplayers charge after the umps. Maybe we’ve built up immunity to that kind of stuff with the proliferation of media. Needless to say, the scribes in the press box didn’t have Twitter to report the action as it unfolded in 1983, while Barry’s overreaction was well documented in the moment.

So maybe that’s why it was downplayed a bit nationally. Howard’s ejection was barely mentioned by The Associated Press or by the Houston media. Apparently it wasn’t a big deal…

Meanwhile, Howard had a conversation with Barry last Thursday when they were both working at first base. Barry, of course, couldn’t be reached for comment, and Howard only confirmed that he spoke to the ump.

At least for now, Howard wants to forget about the incident.

I've seen him mad before," manager Charlie Manuel said, "but never like that."

Brett, however, never stopped talking about his place in one of the more peculiar games ever played. In fact, a couple of years ago Brett said he gathers up his family and they sit down to watch daddy’s little freak out.

“I probably watch it at least once a year with my boys," Brett said during the 25th anniversary of the game. “They just want to watch the aftermath of when the umpire threw me out.”

Better yet, Brett said the Pint-Tar game helped people forget that he had hemorrhoid problems during the 1980 World Series against the Phillies. Because of that Brett went from being the hemorrhoid guy to the pine-tar man.

“Actually, when I ran out of the dugout I had no idea I looked like that. When I saw my reaction I said, ‘You've got to be (kidding) me,’ Brett remembered during the 25th anniversary. “That's the one at-bat you're remembered for and it was an at-bat in July. I never thought it would be that big a deal. Only in New York.”

So that’s what it was… maybe it would have been a bigger deal that Howard was ejected had it been a game against the Mets?

Strasburg's injury hurts more than Nationals

It’s no fun celebrating cautionary tales or being a cynic. No one with any semblance of tact or class wants to be the “told-you-so” guy or the jackass always pointing out the mistakes of others. There’s too much of that as it is.

It would have been fun to witness greatness for a change. No, not the drug-fueled superhuman feats of strength that defined baseball just a short time ago, but instead we long for pure, unbridled skill and talent. A right arm touched by the gods, for lack of better hyperbole.

So with the news that Stephen Strasburg, the once-in-a-lifetime pitching phenom for the Washington Nationals, would likely have to undergo Tommy John surgery to fix that right arm, well, the cynicism rang hollow.

No one wanted the kid to get hurt. Not the players on the Phillies, manager Charlie Manuel or any real fans of the game. Yeah, the Phillies have six games remaining against the Nationals and will likely be fighting for a playoff spot in those games, so not having to face a pitcher like Strasburg is key. In his lone appearance against the Phillies, which was also the game where the “significant tear” of the ligament holding his elbow together was too much to bear, the pitcher dominated. He allowed two hits in 4 1/3 innings without a walk to go with six strikeouts. Noting that he had three mediocre outings in a row leading up to the game against the Phillies, the first four innings of the game were promising.

Manuel, who said he was looking forward to seeing the kid pitch against his team in the days leading up to the game, was pleased to report that the hype matched the skill. Even Ryan Howard, who got one of the hits against Strasburg, walked away impressed.

“He has an easy 98-mph fastball and a great hammer. He’s really good, though it’s like some of us said — the media took it and ran with it,” Howard said. “To his credit, he’s handled it all pretty well.”

Easy. That was the word a lot of players used when talking about Strasburg’s pitching motion. It seemed as if he wasted very little energy before throwing the ball 100-mph. He also had that hammer—the curve ball from hell—that had the makings of becoming the best pitch in the game.

That is if it wasn’t already.

Then he reportedly heard a “pop” in his elbow and got scared. Obviously, that pop resonated pretty loudly because it conjured up names and tales of haunted glory and unfilled promise. As quickly as one of those fastballs old names were bandied about. And as skewed as the angle on his curve, opinion came from mouth breathers of satellite radio and the floor of Congress. Actually, you could set your watch to it. Todd Van Poppel, David Clyde, Brien Taylor, Mark Prior and Kerry Wood should be starring in beer commercials any day for as much as they have been talked about lately. Talk about a Q rating…

Or maybe we should say, gentlemen, start your second-guessing. Based on watching Strasburg pitch in the minors, his major league debut and his final big league start, the kid was treated as if he were a Ming vase since signing with the Nats last year. Even in the minors Strasburg had an entourage of major league public relations people setting up the velvet ropes around the meal ticket. Moreover, his outings were monitored as if they were science experiments with strict pitch counts and plenty of rest.

If there was one pitcher who should not have gotten hurt it was Strasburg. After all, there were all those ex-big leaguers who said the kid was being babied too much. He needed to toughen up and pitch more.

Oops.

“It's frustrating, because this happens to people you think it shouldn't happen to,” Nats GM Mike Rizzo told The Washington Post. “This player was developed and cared for the correct way. Things like this happen. Pitchers break down. Pitchers get hurt. We're satisfied with the way he was developed. I know [Strasburg's agent] Scott Boras was satisfied with the way he's been treated, and Stephen is also. We're good with that. Frustrated, yes. Second-guessing ourselves, no.”

The silver lining is that Tommy John surgery is very common. There are plenty of players on every team in the big leagues that have undergone the operation, which more and more seems like one of those milestones pitchers have to cross…

The minors, a big league debut, arbitration, free agency and Tommy John. Not necessarily in that order.

There’s also a chance that when Strasburg returns in April of 2012 that his fastball will be faster than it was before. The drawback is it will take him some time to regain the feel for his curveball, but the fastball will be OK. Besides, there were nine players in the All-Star Game that had Tommy John surgery: Chris Carpenter, Tim Hudson, Josh Johnson, Arthur Rhodes, Brian Wilson, Joakim Soria, Hong-Chih Kuo, Rafael Soriano and Billy Wagner.

Is baseball doomed in D.C.?
The problem isn’t the surgery, it’s the recovery. It’s not the process, either, but the time. In baseball, like any other corporate structure, time is money. Considering that Strasburg wasn’t just the ace of the Nats, but also The Franchise, it’s fair to ask if baseball in Washington can weather this storm. Yes, Adam Dunn and Ryan Zimmerman are good ballplayers, and Josh Willingham is having a tremendous season while Nyjer Morgan could become a solid leadoff man. But those guys weren’t putting the butts in the seats.

Only the Pirates and Marlins averaged fewer fans per game than the Nationals amongst National League teams, and even in Strasburg’s last home start just 21,695 fans turned out—a good 2,000 below the team’s average per game.

So even with Strasburg was baseball viable in Washington?

Think about it… Washington is a two-time loser in baseball, yet when the Expos where no longer right for Montreal, MLB insisted on giving the city a third shot. Worse, they stuck it to the overburdened taxpayers of D.C. and forced them to build a ballpark that no one goes to.

Now it could be a career-threatening arm injury to cause a section of Southeast D.C. to go back to its pre-Nationals Park form, while the franchise moves on to Portland, Charlotte, Las Vegas or maybe even Monterrey, Mexico. We’ll start using names like Brien Taylor, David Clyde and Todd Van Poppel. We’ll tell more cautionary tales only to go back to believing the hype with the next kid with an arm that supersedes his years.

Washington could be a three-time loser with baseball, which only guarantees that there will not be a fourth chance.

“He’s going to be a tremendous pitcher,” Manuel said. “He has to stay healthy, though.”

Stay healthy because only the entire franchise is depending on it.

Don't mess with Jim, Part 2: When crazy isn't funny

It has long been the official stance here at Finger Food that ex-big league pitcher and soon-to-be ex-senator, Jim Bunning, was (indeed) crazy. We don’t mean that in a clinical sense, because to make such a diagnosis would require an advanced degree, and really… who has the time?

No, Bunning, the first man to pitch a perfect game for the Phillies, toss a no-hitter and win 100 games in both leagues, is simply batbleep crazy. Generally, batbleep crazy folks are the kind we like. After all, these are people who are not only extremely entertaining and sometimes have savant-like talents, but also they are harmless.

Remember when Chad Ochocinco was Chad Johnson? The dude went down to the courthouse, filled out all the paper work, hired a lawyer, went to court and legally had his name changed. In fact, we loved it. America loved it and accepted it very quickly. Rarely will an announcer accidentally drop a “Chad Johnson” when addressing Ochocinco the way they kept calling Muhammad Ali, Cassius Clay and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Lew Alcindor. There is no grand statement involved when a man who wears the uniform number, 85, changes his last name to Ochocinco because it’s just crazy.

Batbleep crazy.

And because of this most folks wouldn’t vote for Ochocinco for county dog catcher if he were to run. You can’t have a guy as crazy as a loon holding an office. Look, there are plenty of precedents but that doesn’t make it right. Just look at what the people in the Commonwealth of Kentucky did by electing ol’ right-hander Jim Bunning to congress.

Maybe the good folks of Kentucky simply have a warped sense of humor?  That has to be the case… right? Why else would Bunning be elected to anything aside from a well-heeled player representative for the Major League Baseball Players Association? In fact, Bunning was instrumental in the early days of MLBPA when he advocated player strikes and work stoppages. The truth is the MLBPA might not have been what it was if it were not for the hard work of guys like Bunning.

It’s also true that Bunning likely turned to politics because he couldn’t hack it in baseball. Oh sure, Bunning is pretty good at revisionist history about his playing career like we all are. In his day ballplayers were tougher, smarter and the game was better… just ask him, he’ll tell you.

See, Bunning is one of those old ballplayers who walked uphill for 10 miles in a driving snow storm just to be able to pitch in a ballgame. In an interview with Politico.com about Washington’s ace pitcher Stephen Strasburg, Bunning could not resist taking shots at the kid who struggled throw a couple of arm injuries in his first pro season. The news on Friday was that Strasburg will need Tommy John Surgery, but before he had even an inkling of the facts, Bunning, the old MLBPA leader, ripped a current member of the union.

“Five hundred twenty starts, I never refused the ball,” Bunning told Politico.com. “What a joke!”

It was 519 starts, but that’s probably just an oversight from a senator who has made a career of whitewashing his real record. To hear the stories from the old days, Bunning was equal parts crazy and jerk. My favorite story comes from the book Temporary Insanity, written by former Phillie Jay Johnstone. To set it up, here is a story I wrote for our pal Mike Meech over at The Fightins:

On my way to the press box lavatory, I literally ran into Jay Johnstone. No one was hurt, but the first thought that popped into my head when nearly trampling the Dodgers’ broadcaster was, “Hey, I read your book when I was a kid.”

The book was called Temporary Insanity and it wasn’t too bad for jock-lit. There were plenty of good stories about all the crazy things baseball players like to do in their free time, including some of the finer details about Johnstone’s time as a Phillies farmhand where he spent most of his energy terrorizing his manager Jim Bunning.

Bunning, of course, is currently the senior Republican senator from the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and based on a conversation I had with him in 2003, he still has not let go of the mental anguish Johnstone caused him. Maybe that’s why he was screwing the unemployed of his state, but I digress.

My favorite story from the book was when Johnstone caught wind that Bunning had been trying to nail him for any team rule infraction he could. So just to steam his manager even more than already necessary, Johnstone spread the word that he was organizing a wild, beer-drinking and card-playing night in his room at the team hotel. As it was told, Johnstone wanted everyone to spread word that the party would be a bona fide rager to end all ragers and to make sure that the manager found out, too. Don’t invite the dude, but just make sure Bunning knew all about it was the plan.

Bunning, as planned, got wind of the party and thinking he was finally going to get his chance to burn Johnstone once and for all, the manager showed up at the room after curfew only to find Johnstone sitting on his bed and reading a book.

Oh yes, the wild rager turned out to be nothing but a rouse. Johnstone set it up so that Bunning would show up only to catch him reading a book.

Classic.

More exasperating for Bunning was when Johnstone looked up from his book at the angry figure in the doorway and said something like, “Hiya, skip! You’re out kind of late, aren’t you?”

As the story goes, Bunning stormed out of there chapped that he couldn’t finally stick it to Johnstone. However, later the future senator got the last laugh. During that conversation with Bunning in 2003, I asked him about Johnstone and he told me that when the Phillies’ brass called him about the best player on his team he immediately told them about the guy who had been a veritable bee in his bonnet. As a result of that, the Phillies called up Johnstone from the minors and he went on to be a valuable left-handed bat for the team.

“I was finally rid of him,” the senator said.

Oh yes, a win-win for all.

It doesn't sound the least bit unreasonable to surmise that because Bunning couldn't hack it as a minor-league manager or control Jay Johnstone, he went on to be a U.S. Senator.

Bunning was in Philadelphia on Thursday to fete Roy Halladay for throwing the second perfect game in team history with all the pomp and circumstance reserved for the last time the team had a ceremony for Halladay for throwing the second perfect game in team history. That one was in June, I think, only Bunning couldn’t be there.

This time, Bunning turned up and told the team’s official web site about how great Halladay’s perfect game was as it related to his perfect game in 1964.

That was the year when Bunning was the ace pitcher for the team that experienced the worst late-season collapse in baseball history.

“After [Halladay's] eight years in the American League there has been no loss in effectiveness,” Bunning noted. “I had the same kind of experience, I had nine years in the American League before I got here. Now, I had a no-hitter in the American League first, but he's come close an awful lot of times.

“I watched the tape of that game and he ran a lot of 3-2 counts. I had just two when I had a perfect game, and truth be told, I faced much weaker competition. But the focus it took to battle through was amazing.”

In other words, Halladay was pretty perfect, but not as perfect as Bunning.

Sheesh!

If that was all the craziness we got from the senator, it wouldn’t be anything to bat an eye at. However, the reporter Bunning spoke to was doing some stringer work for MLB.com and has been unemployed since December of 2008 because of cutbacks at his former newspaper. As the tale was told, the writer was introduced to the senator as an old newspaper writer who was unemployed because of the state of the economy.

Bunning’s response to this information?

“I can’t wait until they are all gone,” the senator said about newspapers.

Oh yes he did!

Bunning, of course, is the same guy who held up unemployment benefits to guys like this reporter last February. In a stance that was a head-scratcher to members of both political parties, Bunning did everything he could to deny folks unemployment benefits.

Here’s what we wrote in February:

On the floor Thursday night, he breached Senate protocol when he shouted out: “Tough s—” as Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley pleaded with him to drop his objection.

Or this gem from the ol’ ballplayer himself:

I want to assure the people that have, heh, watched this thing until quarter of twelve — and I have missed the Kentucky-South Carolina game that started at 9 o’clock, and it’s the only redeeming chance we had to beat South Carolina, since they’re the only team that has beat Kentucky this year — all of these things that we have talked about and all the provisions that have been discussed, the unemployment benefits, all these things. If we’d have taken the longer version of the job bill…we wouldn’t have spent three hours plus telling everybody in the United States of America that Senator Bunning doesn’t give a damn about the people that are on unemployment.

So the fact that there was an unemployment rate pushing toward 11 percent in Kentucky is of less importance than the regular-season matchup between Kentucky and South Carolina to Bunning. He also can’t wait for newspapers to go out of business.

He says he's getting a plaque from his friends for "dealing" with newspapers for 60 years, too.

Yeah...

 

Brown making his way in a familiar manner

It was after the third inning of a Sunday afternoon game at The Vet on Sept. 17, 2000 when it was painfully obvious that Jimmy Rollins was never going to spend a minute in the minor leagues again. Only 21 that afternoon, Rollins hit a triple to lead off the inning for his first hit, but didn’t move too far from the bag afterwards as Bobby Abreu, Pat Burrell and Travis Lee struck out in order to end the inning.

But the point was made. Rollins was a big leaguer. No longer did he have to defer to the likes of Desi Relaford, Tomas Perez and Alex Arias because he needed to spend time at Triple-A so he could get the chance to play every day. All Terry Francona—and then Larry Bowa—had to do was write his name in the lineup and let him go.

Actually, the third-inning triple was just for show. Rollins walked into the old clubhouse ready to go. There was no sense denying it any more.

Just about 10 years later, Rollins snuck a peak over at rookie Dom Brown as he fished through his locker for his batting practice gear, and was asked the same question. He’d sign his name on a bat, glance over at the 6-foot-6 outfielder, and then smile mischievously remembering what it was like back when he was trying to elbow his way into the big-league lineup for good.

“You’ll have to ask Ruben that,” Rollins said with a knowing smile when asked if Brown will ever have to go back to the minors to be a regular player.

In other words, the answer was no. Rollins didn’t say it because he didn’t need to. If the Phillies wanted to send Brown back to the minors for more seasoning, they had plenty of chances to do it by now.

So let’s ask the general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. about Brown’s immediate future.

“It would have been nice [to get Brown more playing time], but right now we’re trying to win as many games as we can and he has the ability to do some things that even if he’s not playing every day to help us,” Amaro explained. “He has the ability to run the bases and hit with some power from the left side as we’ve seen. He gives us the chance to have the best club out there.”

Certainly Brown is in a position Rollins never went through. When he came up from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre to play shortstop he didn’t have to look over his shoulder or wait his turn. From Sept. 17, 2000 to today, Rollins has been the Phillies shortstop without question. In fact, there stands a good chance that the team will offer Rollins a contract extension simply because there is no one in the minors breathing down his neck. Plus, even though Rollins is the longest-tenured Phillie, it’s not like he’s old or getting old. He’s coming into his prime athletic years right now with contract that ends after the 2011 season.

“I’m only 31,” Rollins said. “And the only reason I’ve been here the longest is because Pat (Burrell) left. You have to give those guys credit for drafting guys, bringing them along and keeping them together.”

In other words, Rollins wants to stick around for a while. And who knows? Maybe if the right deal is struck Rollins, Chase Utley, Ryan Howard and Cole Hamels very well could spend their entire careers playing for just one team. Needless to say, in the free agency era players tend to bounce from team to team a lot so if the Phillies are able to keep their main guys together. It says a lot about the guys running the club and the players, too.

A few lockers down, the next great Phillie quietly prepared for a game where he might only get in to pinch hit. Interestingly, Brown has been called on to pinch hit as many times (9) as Rollins has since 2006. Chalk that up to an experience Brown will have when he is a veteran that guys like Rollins, Howard and Utley don’t know all that well.

Where they all have common ground is in the waiting. Like Brown and Rollins, Utley and Howard had to wait in line to get into the big leagues, too. For Rollins it simply was a matter of seasoning since it’s likely he could have skipped the 2000 season at Triple-A and hit .221 like Arias, Relaford and Perez combined for that year. But unlike those guys, Brown is attempting to establish himself on a team that went to the World Series for two straight years. Rollins joined a Phillies team that was on the way to 97 losses and replacing the manager. That’s about as different a situation as one can get.

In other words, it was a good idea for Rollins to spend the season playing for a team that went to the championship round of the playoffs. Just like it’s a good idea for Brown to take the ride with the two-time defending National League champs instead of dominating for a Triple-A club playing out the string.

Brown definitely will learn more in the big leagues than he would in Allentown for the rest of the season.

In the meantime, Brown will wait for his chance just like the other big guns on the team had to do. Of course before he realizes, he’ll blink and will be 10 years into his major league career just like Rollins.

“It feels like it was just yesterday,” Rollins said about that sunny Sunday in September of 2000 when he hit that first triple.

It always feels that way. No matter what.