Señor Mayo!

Carlos Ruiz is leading all of baseball in on base percentage (.481), and he's third in the NL and fifth overall in batting average (.354). Take a moment to read that. Read it a few times. If that's not a sign of how weird this baseball season is so far, I don't know what is. Not that I'm complaining. We've all known about the phenomenon of Choochtobre for the last two years, and the bat of the Phillies usually light hitting catcher suddenly catches fire faster than a forest in California. We've long wondered why he couldn't seem to carry those hot postseason streaks over to the regular season. Well Chooch seems to have figured out a way for now, and his plate discipline is second in the NL only to Jayson Werth, who led the majors in pitches seen per plate appearance last year.

 (Photo courtesy of David Zalubowski/AP)

Even hitting in front of the out-making machine that is Wilson Valdez didn't stop Chooch from providing key hits against the Rockies last night. As a few people pointed out last night, Wilson Valdez has made an average of one out per plate appearance, offsetting each of his five hits with five double play balls. That's not an easy feat to accomplish, and has made me wishing for the return of Juan Castro while playing the even longer "Waiting for Rollins" game. Shane Victorino also had quite the night at the plate, reaching base five times with three walks and two triples, which looks like what a good leadoff hitter should be doing if you ask me. Finally, Ross Gload hit a three run pinch hit homer in the top of the ninth to seal the deal, putting the Phillies up 9-5, a lead that the seemingly dominant Jose Contreras easily preserved.

  (Photo courtesy of David Zalubowski/AP)

Kyle Kendrick had another solidly mediocre performance, pitching six innings and giving up four runs. It was certainly not his worst performance, but not his best. Though we've seen Kendrick pitch seven and eight shutout innings, that seems to be the exception, just as his entire 2007 season now seems to have been the exception, not the norm for his pitching. As for the bullpen, J.C. Romero blew the one run lead in the 7th, but luckily for him David Herndon came in and induced a groundball that looked to be a base hit until future gold-glover Chase Utley made a spectacular diving catch to start the double play. Danys Baez pitched a scoreless but shaky 8th to preserve the 5-5 tie.

The only matter of concern from last night's game, other than the ongoing concerns about Baez and Romero, was that Brad Lidge was unavailable to pitch in the 9th due to elbow stiffness. He claimed this was nothing to worry about and that he would be fine. I seem to remember him saying similar things a lot last year, and we all know how that turned out. For now it's best to give him the benefit of the doubt, but it is a cause for concern. Tonight, none of that matters, since Roy Halladay is on the mound. Tune in at 8:40 PM to watch Roy and the boys do what they do best.