Fans and Pitchers

Lately, the focus at Citizen's Bank Park has been on a the antics of a few fans and the performances and injuries of a few pitchers. First, the fans. During Monday night's game, a 17-year-old fan decided it would be a great idea to run out on the field, after his dad told him not to do so, and was chased around before being tasered by a police officer on the field. This incident would have gotten almost no attention had a taser not been involved, but such is life and yet another story involving Philadelphia sports fans went around national media. This spotlight might have led to a fan deciding last night during the 9th inning to run out on the field once again, though no tasers appeared this time. I don't care for the use of tasers in situations like this, where no threat was posed and the perpetrator had nowhere to run but "around." If the officer legitimately believed that a threat was posed in that moment, I won't second-guess him on that. If he used the taser because he wanted to have the situation resolved more quickly, then that's using force out of laziness and inexcusable. In any event, let's hope the fan on the field streak doesn't continue tonight.

 (Photo courtesy of Matt Slocum/AP)

Second, the pitchers. Brad Lidge and Joe Blanton are back, and thus far (in a very small sample of pitching) seem to be in good form. Ryan Madson is out for two months after he broke his toe from kicking a folding chair in frustration. Being so familiar with frustration lately, Madson should be able to identify with all the Phillies fans who now want to kick him for injuring himself in such a stupid way. With Madson out until mid-July at the earliest and J.A. Happ out for at least the rest of May, the pieces that were supposed to fall into place with Blanton, Lidge, and J.C. Romero returning from injury remain as muddled as ever. As with this time last year, the Phillies 5th starter, Kyle Kendrick this year and Chan Ho Park in 2009, has not pitched well (more on that over in the Phillies Zone). It would be nice to say that Kendrick is on a short leash at this point, but as they point out in the post I just linked to, there isn't much of a viable alternative waiting in the wings. For now, we just need to hope that Roy Halladay continues doing what he does best, Blanton stays consistent, and Hamels continues his return to his pre-2009 form (more on that later) so that only two days out of five are a concern.

You think my toe looks bad? You should see the chair.

(Photo courtesy of Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

Monday night's game was not the best for a Phillies team hoping to continue the momentum from two straight Mets beat downs on Saturday and Sunday, but there were silver linings. Though they lost 6-3 in the end, Blanton looked like he was ready to continue where he left off last year, as a reliable third starter who can last through the 6th or 7th inning on a regular basis. Leaving him in to start the 7th during this game was a questionable decision on Charlie's part, as was bringing in Nelson Figueroa to get out of a two out jam, which Figueroa was not able to do without letting four runs score, two of which were charged to Blanton. Besides the silver lining of Blanton's performance, Brad Lidge pitched a scoreless 9th while notching two strikeouts. Being down 6-2, it was not exactly a high pressure situation. That would come during the following game.

 (Photo courtesy of Stephen M. Falk/Philly.com staff photographer)

Last night's game, with apologies to a timely Raul Ibanez triple in the 7th, was the Cole Hamels, Brad Lidge, and Carlos Ruiz show for the Phillies. Hamels looked phenomenal. He pitched nearly effortlessly through eight innings, except for a jam when, in the 5th, Albert Pujols came to bat with the bases loaded. He then popped out to 2nd on the first pitch. Otherwise, Hamels struck out eight, walked two, and came out for the 9th and gave up back to back doubles to tie up the game at 1-1. Brad Lidge came in with Yadier Molina on 2nd, got a ground out that advanced the runner, then a strikeout and a fly out. The only base runner he allowed was an intentional walk to Colby Rasmus. Both Hamels and Lidge hit velocities with their fastball that haven't been seen from them in a while, or ever in Hamels' case. So far, Lidge appears back in the mid-90s and his slider has the bite that it was lacking last season. Hamels was regular throwing 92-94 mph and even hit 95 once. He also threw his cutter and curveball effectively. On the Cardinals' side, Adam Wainwright also pitched incredibly well, with the only Phillies run coming on a sac fly by Carlos Ruiz to score Ibanez in the 7th following Raul's triple. Ruiz proved to be the hero of the game, when, after Contreras pitched a scoreless 10th, Ruiz hit his first walkoff homer since 2007 off of Blake Hawksworth. Chooch, with the 4th highest OBP in the majors right now, is in Señor Octubre form early this year.

(Photo courtesy of Ron Cortes/Philly.com staff photographer)

I don't have much else to say at this point, but it would be nice to see Kendrick make a decent start tonight. Even when Happ is healthy again, either Kendrick or Moyer will have to be in the rotation, and neither has inspired much confidence so far. I wouldn't be shocked to see the Phillies making a deal with Pedro Martinez again or even John Smoltz halfway through the season to bolster the rotation. As of now, if things keep going as they're going, outside help may be necessary. Fortunately, the 1-2-3 in the Phillies rotation is shaping up to look much better than it did for most of last year. For now, once again to all those injured: get well soon.

Forever Young

47-year-old Jamie Moyer finally had the outing we had been waiting for. Finally, he skipped the one bad inning that plagued him in his first two starts, and pitched as he did in the rest of the those starts. For six solid innings. If not for a pair of Chase Utley errors in the 5th, Jamie Moyer would have given up zero runs in those six innings. As it stands, it's hard to get on Utley's case for those errors after the stellar defense that backed Roy Halladay on Wednesday. Utley's double play that night was more than enough to buy him some breathing room for a few games. Still, it would have been nice to continue shutting out the Braves. The greatest moment in Moyer's outing had to be when he struck out Jason Heyward looking in the 6th after throwing three straight balls to him to start the at-bat. Never mind that Jamie Moyer made his major league debut more than three years before Heyward was born.

(Photo courtesy of John Bazemore/AP)

The offense decided to show up again, tallying up eight runs through good, small ball playing. All of the runs were scored on either RBI single or sac flies, but I can't really complain when they scored more than three runs for the first time since last Friday's outing against the Marlins. Greg Dobbs also went 2-for-3 filling in for a bruised Placido Polanco at third for the first half of the game, and Juan Castro continued his suddenly hot hitting, going 3-for-5 and raising his average to .353. Ross Gload also had the second pinch hit of anyone coming off the bench for the Phillies this year, driving in a run in the 7th.

The bullpen decided to return to form last night. Chad Durbin and David Herndon both managed to pitch themselves into and out of jams, but that "out of" part matters much more than the "into." Durbin had the bases loaded for Brian McCann in the 7th, but managed to escape with only one run scoring on a sac fly by McCann before he struck out Troy Glaus, who seems to be booed every time he comes to the plate in Atlanta. In between Durbin and Herndon, Danys Baez had a nice 1-2-3 inning, which was reassuring to see after his last outing a week before.

The Phillies continue their road trip in Arizona tonight, facing the Diamondbacks for the weekend. Cole Hamels will take the mound tonight, and hopefully show that his 8+ innings, 2 ER, 9 K performance last Sunday is going to be the norm from now on. If he does, the bats better not forget to show up this time.

 (Photo courtesy of Todd Zolecki/The Zo Zone)

In the final news for the day, J.A. Happ was put on the 15-day DL yesterday after starting to throwing an abbreviated bullpen session and talking it over with the trainer and pitching coach. This is probably for the best, as the Phillies have Nelson Figueroa to cover tomorrow and can get away with a four man rotation after that through the end of this road trip. Happ's DL stint is back-dated to April 16th, so he'll be eligible to come off on May 1st. At this point in the season, and with a potential lingering injury like the one that Happ has, it's a good idea to err on the side of caution here. Plus, Joe Blanton is getting closer to making his return, so the Phillies have a little leeway in giving Happ extra time off. Still, another injury is another injury. Hopefully this will be the last of them for a while.

The Bullpen Rears Its Ugly Head

We knew it couldn't last forever. The offense and bullpen simply could not cover up forever the fact that every starter not named Halladay has gone 6 or fewer innings in each of his starts. The offense didn't get it going until the 6th inning, other than yet another homer by Utley early on. They scored 3 more runs in the 6th, but Shane Victorino left the bases loaded, which would become one of many crucial stranding of runners throughout the game. Still, at the time the Phillies were up 4-1 against a lackluster Nationals offense, Ryan Zimmerman-less, that had only managed one unearned run up until that point, despite the fact that J.A. Happ walked 6 men. He may have a 0.00 ERA through 10.1 IP, but he has a pretty poor WHIP, or walks and hits per innings pitched, at 1.65. Just shows how some of the more traditional stats like ERA don't tell the whole story.

Anyway, on most days, going into the 7th with a 4-1 score against the Nationals would have been just fine. Only it became 4-2 with Bastardo pitching. A little worrisome but not terrible. Then it came apart in the 8th. Danys Baez gave up a home run to Adam Dunn, his first of the year, to lead off the inning. 3 batters later, after walking Ivan Rodriguez, an injured Ryan Zimmerman hobbled to the plate (okay, I'm exaggerating) as a pinch hitter, and of course hit a home run. 5-4 Nationals. Bad, but hey, this is the Phillies offense that scored 64 runs through 8 games so far this season. So after the Phillies were retired in the bottom of the 8th, it was up to Ryan Madson to hold it to a 1 run lead for the top of the order coming up in the bottom of the inning. Instead, he continued the first Phillies bullpen collapse of 2009, allowing batters on 2nd and 3rd for Rodriguez to bat them in with a single. 7-4 Nationals. Still, we believed when Victorino led off the bottom of the 9th with a 405 foot homer and Polanco followed with a single. Then Utley, Howard, and Werth were retired in order. 7-5 Nationals.

(Photo courtesy of Yong Kim/Inquirer staff photographer)

There's nothing left to do after a game like this but dust off and move on. The pitching was ugly, no doubt about that. Roy Halladay will be back on the mound tomorrow, and ideally that will give the bullpen much needed rest after today's implosion. As for the rest of the starters, Hamels has his issues but nothing major as of yet. Kendrick is clearly not going to last very long in the rotation, especially with Charlie moving Halladay up to tomorrow from Saturday, since there was an off day this week. This sets up the possibility that Kendrick's next scheduled start can simply be skipped with another off day next week. Joe Blanton should be close to recovered by then. Jamie Moyer's next start will be against the Marlins on Saturday, and it will be interesting to see how he fares against that lineup. In his last start against the Fish last year, he pitched 7 innings and gave up 1 hit, striking out 4. It will also be his day to make history, becoming the first non-knuckleballer in major league history to start more than one game at his age or older.

(Photo courtesy of Pat Sullivan/AP)

Many consider tomorrow night to be the real beginning of the Phillies season, after warming up against the Nationals and Astros for the first 3 series of the season. I don't buy this, but I do agree that the next series against the Marlins then after that against the Braves and Giants will be a truer measure of what the Phillies 2010 season will turn out to be. Game on.

Game 8: Jimmy Who?

Another win is in the books for the Phillies in this offensively hot 2010 season, with them beating the Nationals 14-7. Yes, the Nationals scored 7 runs, 6 of which were off Kyle Kendrick. Remember how people always said to not trust Spring Training results, no matter how tempting? This is starting to look like a good case for why. Of course, it's only 2 starts, but he probably had the most to prove as a starter going into this, and has not done so, even against the Washington Nationals. Once again, he needs to go back to working out with Roy Halladay.

(Photo courtesy of Greg Fiume/Getty Images)

The story of the night, going in, was the effect that losing Jimmy Rollins to the DL (out 2-4 weeks officially, hopefully on the lower end of that) and resting Jayson Werth. Well, from the 1st inning it was clear that this game belonged to the offense, on both sides. Stammen and Kendrick were both rocked and knocked out in less than 2. Kendrick gave up 6 runs in 1.2 innings, Stammen gave up 7 runs in 1.1. Not exactly your classic pitchers' duel. Once again, the Phillies bullpen was phenomenal, giving up 1 run in 7.1 innings. Figueroa not only pitched effectively, but hit a single and a double. He's looking like a better pick up every time he goes out. Durbin continued to look as effective this year as he was disappointing last year. Bastardo and Herndon combined to pitch a scoreless 8th and 9th.

Back to that offense, Shane Victorino's performance in the lead off spot was simply stellar. He was 4 for 5 with 2 singles, a 3 run triple, and a 2 run homer. That's 4 for 5 and a double shy of the cycle. He was certain doing his best 2010 J-Roll impression. Then there was Chase Utley, with his 2nd and 3rd homers in as many games. Placido Polanco and Ryan Howard also contributed multi-hit games of their own (as did the aforementioned Figueroa). All in all, J-Roll was missed, but not in the box score.

(Photo courtesy of Matt Slocum/AP)

Now, it's on to the final game of the series tomorrow, and Happ will try to bring the second sweep in a row for the Phils. So far, the offense is scary good. There's no two ways about that. You can argue all day long that we've only faced the Nationals and the Astros so far, and there's certainly some merit to that. However, even good teams playing terrible teams don't tend to average 8 runs a game. Winning 7 of 8 is impressive no matter what the schedule is. That being said, it'll be fun to see what happens going forward against the Marlins this weekend and against the Braves after that. I say, bring it on.

Sweepin' Up the 'Stros

The Phillies have their first sweep of the season. And wow. Roy Halladay sure knows how to get the job done. Today marks his 150th career win, and 50th career complete game. Yes, you read that right. A full one third of his wins are complete games (Update: It's been pointed out to me that not all of his complete games were wins. Nevertheless, the numbers are still pretty unbelievable). That, my friends and fellow fans, simply does not happen anymore. But it just did, today.

(Photo courtesy of Dave Einsel / AP)

I haven't updated since the Phillies left my area on Thursday, so I'll give a brief rundown of this recent sweep and then some thoughts on what the Phillies have shown so far.

Friday night's game saw a solid start from J.A. Happ, giving up no runs in 5 innings. However, as with Cole Hamels in game 2 against the Nationals, Happ labored through those 5 innings. The bullpen, however sparkled. David Herndon continues to be one of the better Rule 5 picks around lately. His strong innings were followed by an inning each by our favorite pair of former Cuban defectors, Danys Baez and Jose Contreras, who were both unhittable. Among Baez, Contreras, Herndon, and Madson the Phillies have 4 relievers who have touched 95 and above on the radar gun, each with a solid mix of pitches to boot. This raw stuff was simply not there in the bullpen last year. Backing up this combined 4 pitcher shutout, the offense did its job and scored 8 runs on 16 hits, including 3 hits by the reawakened Raul Ibanez. I'm going to pretend that he had a stunt double standing in for him before that point and hope for the best from this point forward.

(Photo courtesy of Todd Zolecki)

Moving on to Saturday night's game, our favorite 47 year old pitcher got his first start of the season, playing on "turn back the clock night" in Houston, where the Astros wore 1965 throwback uniforms. Incidentally, as has been pointed out elsewhere, Jamie Moyer is the only active player who was alive in 1965. It's those little details like that that make his career all the more astounding. His start was not all that astounding, however, giving up 5 runs including 2 home runs in the 3rd inning, which now puts him at 493 homers given up in his career. That means he's 12 short of the all-time record set by the Phillies' own Robin Roberts. Not bad company. That start aside, a 2 run shot by Ryan Howard in the 6th inning put Moyer in line for the win and the bullpen did its job once again, limiting the Astros to one run in 3 innings of relief. Shane Victorino, the last lackluster piece of the Phillies offense, came alive with a 2 run homer in the 8th after an RBI single earlier in the game. The Phillies took it 8-5.

And then there was one. One game left to earn the first sweep of the season. One game left, if all went well, for Roy Halladay to win his 150th game. It was a pitchers' duel from the start, well at least after Roy Oswalt gave up a leadoff homer to Jimmy Rollins, J-Roll's 34th career leadoff blast. That and a sacrifice fielder's choice by Ruiz in the 2nd was all Halladay needed. He went 9 innings, struck out 8, and gave up one unearned run. That included a 6th inning where he loaded the bases with no outs, then got a sacrifice double play and a quick 3rd out when Carlos Lee popped out to shortstop. Halladay gave up 2 singles to start the 7th, then after allowing the runners to advance on a Kaz Matsui bunt, Halladay induced a grounder back to him and a strikeout. Oh, and he even had a single in the top of the 7th. He cruised through the 8th and 9th, though Carlos Lee hit a monster foul ball that was feet away from being a homer to start off the 9th that likely gave all Phillies fans watching a near heart attack. Clearly the baseball gods were smiling on Roy today. When he got Pedro Feliz (yes, that Pedro Feliz) to pop out to Utley to end the game with the Phillies winning 2-1, it became clear to all just why the Phillies went to great lengths to acquire this guy.

Needless to say, the Phillies season so far has been an exciting one. With a 5-1 record, the Phillies came into today leading the majors in most offensive categories, but they showed in today's game that they can win with more than just their frightening offense. The bullpen got its rest in today, but they've all looked sharper than us fans could have hoped for coming out of spring training. About that offense, every single regular has now contributed solidly, even a few of the pitchers, though that's really the icing on the cake. I won't make crazy statements on how many wins, runs, etc. the Phillies are on pace to get, but I will say this. Assuming that there's more to this first week's performance than completely destroying a few mediocre (or worse) teams, this is going to be a damn good year.

Game 3: You Win Some...

Well, it had to happen. We all knew Jayson Werth's bat would come alive, and what a day it was. 3 doubles in 3 at-bats, and long fly out that probably would have been a 4th double if the center fielder hadn't been Nyjer Morgan. It'll take a lot more than that to make us forget about the beard though. Just sayin', Jayson.

Oh, also the Phillies lost. 6-5. What made it worse was that we hit atrociously with runners in scoring position. Meaning we were tantalizingly close to pulling ahead and left runners on base (11 in all), inning after inning, particularly late in the game. The two particularly painful moments: Howard's baserunning blunder in the 5th (probably the fault of 3rd base coach Sam Perlozzo) and Ryan Zimmerman's double in the 7th, which was the rare "blooper" double, thanks to incredible luck of the ball landing inches fair. As for the Howard incident, Perlozzo was waving him right along right until Howard got to the base when he held up a giant "STOP" motion, so it's hard to blame Howard for running hard up until that point, that is to say doing exactly what he was supposed to be doing.

(Photo courtesy of Susan Walsh / AP Photo)

The two bigger issues to take away from this game lay with a certain pitcher and a certain hitter. The pitcher had a stellar spring training that translated into a far less than stellar outing today, with Kendrick's final line being 4 IP, 5 ER, 6 hits, including 1 HR, and 2 K. I guess for all of his working out with Roy Halladay, he still leaves sinkers up in the zone. However, it was just one starts, so I'm willing to cut him a break on that.

The above mentioned hitter had an awful spring training that, so far, has translated into the exact opposite of a torrid start. Raul Ibanez is 1 for 11 after 3 games, though he has scored 3 runs after working a few walks. Still, coupled with his .122 Grapefruit League average and his lackluster second half of the 2010 season, this is starting to be cause for concern. Of course it's early on and Raul has plenty of time to turn things around, but I think all of us would like to see that happens sooner rather than later. Let's face it, he's not a young man anymore.

(Photo courtesy of Yong Kim / Inquirer staff photographer)

The first loss of the season comes with its share of silver linings. Hitters 1 through 5 of the Phillies lineup continued to show why the rest of the league should be afraid of our offense, with each of them having a multi-hit game and going a combined 11 for 23. If they keep this up at even 75% of their current rate, and the 6-8 hitters (though Carlos Ruiz, no slouch at the plate himself in the first 2 games, had the day off today) find their stride, this team could score 1000 runs. Sure, that's wishful thinking, but crazier things have happened in this wonderful sport.

For now, it's on to Houston and time for Happ to show that last season was not all about luck for him. I appreciate the power of numbers, but I hope for the Phillies' sake that Happ proves us statheads wrong this season.

The Curious Case of James Anthony Happ

I've noticed that several writers, particularly the statistically-inclined, are abuzz about our favorite 2nd place ROY finisher and upstart starter, J.A. Happ. The consensus seems to be that he overperformed last year and is headed, as ESPN's Hot Stove U put it, into the "dreaded sophomore slump." Now, I have to be consistent. A lot of the stats, especially BABIP and FIP, that predict Happ having a worse year next year are the same stats that I would point to to say that Hamels will have a better year next year. Briefly, BABIP is batting average on balls in play and FIP is fielding independent pitching. BABIP is generally out of the pitcher's control, while FIP tries to isolate what the pitcher is directly responsible for. So I've already made the argument that Hamels will have a better year because he had bad luck last year, in this case a high BABIP. Happ had an unusually low BABIP. Hamels underperformed his FIP last year, while Happ overperformed his. So based on that, and other stats that you can read about in the links at the bottom, I have to agree that Happ is a candidate for a sophomore slump.

However, no pitcher remains the same from season to season, and Happ is still relatively new to the big leagues. He did show resolve under pressure by coming through time after time with runners in scoring position. Some of his absurdly good numbers in those situations can be attributed to luck, that low BABIP, but he also showed the ability to get batters out swinging after those waist-high (and higher) fastballs. The stuff and confidence is there, even if he did overperform somewhat in 2009. He's also shown that's he's a fast learner, another skill that you can't teach.

I don't remember exactly when it was, but sometime after his beautiful complete game shutout against the Jays on June 27th, Happ said in an interview that someone else on the team told him to throw more strikes, and that's exactly what he did, and that's exactly what he continued to do for the subsequent 3 months. I don't necessarily expect another sub-3 or even sub-4 ERA season out of Happ, but remember, we don't need him to be that guy. That's why we have Roy Halladay, and yes, Cole Hamels.

As promised, some links:

Crashburn Alley: The Case Against J.A. Happ

Phillies Nation: Year in Review: J.A. Happ

If you have ESPN Insider access, definitely read:
2010's Biggest Breakout and Bust