Liberty Ball

Jamie Moyer was extremely sharp in his third win of the season.  He gave up just two hits and two walks with five strikeouts in 7 1/3 shutout innings.  Bret Myers struck out the only two batters he faced and Antonio Alfonseca gave up the only run of the game in the ninth.

Jimmy Rollins went two for five with two stolen bases and he scored two runs in the 6-1 win.  Jason Werth drove in two runs and Jamie Moyer even helped out his own cause with two hits.

So after spending some time in the cellar after the early tough stretch, the Phillies have pushed into a tie with the Marlins for third place.  They’re still just 11-13 and they are 4 1/2 games back of the Mets and Braves, but when you start things off this bad, you just take it a series at a time.  And there’s no better way to make up some ground then against one of those first place teams because they kick off a three game series against the Braves tomorrow.  Jon Lieber gets the start and he’ll face a solid Tim Hudson.

Adam Eaton had a tough time in the Phillies 11-5 loss to the Marlins.  He took the loss and dropped to 2-2 and he gave up seven runs on ten hits and three walks with four strikeouts in 4 1/3 innings.  Francisco Rosario was also hit hard and he gave up three runs in 1 2/3 innings.

Rod Barajas went yard in the loss and he finished with two hits.  Chase Utley drove in two runs and Aaron Rowand went one for four with two runs.

Jamie Moyer gets the start tomorrow in the rubber game.  Hopefully Moyer can do a little bit of a better job then what happened tonight.

The Phillies took the lead back in this game on three different occassions and the third time was the charm as they topped the Marlins 6-5.  The game winner was a walkoff RBI single by Carlos Ruiz.

Freddy Sanchez had a tough time and he gave up four runs on seven hits and two walks in 4 2/3 innings.  Oddly, for as roughed up as he was, he struck out an impressive eight hitters.  Tom Gordon blew the save when he gave up a run in the ninth but then he picked up the win when the Phillies won it.

Aaron Rowand went four for five with a solo homerun.  Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley each went yard as well in the win.

Don’t look now, but the Phillies have moved into a tie for third place with the Marlins.  The Mets lost too, although it looks like the Braves will win.  It’ll be Adam Eaton against Dontrelle Willis tomorrow in a nice pitching matchup.

The Phillies had a nice run but they just ran out of gas today.  Their best starter, Cole Hamels even dropped his first game of the season.  He gave up four runs on eight hits and three walks with four strikeouts in 5 1/3 innings.  The pen got it done though and three relievers combined for 3 2/3 perfect innings.

Wes Helms had two hits and Aaron Rowand hit his fourth homerun of the season in the 4-2 loss.  It’s tough to win with only seven baserunners though (five hits and two walks).

Next up is three against the Marlins, who sit just a half ahead of the Phillies.  Freddy Garcia gets the start in the opener and hopefully he can start a new winning streak.

It’s about the time the Phillies started rolling and they extended their winning streak to four games with a win over the Nationals tonight.  Jon Lieber threw six solid innings and he picked up his first win of the season.  He gave up two runs on five hits with five strikeouts in six innings.

Chase Utley had a huge game in the 9-3 win.  He was a perfect five for five and he drove three and scored one.  Ryan Howard hit homerun number three and Jimmy Rollins scored three times and hit his eighth homerun of the season. It’s been a pretty good month for Rollins.

Cole Hamels gets the start tomorrow as the Phillies go for the sweep.  Shawn Hill will be on the mound for the Nationals.

Don’t look now, because the Phillies are on a winning streak.  They won back to back games for the first time two days ago and they extended that streak to four games tonight against Nationals. 

Jamie Moyer was touched up for three runs in his six innings of work and when he left the game, the Philles were down.  Fortunately, they weren’t out as Aaron Rowand hit a solo homer in the seventh to tie and then Wes Helms singled home Chase Utley in the eighth for the game winner. 

Rowand finished the game two for four with two RBIs and a run.  Chase Utley and Wes Helms each scored two runs in the 6-3 win and Antonio Alfonseca pitched a shutout eighth to pick up the win.  Tom Gordon did his job in the ninth and he picked up his fourth save of the season.

Jon Lieber gets the ball tomorrow as the Phillies take on John Patterson.  Four straight?

The Phillies picked up eleven runs on twenty hits in an 11-4 blowout win in a rain out make up game against the Astros.  Just about everyone was a hitting star in this one and all nine starters had at least a hit.  Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley hit homeruns and Rollins led the way by going four for five with two RBIs and four runs.

Adam Eaton coasted to an easy win.  He improved to 2-1 and he gave up four runs on seven hits and three walks with seven strikeouts in six innings.  The pen was also pretty suprisingly good.

Jamie Moyer gets the start tomorrow in the first game of a three game series against the Nationals.  I like the matchups in all three games in this series so hopefully the Phillies can keep this going.

Yes, it’s two wins in a row.  For the first time this year, the Phillies have won back to back games and this one was a no-doubter as they blew out the Reds 9-3.  Ryan Howard hit homerun number two and he drove in three runs while Chase Utley went two for three with a walk, an RBI and three runs. 

Freddy Garcia picked up his first win as a Phillies with five solid innings.  He gave up two runs on four hits with three strikeouts.  Bret Myers gave up a run in the ninth and Antonio Alfonseca had another solid outing with a perfect eighth inning.

Adam Eaton takes on the Astros tomorrow in a makeup game from last Sunday.  Then it’s three against the Nationals.  This might be the week where the Phillies make a push to come close to the .500 mark. 

What a start by Cole Hamels.  He goes the distance and he strikes out fifteen in a 4-1 win over the Reds.  He gave up just a single run on five hits with two walks.

Chase Utley provided most of the offense.  He homered and finished with three RBIs. The other run was driven in by Aaron Rowand on a solo homerun and Scott Victorino finished with two hits and a run.

Things are so much better when the Phillies win.  They go for their first two game winning streak tomorrow with Freddy Garcia taking on Matt Belisle.

Sometime, fact can be stranger then fiction and I swear, you can’t make this stuff up.  John Lieber and four relievers held the Reds to just a single hit in eight shutout innings.  In the meantime, the Phillies put a run on the board in the fifth on an error by Brandon Phillips.  So all Tom Gordon has to do is come in to pitch the ninth and get three outs.  No problem, right?

Gordon served up a solo homerun to Scott Hatteberg and then in the tenth, he gave up a run after loading the bases to lose the game 2-1 in ten innings.  Sigh.

The loss drops the Phillies to 4-11 and this is just getting ugly.  Cole Hamels will hopefully get it done tomorrow.  If not, all bets are off in this series.

The Phillies finally won their fourth game and while the ninth was a bit scray, Tom Gordon hung on and didn’t blow it.  Jamie Moyer had a very nice start and the Phillies jumped on John Patterson early and the end result was a 4-2 win.

Moyer gave up just two runs on four hits and four walks with five strikeouts in eight innings.  He did pitch into the ninth but as it turned out, that was probably a mistake as Tom Gordon had to come in and stop a Nationals rally.  When the dust cleared though, Moyer had his second win and Gordon his third save.

Scott Victorino went three for five with a run and an RBI and Aaron Rowand hit a solo homerun.  Carlos Ruiz also had a nice game with two doubles and a run.

Next up is three against Cincinnati, who like last year, are exceeding expectations.  I like our chances in this one though as the Phillies will miss both Bronson Arroyo and Aaron Harang, and the Reds back end of their rotation isn’t all that great.  Maybe it’ll be our first series win.

Sigh, the ship is definitely sinking.  You have the overreaction of sending Bret Myers to the bullpen of all places and then there was the Charlie Manual blowup at the radio guy.  I don’t live in Philly so I don’t even know who the guys were but this is getting a big ridiculous.

In last night’s game, the Phillies came back from a 4-1 deficit to tie it, then they lost it in the thirteenth in a tough game.  Greg Dobbs had a big two run double to make it a one run game and then Carlos Ruiz drove home the tying run in the ninth on a ground out.  Earlier, Adam Eaton tried to help out his own cause with an RBI double and that put the Phillies on the board.

Adam Eaton wasn’t all that great in his start.  He gave up four runs on four hits and a walk with four strikeouts in six innings.  Five relievers then combined for six innings of shutout ball before Fracisco Rosario gave up the game winner.

And that makes loss number ten and the Phillies now have the worst record in all baseball.  Maybe, just maybe, Jamie Moyer will be able to get it done this afternoon in the finale.

3-9.  Sigh and the debut of Freddy Garcia was less the expected as he was hammered by the Mets.  He gave up three runs on eight hits and two walks in just 4 2/2 innings.  He did strike out six though and that was a bit optmistic but he threw 95 pitches in that short amout of time.  Three different relievers all gave up runs as well with Matt Smith getting tagged for three.

The lone run came in the third inning when Ryan Howard drew a bases loaded walk.  Pitchers won’t even throw to him with a base open.  Jimmy Rollins had a solid day at the plate and he had three of the Phillies eight hits.

So the Phillies now sit behind even the Nationals and they’re already 5 1/2 games out.  It’s time to start putting a dent into that as the Phillies head to Washington for two games against the Nationals.  Adam Eaton will throw tonight and hopefully he’ll get it done.

Alright, the Phillies are now 3-8.  Pretty disappointing but it’s better then 2-9.  And they did it today by coming back against the Astros.  Down 4-1, they finished with an 8-5 win.

Chase Utley and Jimmy Rollins both homered in the game.  The Astros stayed away from Howard and he drew four walks and both Utley and Rollins drove in two.  Utley finished three for five and he also scored twice.

Cole Hamels had his worst start of the season so far but he picked up his first win. He gave up five runs on eight hits with three strikeouts in six innings.

Freddy Garcia makes his Phillies debut tomorrow.  He’ll go up against Wandy Rodriguez.

The good news is, the Phillies beat up Roy Oswalt, which is no small task.  The bad news is, the Astros hit Bret Myers even harder in the Phillies 9-6 loss.  He gave up seven runs on three hits and five walks with four strikeouts in just 3 1/3 innings.  Two of those three hits just happened to go over the fence.

Ryan Howard and Aaron Rowand had identical lines.  Each went two for four with a walk, a run and an RBI.  Chase Utley drew two walks and he both scored and drove in a run.

Cole Hamels has been the Phillies best starter and he’ll throw tomorrow.  It sure would be nice to pick up that third win.

I guess Jimmy Rollins can’t do it all.  He went two for four with two homeruns and three RBIs as he pretty much was the Phillies offense.  It’s just unfortunate that nobody else could get things going as the Phillies lost 5-3.

Jamie Moyer took the loss.  He gave up four runs (three earned) on seven hits and two walks with six strikeouts in six innings.  Clay Condrey was also touched up for a run in relief.

So the 2-7 Phillies are once again kept out of the cellar by the truly horrible Nationals.  Next up is three against Houston with a great matchup tomorrow.  Bret Myers will face off against Roy Oswalt in a battle of aces.

Adam Eaton gave up just two runs on four hits and three walks with five strikeouts in seven innings last night in the Phillies 5-2 win over the Mets.  Tom Gordon struck out two and he gave up a hit in the ninth to pick up his first save of the season.

The Phillies did most of their damage early when they drew a ton of walks off of Oliver Perez.  In fact all three runs scored without getting a hit.  Wes Helms and Aaron Rowand drew bases loaded walks and Rod Barajas was hit with the bases loaded to drive in the third run.  Rowand finished with two RBIs and Ryan Howard walked twice and scored two runs.

The Phillies can actually win a series if they get it done tonight.  Jamie Moyer is on the mound in a battle of 40+ year olds as he takes on Tom Glavine.

Talk about an ugly game.  The Phillies took a 5-4 lead into the bottom of the eighth and when the Mets were done, it was 11-5.  A solid start by Cole Hamels went to waste and Geoff Gear took the brunt of the Mets offensive attack by giving up five of the seven runs in that inning.  Hamels struck out seven in six innings and gave up three runs on six hits.

Chase Utley and Ryan Howard hit their first homeruns of the season and they accounted for the five Phillies runs.  Aaron Rowand drew three walks and Pat Burrell went two for five.

So Adam Eaton will try to get the Phillies their elusive second win.  Oliver Perez is throwing for the Mets so I’m hoping the Phillies can get this done.

Zach Segovia took it on the chin as the Phillies lost for the fifth time in the first six games to drop four games behind the 5-1 Braves.  Segovia gave up five runs on eight hits and a walk with two strikeouts in five innings of work.

The Phillies drew eleven walks in this one but the stranded fourteen.  Ryan Howard led the way with the stick. He went two for four with a double, two RBIs and a run.

And it doesn’t get any easier as the Phillies head to New York to take on the Mets.  Cole Hamels will throw against John Maine in a solid battle between two young starters.

It’s bad when you’re 1-4 and your ace gets his you know what handed to him.  He gave up six runs and didn’t even last five innings as the Marlins tore him apart.

Jimmy Rollins hit his third homerun of the season with a three run shot.  Chase Utley accounted for most of the rest of the offense with two doubles and an RBI in the 8-5 loss.

Zack Sagovia makes his major league debut tomorrow in the rubber game.  He’ll face Scott Olsen.

Maybe the Phillies just needed a change of scenery and sunny Florida did the trick as the Phillies blasted the Marlins 8-2.  Pat Burrell had a big game at the plate.  He went two for four with a homerun, four RBIs and two runs.  Jimmy Rollins also went yard with a two run shot while Carlos Ruiz went two for four with a run and an RBI.

Jamie Moyer picked up the win and I erred in my column yesterday.  I got Moyer and Freddy Garcia confused so this obviously wasn’t Moyer’s Phillie debut.  Anyway, he gave up two runs on seven hits and two walks with three strikeouts in seven innings of work.

Bret Myers goes for his first win tomorrow.  Maybe the Phillies can put together a little winning streak here at the Marlins expense.

The Phillies have yet to pick up their first win and I’m glad the Braves are out of town.  This time it was more of a beatdown but it was a loss none the less.  Adam Eaton was knocked around for eight runs on seven hits and four walks in less then five innings of work.  The pen did a nice job and didn’t yield a run but the deficit was too much to overcome.

Chase Utley had three hits and a run while Pat Burrell had two hits, a run and an RBI.  The Phillies head on the road to Florida to take on the Marlins.  Jamie Moyer makes his first Phillie start and hopefully he can right the ship.

This is getting old, and it’s only the second game.  An incredible start by Cole Hamels was completely wasted when Tom Gordon gave up a two run homerun in the top of the ninth that sent the game into extra frames.  Then in the eleventh, Ryan Madson gave up a solo homerun that ended up being the game winner.  Hamels struck out eight in seven shutout innings and he gave up just four hits.

Carlos Ruiz had a nice game at the plate.  He had two hits including a homerun and Scott Victorino drove in the other run with a double.

The Phillies have to win tomorrow to avoid the sweep.  Adam Eaton gets the start on get away day.

Baseball Prospectus profiled Chase Utley today.  Good stuff as they go through his minor league career and then finish up with what he did in 2006.  There’s a lot of good stuff in here so be sure to check it out.

Ah well, I guess you can’t win it all.  Bret Myers threw a solid game but one bad pitch to Edgar Renteria meant that he left the game tied instead of ahead.  Myers had a solid game though.  He gave up the three runs on four hits with only two walks and then the nine strikeouts.

And this is the problem with having an aging closer who’s really only good for one inning.  Instead of your best reliever in there in the tenth inning, you have Ryan Madson.  Gordon pitched a scoreless ninth but then Madson gave up the two runs in the tenth and just like that, you’re done.

Jimmy Rollins homered and both Ryan Howard and Aaron Rowand had two hits each.  We’ll see Cole Hamels on Wednesday after an off day tomorrow.