THE PODCAST OF AWESOMENESS: VOL. 2, NO. 1

There are some jokes that are timeless. For instance, the old vaudeville bit called The Aristocrats has withstood the test of time through the generations in certain circles.

Don’t go telling that joke at the dinner table when your grandmother is around.

Of course there are other bits of humor that we latch onto as kids and never let go. Heirlooms, of sorts, that becomes flash points in a family history. You know, like the very first time you went to your oldest son and said, “Pull my finger.”

It never gets old.

Reliving the times when funny stories were told never gets old, either. That’s especially true of the tales that involve hand buzzers, bubble wrap or whoopee cushions. In this instance it isn’t just family or friendly banter that these things are relegated to. Oh no, not at all. In fact, Roman Emperor Elagabalus was known to trot out the whoopee cushion at dinner parties when he took over in the year 218. Sure, Elagabalus was only 18 when he was assassinated in the year 222, but a precedent was set.

Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales is filled with fart jokes. There was hardly a moment when the Squire, Merchant or Parson was making a crack with a face Rodney Dangerfield made famous attached to it. Better yet, master comic Mark Twain was not averse to going to the ol' breaking-wind route.

So in our first episode of the new year after a long hiatus, we discuss the etymology of the scent gag. Here, take a listen:

010411 PODCAST V2_1

Of course we break down the matchup between the Packers and Eagles in the NFL Playoffs, discuss the possibility of the Winter Classic in Philly, and wonder if the governor of the commonwealth has lined up when his political career is over.

Maybe he become a gag-pulling talking head on the chat shows… 

2010: The year of Roy, Lee and crazy endings

Note: For all intents, this will be the last installment for 2010 and as such we here at The Food would like to extend hearty December wishes to all our supporters, friends, colleagues and even the haters. All of these folks made 2010 a pretty interesting year and we’re hoping 2011 can be just as good. So for now, see you soon and be ready for some cool things to come, including the reemergence of The Podcast of Awesomeness in early January.

I don’t like end of the year lists. In fact, I loathe them. Yeah… loathe. It’s not a normal thing for people to dislike, especially one in the business of recounting things that already happened. Weird, right?

Maybe it’s something about the passage of time that gets some people like me down. Another year slips by, another year older, another missed chance. Or perhaps the veritable annual list is the refuge of the hack, kind of like the post-game or post-season report cards? List and report cards? Lame.

Thing is, I enjoy reading a list from time to time. When done well or uniquely, they can be fascinating. Chances are this won’t be one of them, but alas, I’m saving my ideas for something else.

So, without any more blathering on, here are some lists of a pretty remarkable year that is all but gone.

Best big-time performance nearly everyone forgot about

Roy Halladay vs. San Francisco in Game 5 of NLCS

Undoubtedly, 2010 was a pretty big year for Roy Halladay. In fact, Halladay also should be the top of a list for both elbowing a big event out of the way (perfect game in Miami on the same day as Game 1 of the Flyers in the Stanley Cup Finals), while also being shoved out of the limelight (Donovan McNabb was traded to Washington the night before his debut with the Phillies in Washington). The fact is Halladay did everything for the Phillies except for a World Series victory, but we have to figure that the addition of Cliff Lee to the pitching rotation should remedy that.

It wasn’t as if Halladay had too many doubters in 2010, though a few warnings were issued, like my favorite delivered before the Halladay’s postseason debut: “Hey, he’s going to learn that the playoffs are much different than the regular season…”

Yeah, they’re easier. Halladay made his playoff debut with his second no-hitter of the season and just the second ever in postseason history.

But sometimes it really isn’t easy at all. For instance, Halladay did not have an easy time in the do-or-die Game 5 in San Francisco against Giants’ ace Tim Lincecum. Halladay suffered a groin injury during the second inning of the game—one that would have ended his night during the regular season—but persevered long enough to pitch the Phillies to victory. The injury came while attempting to put a little something extra on a pitch to Cody Ross, and hurt so badly that Halladay says he spent the time between innings jogging and riding a stationary bike so the groin would not further tighten and cramp.

So Halladay would pitch an inning then workout until it was time to pitch again. The catch-22 was that the legs are vital to a pitcher like Halladay, so not only was he keeping the cramps at bay, but also was tiring other muscles needed to pitch.

Instead, he labored through six innings, didn’t have the greatest command or velocity, yet still held the Giants to just two runs to beat Lincecum and save the season.

Afterwards, many players on the team said Halladay’s performance was more impressive than the no-hitter and perfect game.

“That’s what I’m thinking,” said Brad Lidge, who got the save in the game. “It’s not going to go down that way. But the guy was pitching on one wheel and he gave us six innings and left with the lead in a game we had to win or else. People won’t realize how great this was because there’s no statistic for it, but we, the guys in this clubhouse, do.”

Equally impressive was how Halladay shrugged it off after the game and even threw his hat into the ring as a possible reliever for a potential Game 7.

“I was going to try to find a way,” Halladay said. “I just hoped that way was going to be good enough and fortunately it was.”

Unfortunately there is no statistic or formula to measure what Halladay meant to the Phillies in that game.

Heroic performance that ended badly

Roy Oswalt in relief vs. San Francisco in Game 4 of NLCS

Who doesn’t love feats of strength? Who doesn’t get excited by extraordinary occurrences? In those regards, a pitcher working on short rest is always a time to sit up and take notice.

First of all, something had to happen to put a team in the position to use a pitcher without proper rest. Usually that thing isn’t good, and in this instance starter Roy Oswalt saw the way the pivotal Game 4 was unfolding and figured he had to do something. When he looked down the right-field line and saw Kyle Kendrick throwing warm-up pitches next to lefty Antonio Bastardo and Ryan Madson so quickly after Chad Durbin gave up the lead on the third hitter he faced, Oswalt probably didn’t feel too confident. Chances are Oswalt might have panicked when he saw Charlie Manuel’s options.

So when Madson went out to the mound to start his second inning of work in the eighth, Oswalt approached pitching coach Rich Dubee with a proposition…

Give me the ball.

Imagine what a legend Oswalt would have become if he would have survived the ninth, figured out a way to win the game, and then rode Halladay’s performance in Game 5 to a 3-2 advantage going back to Philadelphia. Backed by a masterful three-hitter over eight innings just two days prior, Oswalt could have been the catalyst to get the Phillies back into the World Series.

Instead, he was merely a footnote and a mark in the box score that indicates that he got two outs in the ninth inning of a loss. Oh, but it was nearly so much more.

Most disappointing way to end a season

Ryan Howard watching strike three go past with tying and winning runs on base

Yeah, it was the one moment that perfectly defined the Phillies in hitters in 2010. Though Ryan Howard batted a team best .318 in the NLCS, he struck out a record-breaking 12 times. Instead of a big hit like in the 2009 NLDS against Colorado in a similar situation, Howard watched the season end with the umpire waving his right hand in the air.

Oh, but every dark cloud has a silver lining. Knowing that the rapidly aging Phillies’ hitters are streaky and riddled with question marks, general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. thought it was necessary to go out and get Cliff Lee.

Way to go, big fella.

Honorable mention

Patrick Kane’s goal in overtime of Game 6 that Michael Leighton still hasn’t seen or fished out of the net was particularly maddening, but not for the reasons one would think.

Though it ended the Flyers’ chances to win the Stanley Cup for the first time in 35 years, and ruined an improbable comeback thanks to Scott Hartnell’s goal with 3:59 remaining in regulation, this one was especially sloppy because the Blackhawks had to wait for a review before they could properly celebrate. We knew it was a goal, but we had to wait…

And then Jeremy Roenick cried.

Best one-day performance in Philadelphia

Usain Bolt at the Penn Relays

Actually, this one could go down for the best performance nobody paid much attention to except for the 50,000 people packed into Franklin Field.

Certainly there many candidates for this one, like Roy Halladay and his no-hitters or Michael Vick’s recent spate of awesomeness, but when the fastest man ever to set foot on the planet comes to town and then runs faster than anyone has ever seen before… well, that’s beyond cool.

Usain Bolt, of course, is the 23-year-old Jamaican who destroyed the world records in the 100- and 200-meters at the Olympics in 2008 and the World Championships in 2009 in a manner that transcended mere athletics. In fact, Bolt’s electrifying efforts at those competitions motivated a even a few of the most jaded and experienced sports writers to describe the events as the most exciting and exhilarating they had ever seen.

Moreover, crusty old veteran track coaches have gone so far as to compare Bolt’s talent along the lines of those possessed by Einstein, Beethoven and Newton. Certainly those aren’t the usual names one hears an elite-level athlete compared to.

Still, the largest crowd in the 116-year history of the Penn Relays came to see one guy, and he competed for just 8.79 seconds in his anchor leg effort. Actually, Bolt’s personality and talent is so large in the sport, that Olympic gold medalists and champions of the sport lingered around the track just to catch a glimpse.

And then he did his “Lightning” pose.

“I was leadoff leg and I could actually hear, right next to me, the crowd screaming. I’ve been coming here for about 12 years now, and this was the loudest one. It was great,” said two-time world champion, Lisa Barber, who helped Team USA win the women’s 4x100-meters. “When Bolt was warming up, I couldn't hear my music anymore through my headphones. It's great that Usain is getting this much press. He’s getting so much recognition worldwide.”

Playing a team sport is one thing, but watching a guy run as fast as Bolt is stunning.

Actually, just seeing Bolt run might be the coolest and surreal thing in all of sports. Standing yards away from the finishing line on Saturday, Bolt moves past as if he were a runaway motorcycle and the breeze from his nearly 30-mph wake was enough to cool the crowd on a sun-soaked afternoon.

“I told the guys to make sure I didn't have to work, because I really didn't want to do much,” Bolt said. “I got the baton, so I wasn’t really worried about anything else.”

Worried? What could the fastest man in the history of the earth ever have to worry about?

Best example of being careful or someone will lose an eye

Ian Laperriere blocked shot vs. New Jersey in Game 5 of NHL playoffs

Interestingly, one of the best ways to remove blood from an article of clothing or fabric is with an ice cube. According to one of those helpful hints web sites, the ice will melt through the fabric and take the blood with it. However, blood stains on the ice require a little more elbow grease to come out. The trail of blood left behind by Ian Laperriere on his way to the Flyers’ dressing room took a stoppage of the game, the ice crew to skate out with tools to chip it away and then about 60 or 70 stitches to close up the cut right above his eye.

Who knew a piece of vulcanized rubber traveling approximately 100-mph could cause so much damage to a man’s face? Moreover, who knew a man would be so crazy enough to put his face in the way of something traveling so fast all because he felt it would be beneficial to his teammates?

Better yet, as soon as Laperriere realized he had not left his eye out on the ice and just needed a few dozen stitches, he boasted he would do the same thing over again if the situation arose.

“He would have been back on the bench if they could have gotten him stitched up in time,” Flyers coach Peter Laviolette said.

The best part about Laperriere stopping a puck with his eye to help the Flyers eliminate the Devils in the first round of the playoffs wasn’t all that blood. That was quite disturbing. No, what was cool was that Laperriere took his time to answer question from the press—even offering to “go outside” and fight with a writer—so soon after blood poured out of his face as if being released from a squeezie bottle.

“I do what I do and I don’t think twice about doing it,” Laperriere said. “The next game, if I get a chance to block a shot I’ll go down, because that’s what I do. The day I stop doing that, I’ll retire. Call me dumb, call me stupid, whatever. I block shots.”

He’s not lying. Earlier in the season, Laperriere took a puck to the face that opened up his mouth as if it were a piñata. In that case he needed more than 100 stitches to close the wound, and since it occurred early enough in the game, Laperriere was back on the ice by the third period.

Yes, he blocks shots.

Best game we will still be talking about next year

Eagles 38, Giants 31

Michael Vick, Desean Jackson and 28 points in eight minutes. Was it real or was it Tecmo Bowl?

The fact is the Eagles’ crazy comeback at the Meadowlands last Sunday was the best ending to a regular-season football game most of us will see. However, I must admit I am saddened that the Sept. 17, 1989 game in which the Eagles scored 21 in the final quarter to overcome a 20-point deficit at RFK Stadium.

Remember that one? That’s when Randall Cunningham threw for 447 yards with five TD passes and 12 catches for Keith Jackson. Jerome Brown, Reggie White, Wes Hopkins and the rest of the Gang Green defense was at its chaotic best even though Redskins’ running back Gerald Riggs ran for 221 yards.

Make that 221 yards offset by four fumbles and two interceptions by the greatest Philadelphia team to never win a championship.

Incidentally, the week after the comeback in Washington, the Eagles lost to the 49ers at the Vet when Joe Montana threw four TD passes in the fourth quarter. Ultimately, the Redskins got revenge when they beat the Eagles in a playoff game in Philly. The next day, Buddy Ryan was “fired for winning.”

Best trade

Donovan McNabb to Washington for draft picks in 2010 and 2011

The trade that brought Roy Halladay to Philly was pretty good. So too was the trade for Roy Oswalt, who turned out to be the Phillies’ best pitcher in August and September.

However, has there ever been a more impactful “addition by subtraction” deal than the McNabb trade? McNabb has been sent to the bench in Washington while his replacement, Michael Vick, looks to be the MVP of the NFL. How did that happen?

It’s funny to look back to last April when it all went down. Looking back on what was said the afternoon of the introductory press conference at Redskin Park in Ashburn, Va., the seasons for both teams turned out to be the exact opposite as predicted.

McNabb said he knew his days with the Eagles were numbered when Brian Dawkins was allowed to leave. Even though Andy Reid told anyone who would listen that he saw McNabb quarterbacking his team for the foreseeable future, McNabb knew otherwise. Reid was creating an oil slick on the surface to try and create a diversion of sorts.
 
“We knew it was going on from the beginning,” McNabb said about the trade talks by the Eagles.

“For you not to bring Brian Dawkins back, that (says) we're all replaceable," McNabb said. “I'm a part of it this year. They’re rebuilding, and they're going young. I never knew 33 was old, but I guess I'm old.” 

The Eagles rebuilding? At 10-4, they sure have a funny way of doing it.
 
Better yet, McNabb was telling us how much better it was going to be now that he was finally out of Philly.
 
“You guys from Philly don’t know much about the running game,” he said with one of those grins that makes it seem like a joke, but it’s really a dig. “We will run the ball here.”
 
Yeah, how did that work out?

The best parts were when McNabb copped the Mark McGwire act and said he didn’t want to talk about the past. Football is a team game with 11 men on each side and one man didn’t make a huge difference, McNabb said. But in the next breath he told us how great the Eagles became when they smartly took him with the No. 2 pick in the 1999 draft.
 
“I came to a team that was 3-13 and we went 5-11 (his rookie year) and then average nine of 10 wins a year and made it to five NFC Championship Games and a Super Bowl, and not many teams can say that,” McNabb said. “Yes, we didn't win it, but it was a good ride. Every time the Eagles stepped on the field, everybody felt confident we could win that one, and I want to bring that here.” 
 
Or, more succinctly: you’re welcome, Eagles. It was me that made you guys look better.

He was never more right about that than this year. Funny how things play out.

Things that happened that we saw

• Gilbert Arenas fired his six-shooters for the last time of the 2009-10 season in Philadelphia last January. Before the game, Sixers’ coach Eddie Jordan actually said: "The impression I have him is he’s a heckuva three-point shooter, he drives to the basket and he hurt us a lot down there the last time we played them, and he’s an assassin on the floor—he’s a really good player and that’s what we have to prepare for," Jordan said.

  As he walked away, Jordan thought for a quick second and said to no one in particular.

  “I probably should have used another word than 'assassin.'”

• In February they had the Wing Bowl again for some reason. Snooki showed up and people had mass quantities of food.

• The beginning of March saw the end of the winter Olympics, highlighted by the gold-medal hockey game where Canada beat the U.S. Also during March, it was suggested that the Phillies were going to trade Ryan Howard to the Cardinals for Albert Pujols.

• Philadelphia jumped into Major League Soccer when the Philadelphia Union made their debut in April.

• In May, the Phillies could not score a run, a kid got tasered and Mike Meech went on a hunger strike. Floyd Landis also came clean about his past in professional cycling and outed Lance Armstrong as a PED user. This one is sure to heat up big time in 2011. Sadly, the great Robin Roberts died at age 83.

• Tiger Woods brought his golf tournament, as well as some of the best golfers in the world, to Aronimink in Newtown Square. The World Cup mesmerized everyone, and Stephen Strasburg made an incredible big league debut in Washington.

• Dom Brown made it to the Majors in July and hit a double in his first at-bat. The Phillies traded for Roy Oswalt and notorious Yankees’ owner George Steinbrenner died.

• In August, Stephen Strasburg pitched his last game in Philadelphia before heading off to Tommy John surgery.

• Brad Lidge capped off a strong season in September, while the Phillies clinched their fourth straight division title and finished the season with the best record in baseball for the first time.

• In October, Jayson Werth played his last game for the Phillies, Roy Halladay threw another no-hitter, Cliff Lee dominated for a little while, and the Giants got to the World Series.

• November saw what is likely to be the end of Jamie Moyer’s career, the beginning of the destruction of the Spectrum and Halladay won the Cy Young Award. Meanwhile, the Giants won the World Series even though Pat Burrell was horrible, and baseball great Sparky Anderson died.

• December? We’ll let you figure that one out.

Werth is determined, not bitter

WASHINGTON — Let’s not get it twisted, Jayson Werth is not bitter. Who gets bitter about signing a $126 million, no-trade contract? In this economy and with the unemployment rate near 10 percent, Werth can work for seven more years before cashing out. In fact, with the right money manager, Werth’s young children can retire, too.

Bitter? C’mon… he’s not stupid. Early on during the 2010 season Werth told us he was going to test the free-agent market and go for the best deal out there and that’s exactly what he did. Werth wanted to get paid like his former teammates Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, Roy Halladay and the rest of the players on the Phillies who were taken care of by management. Instead, he had to go somewhere else for that big contract.

The Phillies reportedly had just a three-year deal worth $16 million per season for him when Werth hit the open market.

Nevertheless, Werth is also a pretty competitive dude. No one gets to the big leagues and slugs 13 postseason home runs by accident or by tricking people. Moreover, not many ballplayers accomplish what Werth has so soon after his career was nearly over.

So if you want to know what this is all about, it’s the injury. It’s the sitting at home during the 2006 season with nobody knocking at the door or ringing the phone. It’s about the misdiagnosis of a wrist injury that forced Werth out of desperation to trudge up to Minnesota and the Mayo Clinic with one last chance to save his career. A person can almost hear music in Werth’s voice when he describes how specialist Dr. Richard Berger figured out the injury was a ulnotriquetral ligament split.

He hasn’t been the same since.

Yes, that’s why Werth took the seven years from lowly Washington instead of the three from Philadelphia.

“A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into this,” Werth said. “Obviously the years were important to me. The chance to come to a city, guaranteed to be here for a long time, the no-trade was a big deal for me. I have a chance to set my family up for years to come here.”

It’s hard to fault a guy for thinking like that. However, Werth is not without his pride. Baseball is his job for goshsakes. Sure it’s fun and a remarkable way to make an obscene amount of money, but Werth isn’t messing around out there. He wants to perform well, win games and celebrate at the end of the season. Looking for examples? OK, how about when he hit that home run against the Yankees in the World Series at the Bank, slammed his bat down and yelled into the Phillies’ dugout?

Or what about Game 4 of the 2008 World Series when Werth hit a homer in the eighth inning and circled the bases with a fist in the air. He looked as if he could feel the championship ring being placed on his finger right then. Of course there was that incident with the kid and his father in right field last year, too… didn’t they know Werth thought he could stretch into the stands beyond his reach to catch a foul ball? Didn’t they know ballplayers use those types of words when things don’t go their way?

If anything, the pride aspect of Werth’s personality is what makes the move to Washington puzzling even when factoring in the $126 million. That’s especially so when listening to him speak on Wednesday afternoon at his new ballpark.

“I’ve been in the postseason a lot the last couple of years,” he said. “That’s what it’s all about. That’s what you play for. That’s what you work out for. That's what you get to spring training early for. I hate to lose. I’m here to win.”

That task didn’t seem so daunting when Werth first signed the deal. After all, the Phillies were basically the same team that fell short in 2010 minus their everyday right fielder. Then the Cliff Lee thing happened and everything changed.

“They got their boy back, I guess,” Werth said. 

Yes they did and it wasn’t Jayson Werth. Instead he was allowed to run off much like Aaron Rowand, a player who signed with San Francisco for a lot of years and a lot of dollars because the view from management was that his stats were enhanced by Citizens Bank Park and the Phillies’ lineup. Maybe that’s where the twinge of bitterness might come in for Werth.

No, he wasn’t double-crossed, but he wasn’t really needed, either.

That’s not the case in Washington, though. Instead, GM Mike Rizzo submitted on nearly every point to Werth and his agent Scott Boras. From the Nats, Werth got big money, a huge length of the contract and a no-trade clause on top of it all with promises of more players to come. Actually, the undercurrent from the Nats’ view was that Werth was the first one onboard and the one who gives them credibility with other potential ballplayers.

That’s the sense “No Discounts” Boras gets, too.

“When Jayson signed, the first thing (players) all asked me was, ‘Oh, so Washington's stepping up? They’re taking those steps? They’re looking to win now?’” Boras said. “In the player community, when you gain that kind of street credit, you have taken a huge step as far as what players will look at your organization, and how they’ll look at it differently.”

It’s not going to happen overnight, though, but Werth hammered home the theme that promises were made.

“The thing about this team is, I think there's some pieces of the puzzle that could be put together and make this team a winner,” Werth said. “I was assured by the Lerner family and Mike Rizzo that they’re going to take steps needed to go get those players and fill the roster accordingly—not with just anybody, but the right-talented guy and the right mix, the person that will make the clubhouse a good place. That was important to me, and that was one of the things that led me to sign here.”

No, that doesn’t sound like a bitter guy at all. Actually, it sounds like a guy with a lot of pride and a hunger to lift the Nats to the top of the standings.

“He doesn’t like losing. I certainly don’t like losing,” Rizzo said. “My job is to put a winner on the field, and we’re hell-bent on doing that.”

It’s not going to be easy, though. After all, Jayson Werth can’t pitch.

Does Cliff Lee make the Phillies one of the best teams ever?

There was a stretch last September where the Phillies went on a run to cripple the rest of the NL East, winning 11 games in a row and 22 of 26 in which the team showed glimpses of something otherworldly. It was thanks to that streak that the Phillies erased a seven-game deficit in the standings and turned it into a seven-game advantage faster than one could say, “The Big Three.”

Led by the starting rotation made up of aces Roy Halladay, Cole Hamels and Roy Oswalt, most of the players in the clubhouse were playing for the best team ever. At least that’s what they said.

“Definitely. We’re better all around – less question marks. Not that question marks ever bothered us because we like to prove skeptics wrong, but coming into this year there were only one or two things people were iffy about,” said Jimmy Rollins, the longest tenured player on the team. “Then we had a great acquisition in little Roy [Oswalt] and that took the pressure off of Cole [Hamels], and then Roy [Halladay] took the pressure off of everybody. He just came in and shut the door. Lights out.”

Still, it’s tough to label the team the best ever if it didn’t win the championship, and despite a postseason where the pitching staff posted a 2.37 ERA, got 80 strikeouts in 79 2/3 innings and had two shutouts, a near shutout, and a no-hitter, the ending was quite disappointing.

So rather than keep Jayson Werth on an offense that was frustratingly maddening during the season and playoffs, general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. did the next logical move and backed up a Brinks’ truck on Cliff Lee’s front lawn. Apparently the Phillies plan for 2011 is if they aren’t going to score many runs, then the other team isn’t going to score any...

At all.

And that’s just it, isn’t it? The Phillies intend on flirting with history in 2011 and to do so they have replaced Cy Young Award winners Cliff Lee and Pedro Martinez with Oswalt and Lee (again). In fact, the motto for the Phillies hitters in the coming season might be, “One and done.” After all, on most nights they probably can get by with just one run.

But is this the best pitching staff in team history, let alone recent baseball history? Baring an injury there is a chance the quartet could become just the third group in baseball history to have four 20-game winners on the same staff. Only the 1971 Orioles with Dave McNally (21-5), Pat Dobson (20-8), Jim Palmer (20-9) and Mike Cuellar (20-9) as well as the 1920 White Sox with Red Faber (23-13), Lefty Williams (22-14), Dickie Kerr (21-9) and Ed Ciciotte (21-10) have accomplished the feat.

However, neither team won the World Series.

So yes, for history to judge the Phillies most favorably, they have to win.

After all, does anyone remember much about the Oakland teams that went to the postseason in four straight seasons but never made it past the ALDS? How about the Indians of the 1990s that made it the playoffs for five seasons in a row and the World Series twice, but never wore the ring?

Of course there are also the Braves that dominated divisional play for 14 years in a row, but have just one title—against the Indians in ’95—to show for it.

Going back a bit, the Orioles made it to the World Series three years in a row (1969, 1970, 1971), but won it once. The same thing happened with Oakland in 1988, 1989 and 1990. Those teams are remembered as dynasties that might have been had it been able to finish the deal.

Are the Phillies worried about how history might judge them?

“You play this game to try and win championships and that’s our focus,” Ryan Howard said toward the end of the 2010 season. “We stay focused on the task at hand and let you guys tell us where it fits into the history books. That will sort itself out.”

The collating process might be a little simpler with Lee and maybe the “wow” factor engulfing the baseball world will lend itself to a few victories. Still, has Amaro assembled the best foursome ever? Just how does this group compare with the Braves of 1998 where five pitchers (Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz, Millwood and Neagle) won at least 17 games? What about the 1966 Dodgers with Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale, Don Sutton and Claude Osteen that posted a 2.68 ERA in 1,062 innings averaging 7.1 strikeouts per nine innings? The ’66 Dodgers had three Hall of Famers while the ’98 Braves have three pitchers that should be in as soon as they are eligible.

Then there was the 1954 Indians with its trio of Hall of Famers in Early Wynn, Mike Garcia, Bob Lemon and Bob Feller that compiled 77 complete games and 12 shutouts on the way to 111 wins… do the 2011 Phillies fit in with those great teams?

Maybe, but the Phillies hope not. Why… because none of those teams won the World Series. In fact, the Indians and Dodgers got swept and the Braves never got there. Of course there is the alternative, too, which is a flat-out flop. The teams that come to mind in the flop category are the 2007 and 2008 Mets who went out and got Johan Santana to lead a rotation comprised of Glavine, Pedro, Oliver Perez and John Maine only to collapse, titanically, before reaching the finish line.

Also, there are many Yankees teams that tried to buy a championship with pitching only to fall flat, which is the risk the Phillies are faced with now. With two of the highest paid pitchers in baseball history followed by two past NLCS MVPs, one of whom is heading into his free agent year, the Phillies have plenty of pressure piling up this season.

And then, of course, there is history to tend with, too.

Why was Cliff Lee traded in the first place?

There was a casual moment before a game in New York last season where general manager Ruben Amaro Jr., while shooting the breeze with a few writers, mused on last December’s trade that sent Cliff Lee to the Seattle Mariners for a gaggle of supposed prospects.

“According to some people,” Amaro said jokingly, “it was the dumbest trade ever.”

The response to that was, “Well, not the dumbest.”

Sure, it was a light moment and everyone had a good chuckle, but it underscored the one theme of the 2010 season that never went away…

Just how could anyone trade Cliff Lee?

Certainly there was plenty of grumbling about the media and the fans fascination with Lee after he was dealt away only to resurface in Texas where he led the Rangers to the World Series for the first time in club history. Shoot, even while reveling in the glory of Roy Halladay’s no-hitter in the playoffs, senior advisor Dallas Green said the moment gave the Phils’ brass a chance to "go wild."

“We forgot about Cliff Lee,” Green said.

That didn’t last too long, though. Lee didn’t let anyone forget about him by tearing through the first two rounds of the playoffs with performances that topped even the greatness he put together with the Phillies in 2009. In his first 24 innings, Lee racked up 34 strikeouts and allowed just two runs. He made it very hard on Phillies fans even though no one was unhappy about their team. How could anyone be upset about replacing Lee with Halladay and Roy Oswalt?

Still, there was something about Lee. He was as cool pitching for the Rangers as he was in 2009. Unflappable might be the best word because he never, ever changed his approach or his routine. He still ran on and off the field, still pantomimed a throw into center field from behind the mound before he began to warm up before an inning, and still threw that low 90s-mph fastball.

How cool was Lee? While most pitchers cocooned their arms in ice after games, Lee showered, dressed and was gone. He didn’t treat his arm with ice like most pitchers. Even after a career-high 272 innings pitched (counting the playoffs) in ‘09, Lee never strapped his arm in an ice pack after a game. In 16 of his 39 starts Lee pitched into the eighth inning. He averaged 104 pitches per start and hardly walked anyone.

And then he got even better. Better yet, Lee got so good that the New York Yankees and the millions they offered at him wasn’t enough. Apparently Lee wants to win, too, and there was no other place he wanted to do it than Philadelphia.

What in the name of Scott Rolen is going on here?

Strangely, the Phillies now have Halladay and Lee. They have Roy Oswalt and Cole Hamels, too, while the comparisons to the Braves of the 1990s and Orioles of the early 1970s roll in. Actually, the talk is that the rotation that Amaro somehow put together could be the greatest ever, and that’s not just in Philadelphia where Connie Mack put together some strong teams in the first half of the last century. Instead people are talking about the top four starters as the greatest ever in baseball. Of course they have to win it first—win it all, not just get there—but the resume is nothing to sneeze at.

Amongst the Fab Four, there are three Cy Young Awards, two MVPs in the NLCS, one in the World Series, six 20-win seasons and 13 All-Star Game appearances. Already we’re talking about whether the Phillies can have three 20-game winners on the staff, a feat not pulled off in the big leagues since Oakland did it in 1973 with Ken Holtzman, Vida Blue and Catfish Hunter. Meanwhile, a team has had four 20-game winners on a team just twice in history (1920 White Sox, 1971 Orioles).

Incidentally, the Phillies were the first team to have three 20-game winners on the same team when the second-place 1901 club did it, but then again that they carried just six pitchers all season.

Nevertheless, the Lee deal begs the question as to why he even had to be traded at all. Was the 363 days spent in the American League really necessary or was it something that needed to happen in order for everyone to understand just how valuable pitching is? More importantly, with Oswalt headed into the final year of his current deal, is the fearsome foursome just a one-year rocket ship headed for October or will Amaro be able to find the cash to keep it together?

Don’t tell us that they will have to trade Oswalt only to bring him back after a season in the wilderness.

Whatever happens, 2011 is going to be pressure-packed and fun to watch. Halladay, Lee, Oswalt and Hamels have to win it, don’t they? Anything short of another WFC has to be considered a failure, right?

Is this what it feels like for Yankees and Red Sox fans, too?

Anyway, there was a valuable lesson learned since last Dec. 16 when Lee was sent packing and it is, give up on Lee at your peril. The Yankees couldn’t swing a deal for him at the deadline last July and paid for it during the regular-season and the playoffs. Tampa Bay could have used Lee, too, but in the end he beat them twice in the postseason. Halladay and Oswalt were spectacular during the second half of the season, but if Amaro thought for a second that the offense would be outdone by the Giants’ in the NLCS, do you think he would have given up on Cliff Lee?

They Giants won the World Series with a rookie, Pat Burrell and Aubrey Huff in the middle of their batting order and that just ain’t right.

Maybe the better question is just what was it about Lee that keeps folks in Philly talking? After all, Lee arrived at the end of July in 2009 and was gone by the second week of December. That’s not a long time at all and yet it’s a wonder an impromptu parade down Broad Street didn’t break out when news of his reacquisition hit like wild fire.

Yes, Lee is back only this time it has to be better than before.

He's back...

TOUCHDOWN!

Lunch break

More rock, less talk...

http://www.csnphilly.com/common/thePlatform/web/swf/flvPlayer.swf

Nationals go familiar route, but can Werth lead the way?

Stick around baseball long enough and you’re bound to hear something new every once in a while. That is the beauty of it, after all. Nothing stays the same, which is good because it chases away the boredom. Still, it was a remarkable thing to hear some of things Roy Halladay said just about a year ago.

“This is where we wanted to be,” Halladay said during last December’s introductory press conference at Citizens Bank Park. “It was an easy decision for me.”

Halladay just didn’t say it that one time either. Oh yes, the big right-hander made it point to drive home his point that more than anywhere else, he wanted to be in Philadelphia.

My, how far we have come.

“He did say that his was the place where he wanted to be,” general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. pointed out the day the Halladay trade went down. “A player of his caliber saying that? I’m not sure [if that’s happened].”

Remember how it used to be, though? Ballplayers used to go out of their way to avoid our fair city. Some even had it written into their contracts that they could be traded anywhere in the world as long as it wasn’t to Philadelphia. Then there was J.D. Drew and Scott Rolen, for whatever reasons, needed to play anywhere else. In fact, with Rolen it was turned into something personal instead of what it really was…

He was sick of losing.

But even Rolen admitted that in order for the Phillies to get to the level they enjoy now where players like Roy Halladay beg to be sent here, he was the one who had to go. See, before the 2002 season then general manager Ed Wade reportedly offered Rolen a deal that he would still be playing out. Oh sure, with Rolen at third base and healthy, the Phillies never would have had David Bell, Wes Helms, Abraham Nunez, Pedro Feliz or Placido Polanco. Chances are they would be trying to find someone take the last few years of the 10-year, $140 million that was said to be offered.

See, it was OK that the Phillies had a veritable revolving door at third base because that meant players had changed their minds about going to Philadelphia. Plus, 10-year contract aside, if Rolen had taken the deal, he said.

“If I would have stayed there, there was no way they would have gotten Thome,” Rolen told me during a conversation at old Yankee Stadium in 2003. “They might have been able to get [Kevin] Millwood, but there's no way they would have been able to have Thome and me on the same team.”

Jim Thome was the linchpin. Without Thome there is no Cliff Lee or Pedro Martinez. Without Cliff Lee there is no Roy Halladay. Without Rolen, Bobby Abreu and those not-quite-ready ball players, the Phillies don’t get the draft picks for Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins, Pat Burrell or Ryan Howard.

Still, it was Thome who made all the difference… Thome and that crazy six-year deal worth $85 million that just came off the books last year.

“We needed to do something at the time,” Rollins said. “He brought excitement back to Philly baseball.”

More than that, Thome was the secret to the formula. Getting the future Hall of Famer to agree to a six-year deal even though he would have preferred to stay in Cleveland sent a message to the rest of baseball that the Phillies were serious about being serious. Sure, it might have been the best contract, but that $85 million looks pretty cheap these days.

“At that point he was the most-coveted and the best player during the off-season and we really made a push to get him to Philadelphia,” Amaro said last December. “I really believe, honestly, that put us over the hump.”

Yes, getting that one player can have a trickle-down effect. It’s like a snowball that rolls downhill and turns into a runaway behemoth by the time it gets to the bottom.

“He came at kind of the right time for all our kids," Amaro said. “The Rollinses and Utleys and those guys weren’t quite coming into their prime and we’re fortunate to have those guys, with Ryan Howard, step up and come into their own. … All those guys didn’t get to their primes until after Jimmy was gone, but he certainly helped legitimize what we were trying to do.”

So is that what the Washington Nationals are attempting to do with Jayson Werth? No doubt the seven years and $126 million makes the Thome deal look like tip money, but is Werth the kind of guy a team uses to draw the others to town?

That is the $126 million question.

Let’s get it out of the way right here… Jayson Werth is no Jim Thome. Not even close. Sure, Werth is popular with the stat geeks and is certainly a better fielder than Thome was, but as far as the whole package goes, no, not in the same ballpark. Thome is revered by teammates, coaches and the press. He is a leader whose words carry weight in the clubhouse. Werth is an acquired taste. Sure, he’s a tireless worker and has a lot of friends in the clubhouse, but in certain circles he can be merely tolerated.

Jayson Werth is a piece teams like the Phillies add, not a centerpiece to be built around like the Nationals say they are going to do.

“He’ll be a centerpiece of our ballclub on the field and in the clubhouse,” Nats GM Mike Rizzo said to The Washington Post. “It kind of exemplifies Phase 2 of the Washington Nationals’ process. Phase 1 was a scouting-and-player development, build-the-farm-system type of program. We feel that we’re well on our way of doing that. We feel that now, it's the time to go to this second phase and really compete for division titles and championships.”

Rizzo isn’t laying out an unfamiliar program. In fact, it is the program to build a winning team. It’s the same one the Phillies relied on many times in their history, like when they got Thome or Pete Rose before the 1979 season. Not only were they deals that resonated in terms of the finances (Rose got $3.2 million for four years), but they changed the way everyone saw the franchise.

They changed the culture of the organization.

Werth is doing that in Washington, but he’s not going to be able to do it all by himself. Ryan Zimmerman will be by Werth’s side until at least 2013, and ace of the future Stephen Strasburg should be recovered from Tommy John surgery in time for the 2012 season. The ETA on last summer’s top pick of the draft, Bryce Harper, could be 2012, too. But there are still many question marks that go with prospects. If Werth is going to be what the Nats expect, the Lerner family (owners of the club) need to spend some more cash.

Werth’s close friend Cliff Lee would be a good place to start.

“I think in a short time, we’re going to surprise a lot of people,” Werth told The Washington Post. “I’ve been given a lot of assurance by the Lerner family and by Mike that we’re going to go after some guys that are going to make a difference, that are going to put this team where it needs to be. . . . I came here to win.”

Hey, maybe Werth is the man to build a club around. Why not? He's a young 31, a former first-round pick who has been to the top of the game with the Phillies and nearly quit a few years ago when he was unsure if his injuries would clear up. He's from a baseball family in which his grandfather and uncle spent a combined 33 years in the majors, and his dad played 11 pro seasons with a cup of coffee with the Yankees and Royals in the early 1980s. Yes, Werth has a baseball education, but can he pass it on?

Give Rizzo, the Lerners and the Nats credit for taking big risks. After all, there is a chance Strasburg never comes back at all and playing in a city that is rather ambivalent about its third crack at a big league franchise, the future of the team very well could be on the precipice.

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. So yes, there is plenty of culture to change for Werth and his young sidekicks.

The future of the team could depend on it because Washington could be a three-time loser with baseball with a guarantee that there will not be a fourth chance.

Nats pay what others wouldn't to ink Werth

To properly understand the deal that sent Jayson Werth to the lowly Washington Nationals after spending the past five of his last six seasons in the playoffs, there is only one number that matters.

Seven.

That’s seven years with $126 million tied to it for a player who has been in one All-Star Game as an injury substitute and played just two seasons as an everyday player. In fact, it wasn’t until veteran Geoff Jenkins got injured that Werth finally got a shot to be the starting right fielder for the Phillies.

Now, he’s the centerpiece of the Nationals' offense after the team’s brass decided to let slugger Adam Dunn take a four-year, $56 million deal with the Chicago White Sox. Dunn, in comparison, has belted at least 38 home runs and driven in 92 RBIs for seven straight seasons. Moreover, Dunn is a 10-year vet who is actually younger than Werth.

So just what is it that general manager Mike Rizzo and the Nationals are trying to do? Or, is this the type of deal that solidifies Scott Boras as the agent most able to deliver the bottom line? More importantly, what’s the difference between a three year deal worth $16 million per season like the one CSNPhilly’s Jim Salisbury reported, and the $18 million Werth will get from the Nationals?

Surely those playoff shares make up the difference along with the idea of building a legacy as one of the few men to help the Phillies win the World Series.

Still, $126 million for seven years. Seven years!

“It is an elite player,” Rizzo said at a news conference from the Winter Meetings in Lake Buena Vista, Fla. “Elite players get a lot of money.”

In that regard, Werth and Rizzo are both shortsighted. After all, Werth isn’t exactly an elite player. At least he is not compared to Matt Holliday, whose contract with the Cardinals served as a model for the one Boras and Werth sought. Sure, Werth had strong numbers in categories favored by devotees to advanced metrics, posting a .921 OPS, .532 slugging percentage, .296 batting average and led the league with 46 doubles. But those numbers seemed to ring hollow. In 2010, Werth was incredibly streaky and certainly benefitted from batting behind Ryan Howard in the Phillies’ lineup.

Despite a favorable spot in the batting order, Werth hit a league-worst .186 with runners in scoring position and .136 with runners in scoring position and two outs. As a result, Werth was the poster boy of a July slump that saw the Phillies sink to 48-46 and fire hitting coach Milt Thompson. During a four-game series in Chicago to start the second half, Werth went 2-for-14 with nine strikeouts. He whiffed without even moving the bat off his shoulder in five of his first seven hitless at-bats.

Regardless, who would have thought Werth would be in this position when general manager Pat Gillick plunked him off the scrap heap before the 2007 season? When Gillick signed him in December of 2006, it was a move that slipped under the radar. The acquisitions of Abraham Nunez and Wes Helms rightfully made more news that winter.

Werth did nothing to change that in 2007 when he nursed injuries and appeared in just 94 games after missing all of 2006. Shane Victorino, a former teammate of Werth’s with the Dodgers and Phillies, remembered talking to Werth during his season spent adrift where the talk was about giving up.

“I remember him calling me in 2006 and telling, ‘Hey, I’m on a boat and I’m battling my wrist injury and it hasn’t gotten better and I don’t know if I’ll ever play again.’ He said that. That’s crazy,” Victorino said. “He was so frustrated with his wrist injury that he doubted it would ever get better. And now to see where he is today, I’m happy for the guy. I’m overly happy for the guy. Whatever he goes out and gets he deserves.”

Of course, that’s the player in Victorino talking. Rival general managers around the league are undoubtedly shaking their heads at the Nationals’ largesse. According to the Newark Star-Ledger, new Mets GM Sandy Alderson scoffed at the announcement.

“It makes some of our contracts look pretty good,” Alderson said. “That's a long time and a lot of money. I thought they were trying to reduce the deficit in Washington.”

Moreover, deep-pocketed teams like the Yankees and Red Sox quickly backed away from pursuit of Werth when they learned what he and Boras were after.

Perhaps it was postseason abilities that got Werth the big cheese? After all, in 2008 Werth was so good during the playoffs the Phillies let Pat Burrell walk away because they had a capable right-handed bat to put in the lineup behind Howard and Utley.

 Then, when doubters wondered if he could handle the rigors of playing the full slate of games in 2009, he belted 36 homers, got 99 RBIs and made the All-Star team.

“When he first came here, he came here with a lot of talent. Pat Gillick always liked him, and he definitely was the one that kind of like wanted him and kind of persuaded him to like to come with us,” manager Charlie Manuel said. “It took him a while to really, I think, adjust to our team and really kind of get things going. I think that he was like he needed to play. He hadn't played in like a year, year and a half or something. And once he got started, he earned a spot and he actually beat Geoff Jenkins out of right field. He earned a spot to play, and he definitely enjoys playing here. He’s been a solid player for us, and he's got a ton of ability.”

Certainly postseason ability probably won’t matter in 2011 since Werth is joining a young team that rated in the bottom half in the league of every offensive category and just allowed a younger, perennial 40-homer slugger walk away. Worse, Werth joins a team that hasn’t had a winning season since 2003, when it was playing in Montreal, in a city that has not fielded a baseball team with a winning record since 1969.

The last World Series played in Washington, D.C. was 1933 when the first version of the Senators lost to the New York Giants. The city had a winner in 1924 when Walter Johnson came on in relief to beat the Giants in 12 innings of Game 7.

Then again, a lot can change in seven years. Back when the Phillies were battling mediocrity, it took a six-year, $86 million deal to Jim Thome to get folks to take them seriously. Plus, with phenom pitcher Stephen Strasburg expected to return from Tommy John surgery in 2012, a season that could be the arrival time for 2010 No. 1 draft pick Bryce Harper, the Nats could be building toward something.

Whether they get there with Werth, of course, is the big question. 

Howard, Utley have something to fall back on

Ryan Howard and Chase Utley just sat there in straight back chairs with bemused looks on their faces as they watched two drunks wrestle on the floor. Not until they paused to catch a breath with their dress shirts torn open, did the winning lines from the ballplayers help put a bow on the scene.

“I just saw you bite that dude,” Ryan Howard said while appearing as Ryan Howard in the program It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

That was followed by an invitation to wrestle from two of the main characters of the show, played by Glenn Howerton and Charlie Day, who were sprawled out on the floor at PSPCA benefit. Needless to say, charity events for animals have a tendency to get out of hand with grappling and/or fisticuffs popping up throughout a ballroom. It’s a serious business and some folks need to give until it hurts.

However, the invitation to Howard and Utley to join in the wrestling match because they were, “wasted,” was met with a witty rejoinder from the All-Star second baseman.

“No we’re not,” Utley said.

“No, we’re completely sober. But you guys drink a lot though,” Howard added.

“You guys drink more than anyone I’ve ever seen,” Utley finished before the ballplayers shrugged their shoulders and exited, stage right.

And to think, Utley was teammates with Vicente Padilla and has been known to work blue when delivering comeback wise cracks to fans in New York City or the home crowd when expressing delight in winning a World Series. For this occasion, Utley had to defer to the writers to craft his lines—you know, FCC guidelines and all. Plus, he seemed genuinely enthused and didn’t speak in clichés straight out of Bull Durham, unlike in situations with the press at his day job. On an everyday basis, Utley has the charisma of a toilet seat, or maybe he genuinely means that he wants to “stay within himself,” or “take them a day at a time.”

No sense getting ahead of yourself. It’s a long season.

Still, despite the star turn from the All-Star ballplayers, it was hardly the best thespian work by a Phillies player. Granted, it wasn’t bad and the scene in which the players play straight men for Howerton and Day was pretty darned funny. Who knows… it could open the door for more acting work. Howard seems to be branching out from commercials to situation comedies, which shows much more versatility than his work in baseball.

But when Howard paired with Jimmy Rollins for a short feature on the “Funny or Die” web site, the bar was raised pretty high. Here, take a look:

http://player.ordienetworks.com/flash/fodplayer.swf

Certainly there are fewer limitations on the web than with regulated mediums like TV or the radio. For instance, there’s no way the censors would allow Howard to get away with that dance that mimics Prince. It’s just too funny and a big man shouldn’t have moves like that. It wasn’t quite as wacky as Shaq’s entrance with the Jabbawockeez before the All-Star Game a few years ago, but it’s up there. Then again, word on the street was Howard and his buddy Jared was going to use the same moves in a Subway commercial until Shaq beat them to it.

Our loss. A dance with the Jabbawockeez might be the best way for Howard to make up for the appearance on the HBO show Entourage. No, he wasn’t bad, but that show needs to have the plug pulled. Either that or have an episode where the Fonz goes water skiing in his leather jacket.

Of course Jimmy Rollins is no slouch, either. He might not be working with big stars like Jared or the gang from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, but his work in an ad for the sporting goods franchise, Dick’s, is Emmy Award quality. That’s the award they give to TV commercials… right?

Interestingly, when it comes to TV commercials the Phillies doing the acting have delievered nothing short of Olivier quality work. If I recall correctly, Mike Schmidt did a commercial for 7-Up in the early 1980s. It was around that time when Steve Carlton hawked milk in a TV spot, which for many of us who never heard him speak because of his refusal to grant any interviews, was a landmark event. We finally heard Lefty talk and then for a while he wouldn’t stop and it was all we could do to seal up his bunker in Colorado to keep him quiet.

Of course Carlton still turns up for the reunion weekends at the ballpark where he usually sits with the broadcast crew for an inning or two where listening in it sounds as if the ol’ left hander is attending a baseball game for the very first time.

The biggest draw for advertisers was Pete Rose, who shilled for everything from Kool-Aid, Wheaties, Nestle Crunch, and Aqua Velva. Having had the chance to hang with Pete in Las Vegas, it seems as if he was given a lifetime supply of Aqua Velva as payment for doing the ads because one whiff made it seem as if he was trying to use it all at once.

But, you know… it’s Aqua Velva. That’s the good stuff.

A commercial and work in a sit-com are very different. Chances are Howard and Utley spent a long day hashing it out with the pros. There was a lot of improve and the script mostly served as a guideline and direction for the actors. It wasn’t just about standing in front of a camera and repeating lines as the guys told former child actor turned MLB.com writer, Todd Zolecki, last summer.

“I don't really see acting in my future,” Utley told Zolecki.

That’s not quite the case for Howard.

“It was cool,” Howard said to Zolecki. “Once again, it was stepping outside my realm and doing it to see how it would go. Doing 'Always Sunny,' especially doing it with Chase, who everybody knows isn't usually a talkative guy—he did a good job. We had a lot of fun doing it. We were over there just clowning the whole time. It's just something that was out of both of our elements.”

See, they have the modest actor patter down perfectly. Perhaps talking to the press about baseball games where pedantic answers are given as a default has helped with the acting.

Nevertheless, the guys still have some work to do if they want to top Scott Rolen’s performance on Saturday Night Live a little more than a decade ago.

Wait… you missed that one? Don’t worry, Rolen didn’t host it like Charles Barkley has twice. However, Rolen appeared in a sketch with about a dozen ballplayers, including Phillie Gregg Jefferies and Mike Sweeney, in which they magically appeared in the room of a little boy played by Chris Kattan. See, the kid had posters of baseball players on his wall and dreamed of playing in the majors until the guys showed up in his room and acted like a bunch of ballplayers.

They blasted music, swilled drinks, made untoward comments at the kid’s mom before it finally was tied together with the show-stopping line from Rolen…

“Hey, Griffey is naked on the lawn again!”

Rolen not only delivered the line flawlessly on national TV, but he did it on a show hosted by Oscar winner Helen Hunt in which Jack Nicholson made a cameo. Nope, he wasn’t working alongside some dudes in the local community theater troupe. Rolen was trading lines with Oscar winners.

But get this… a couple of years later I told Rolen that I saw his acting chops on the show much to his amusement.

“You know, I can get a Screen Actors Guild card for that,” he said.

“Really? Not bad. A lot of actors would kill to get a SAG card. Do you have it?”

“No. I’m not going to get it,” he said.

“Why not?” I asked.

“What am I going to do with it?”

“Well, what if this baseball thing doesn’t work out. You might need something to fall back on.”

Yes, this conversation actually occurred. Someone should have been filming it.

What the Hall: It's never easy

It’s never easy to vote. Sure, the actual process is easy—just put a check mark next to your guy, hope they count it and that’s about it. Easy as that.

However, if your brain is turned on, choosing the right person to vote for is difficult. Forget about politics where a vote determines employment [1], look at something like the baseball Hall of Fame. Simply by voting a person’s life work or legacy is defined and categorized. Folks unfamiliar with the sport will immediately attach some value to a Hall-of-Famer even if they have no clue what the person did to earn the honor.

So yeah, voting is tough. In fact, for those members of the Baseball Writers Association of America who are qualified to vote for the Hall of Fame, this year’s ballot might be the most difficult in recent memory. But in a strange little twist, the difficulty will come not from voting players in, but deciding which players to keep out.

Oh yes, the so-called Steroid Era is not over yet. Call this part of it the aftershocks following an earthquake.

What happens now that Jeff Bagwell, Rafael Palmeiro, Juan Gonzalez and Larry Walker are finally eligible? After all, there are four MVP Awards, two Major League Player of the Year awards and a Rookie of the Year divvied up amongst that group. With credentials like that it would appear that a large Hall of Fame class will make the trip to Cooperstown this August. The thing is, there isn’t a slam dunk in the bunch.

Looking at the numbers on the stat sheet paints a different picture. Palmeiro, of course, is one of a handful of players to collect 3,000 hits and 500 homers. The other members of that club—Henry Aaron, Willie Mays and Eddie Murray—are enshrined. The difference, though, is that Aaron, Mays and Murray never tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs after getting that 3,000^th hit, nor did they test positive shortly after wagging their fingers at Congress to scold anyone from thinking he would ever take a performance-enhancer.

Ironically, Palmeiro was the spokesman for Viagra during the latter years of his career.

Gonzalez was the AL MVP in 1996 and 1998 where he slugged his 300^th career homer before his 28^th birthday and became the first player in 63 years to reach 100 RBIs before the All-Star Break. Gonzalez had all the makings of a once-in-a-lifetime career until he reached his 30s and his body seemed to fall apart. Back injuries led to an end that saw Gonzalez bounce from organization to organization before finishing with the Long Island Ducks of the independent Atlantic League.

Certainly being named in the Mitchell Report or in Jose Canseco’s tell-all steroid book hasn’t helped Gonzalez’s case much, either.

Bagwell, on the other hand, is the guy no one knows what to do with. More than the gaudy numbers he produced, Bagwell was one of the biggest stars of the 1990s, and though the stats certainly matter, it was something Billy Wagner told me about Bagwell carries much more weight. According to Wagner, Bagwell was the best teammate he ever had. Moreover if respect from his peers counted for votes, then Bagwell is a landslide winner.

We just don’t know about the guy. Sure, he never tested positive nor did he ever show up in the Mitchell Report. But Bagwell seems to be guilty by association for having played with admitted steroid users Ken Caminiti and Jason Grimsley during the era where dabbling in such things was seemingly the norm.

Besides, Mark McGwire and Barry Bonds never tested positive during their careers, either, and the consensus is that the record-breaking statistics those guys piled up are tainted. The fact that McGwire hit 583 homers yet never got more than 23 percent of the votes in the BBWAA balloting explains what the electorate thinks of his records.

So is Larry Walker a first ballot Hall of Famer and/or the only guy voted in this year? Is Walker good enough to be considered in such a lofty group and did anyone think he would have a plaque in Cooperstown when he’d come to the Vet to play against the Phillies with the Expos?

If those other guys are guilty of falling prey to the silently accepted norms of the game, does Walker get penalized for playing in Colorado and the performance-enhancing altitude?

Probably not. After all, someone has to get in. Given that only Andre Dawson was voted in last year while Roberto Alomar and Bert Blyleven fell less than five votes short, Walker could be the lone first-ballot inductee alongside a few others.

Then again, last year the MLB Network set up cameras at Alomar’s home because they were sure he was getting the call. Some suggested that Alomar fell short because of the unfortunate incident where he spit on umpire John Hirschbeck during a disputed call late in the 1997 season. The theory was that some writers held the mistake against Alomar despite the fact that he and Hirschbeck have buried the hatchet and become friends. This protest vote was made despite the fact that Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Cap Anson, and Juan Marichal are Hall of Famers. Among those names are men who attacked a crippled fan, punched an umpire, beat an opponent on the head with a bat, and helped foster nearly a half-century of institutional racism.

Some say without Cap Anson, baseball never would have been a sport that denied the inclusion of some because of the color of their skin.

But, you know, Alomar spit at a guy...

Nice Hall of Fame you have there, baseball. Apparently spitters, steroid users and gamblers need not apply. But for the violent types and the racists, sure, come on in.

Nevertheless, here’s one man’s ballot for the 2011 class of the Hall of Fame:

• Larry Walker
• Roberto Alomar
• Bert Blyleven
• Tim Raines
• Jack Morris
• Fred McGriff
• Barry Larkin
• Edgar Martinez
• Lee Smith

---

[1] More than ever it seems as if the only folks who get into the politics business do so because they can’t keep a job doing anything else. Check it out sometime… would you hire most politicians to do a job at your home? Why is it then we give those dregs the keys to everything?

Is it personal or is it business?

It’s pretty tough to bounce around the Internets without stumbling onto a picture of Derek Jeter, shirtless and hanging out with his fiance, Minka Kelly. That’s just the way it goes when the free-agent market is as tissue-thin as it is this winter, but moreover, that’s the way it is when it’s Derek Jeter.

Jeter, the captain, shortstop, glamour boy and link to the Yankees’ ghosts, has been the hot stove story thus far, mostly because the negotiations with the club haven’t gone all that well. At least that’s the portrait painted by the hyperbolic New York press, where the reports claim there is an $80 million and two-year gulf between the player and his team.

Actually, the consensus is the Yankees are daring to go to another team as if Jeter’s act only works in New York City. You know, because popular players who bat at least .291 in 15 straight seasons heading into 2010 with five World Series rings while just 74 hits shy of the magical 3,000 hit mark have difficulty adapting.

But this isn’t about history, loyalty or legacies. This is 2010 and even though Jeter might be the modern version of Joe DiMaggio, it’s the money that matters.

No, it’s not personal. It’s business.

It’s really a ridiculous phrase if you stop and think about it. Actually, it’s one of those idioms that is an established part of our lexicon that results in solemn nods or resigned shoulder shrugs whenever someone lays it out there.

Well, it’s just business.

What in the name of Gordon Gecko does that mean?

Apparently, it means Jeter and the Yankees are trying to save face. It means if the world is a rat race then it’s OK to be a rat. It means Tessio is going to have to go for a ride with Tom Hagen and he’s not going to be able to talk his way out of it. Not this time.

Tell Mikey it’s just business, it’s not personal.

That’s exactly what this standoff is all about. Jeter doesn’t want to take a cut in the 10-year, $189 million deal he just completed and the Yankees want to stop being the Yankees to guys like Derek Jeter. Instead, the Yankees want to be the Yankees to Cliff Lee and make a deal with the lefty that will make Jeter’s look like tip money. Certainly the three-year, $45 million the Yankees reportedly offered Jeter will look like loose change found in the cushions of the couch compared to what Lee is expected to command.

So what we have here is a situation where one side has to determine the worth of its counterpart. Certainly Jeter is one of the most popular players in the game, and even though he just wrapped up his worst season where he established career lows in batting (.270) and slugging (.370), those within the game rate him as one of the top handful of players. However, at 36, Jeter’s age and defense is an issue. Plus, the Yankees have already paid Jeter more than $205 million in salary where as the Yankees’ captain and shortstop, he is one of the few baseball players with an elite-level Q-rating.

Jeter wants four to five years. These days, the length of a contract is the deal-breaker for most ballplayers, simply because unlike in the NFL, MLB deals are guaranteed. Look at Jayson Werth and the Phillies—in that situation, a deal likely could be brokered for three years, but Werth wants more, and he’ll probably get it. No, Jeter probably doesn’t need the money a guaranteed deal ensures, but if he’s healthy he’s going to get a chance to play with a five-year deal.

Five more seasons could put Jeter on the cusp of 4,000 hits, a milestone reached by only two hitters in Major League Baseball history. In fact, Pete Rose, the all-time hit leader, was exactly 10 hits behind Jeter at similar points in their careers. Rose had just turned 37 when he collected his 3,000^th hit in his 16^th season. Jeter will likely get his 3,000^th career hit around his 37^th birthday in his 16^th season, too.

Interestingly, I met with Rose in Las Vegas a couple of years ago and asked him if he thought anyone could break his record of 4,256 hits. The answer, of course, was a blunt and resounding, “No.”

But I pressed on anyway, ticking off names as if we were a couple of baseball fans talking about the game in a bar or wherever. Only in this case it was Rose, me and the workers at a memorabilia shop in Caesar’s Palace where the all-time hit king was signing autographs and posing for pictures.

“Alex Rodriguez?”

“No.”

Even though A-Rod averages 190 hits per 162 games, his tendency to hit homers and standing in the middle of the Yankees’ offense might make it difficult for him to get beyond 3,800 hits.

“Ichiro?”

“If he would have started out playing in the U.S., maybe. But he lost all those years.”

Yes, that’s true. Ichiro would have the best chance if he hadn’t spent the first half of his career playing in Japan. He is 36 and has nearly 3,500 hits between both Japan and the U.S. and needs just 16 more hits this season to break Rose’s record of 10 seasons with at least 200 hits.

Regardless, Ichiro’s nine “lost” seasons in Japan cost him.

However, the way Rose so quickly dismissed the next name was kind of surprising.

“Derek Jeter,” I said.

“No,” said Pete.

“Really? Why not? He gets 200-hits a season and hits at the top of a lineup that needs his to get hits. Ten years worth of 200 hits or close to it is nearly 2,000 hits. That adds up.”

“Yeah, but he’s 35,” Pete said.

What Rose didn’t mention was that when he was 40, he led the National League in hits. He also played first base in his first four seasons with the Phillies, a far less demanding position than shortstop, and got 705 hits from ages 38 to 41. That comes to an average of 193 hits per 162 games.

Not bad for an old guy.

In another coincidence, Rose was just a year older than Jeter when he left Cincinnati for Philadelphia and the Phillies and WPHL (Channel 17), ponied up a record $3.225 million over four years (with an option for the fifth year) to give the old man. Times were different, of course. With Rose, the Phillies sold more tickets and Channel charged more for ads. Philadelphia also got to see Rose pass Stan Musial for the hit record in the National League. Better yet, the Phillies won the World Series in 1980 made it back there in ’83 and made the playoffs in 1981.

In other words, the Phillies needed Pete Rose.

Do the Yankees need Derek Jeter? Will Jeter help the Yankees sell more tickets or attract more advertisers to their TV network? Probably not. But will he pass some meaningful milestones at Yankee Stadium and help the team get to the playoffs where the cash really rolls in. Additionally, will signing Jeter prevent the Yankees from going after players like Cliff Lee?

Jeter’s value is found in the answer to those questions.

Reid says everything by saying nothing

Typically, a guy could set his watch during one of Andy Reid’s post-game press conferences. In fact, it usually took just about three minutes after all the throat clearing and injury updates when I would reach down and grab my right shoe and fire it hard as possible at the television set.

Wide left.

Unbowed, it would take a minute more of evasiveness and non-answers until I would grab my left-footed Chuck Taylor with my right hand and do my best impression of some sort of dissident journalist. Luckily my aim was bad.

So out of ammo and not willing to get up and dig into the couch cushions for the remote, I’d watch Andy Reid’s head mounted on the TV screen as if it were a prized trophy elk. The eyes on the thing were almost lifelike as they scan the room to focus a fuzzy gaze on the questioner. Oh, what those eyes must have seen! Babbling brooks, the greenest brush sprawling under a canopy of stately oaks, squirrels and rabbits and birds.

Then here comes the shoe-throwing idiot trying to take him down with some rubber sole to the dome.

Sometimes press conferences just aren’t fair.

Look, Andy Reid didn’t do anything wrong by sitting in front of the cameras and recorders while attempting to deconstruct Sunday night’s big victory over the New York Giants, nor was he exactly revealing, either. However, unlike in the past where his lips would move and sound would emanate from his mouth, the non-words and mish-mash of words that began to sound like the teacher from the Charlie Brown cartoons weren’t that offensive.

I didn’t go for my shoes.

Andy Reid’s verbosity in press conferences is nothing new. In fact, Reid’s brevity is analyzed so much in these parts that it’s a cliché. Sports comedians in Philly have two standard impressions in their arsenal—Charlie Manuel’s Appalachian twang and Andy Reid clearing his throat to talk about someone’s groin injury. Get Charlie away from the cameras and he’ll drop some pearls on you and regale one and all with tales about playing ball for Billy Martin and against Sadaharu Oh in Japan. Reid is probably the same way—get the guy away from the glare and he’s probably brimming with stories and wisdom.

Hey, if the guy doesn’t like to talk to a room full of strangers, what are you going to do?

No, the thing that’s most interesting to ponder is the idea that sports press conferences could imitate those serious affairs with political types. More specifically, think if the local scribes just starting hucking shoes around the first time they got offended. It would be a hail of white sneakers and old loafers flying through the air like moths buzzing an outdoor light. Media folks have a low threshold to begin with, and it’s not just the subjects on the dais with the microphone that should duck and cover. The local media will turn on each other like angry snakes with an empty stomach if given the chance.

So what’s the point? OK, try this… maybe Reid is loosening up. No, it’s tough to tell from the way things unfold after the game, but the color-coded tension level has dropped to something like a warm earth tone. Remember how it was when Donovan McNabb was still the quarterback? Heck, remember how it was after the opener when Kevin Kolb was moved from the starting QB spot and players were sent back into the game despite suffering concussions. Back then, Reid had to bob and weave Sugar Ray Leonard against Roberto Duran in the “No Mas” fight.

Reid seems relaxed these days. Why not? At 7-3 the Eagles just might be the class of the NFC. The interesting part, though, is how it got to this point. It was simple, actually. All Reid had to do yank Kolb in favor of Sports Illustrated cover boy, Michael Vick, duck and cover from the flying shoes and poison pens and hope that everything would fall into place.

It was that simple.

Still, who would have guessed that 10 weeks after the Week 1 debacle that Reid would be riding Vick’s coattails to a coach-of-the-year bid? Better yet, with Vick behind center the conservative coach (with a penchant for gadget plays), is making calls he never made with McNabb. That fourth-down play that turned into a long TD run for LeSean McCoy is not a call Reid would have made with McNabb.

“Michael Vick is playing out of his mind right now, and that’s a beautiful thing,” Reid said during his press conference.

That is the old coach opening up and letting it all out.

Another one turned to dust

It’s very likely a sacrilege for the old salts in Philadelphia who have decided on which memories we should savor and which things are important, but we’re going to put it out there anyway…

The fact of the matter is that to a bunch of kids born in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, the Spectrum was the most important building in Philadelphia. Oh yes, there are no boundaries. Throw the Palestra in that mix along with Franklin Field, Connie Mack Stadium, The Vet and the old Liberty Bell pavilion from the days when a person could walk right up to the relic and slide underneath it for a view not shown in the brochures.

But as obsessed as we were with big-time sports and gritty rock shows, the Spectrum was more important than all of those other places combined.

Actually, let’s set it straight. It wasn’t the Spectrum that was important. It was, after all, just a piece of real estate where things happened. The same goes for any other building deemed significant because a bunch of people showed up and did something extraordinary. In fact, it’s never about the building…

It’s always about the people.

I never thought I believed in ghosts. I believed in nature like the wind, the sun, the moon and stars and the fact that another person can have an effect on my life. Maybe, in a sense, that is belief in ghosts. So to me, the idea that the Spectrum was the epicenter of some extraordinary moments in history is valid. The Spectrum was, after all, the place where the Flyers won their only Stanley Cups four decades ago. Actually, the place was built for the Flyers, and judging by the dignitaries at the podium for the demolition, the joint still very much is/was a hockey rink.

Apparently the only old Sixers they could find were Dr. J and World B. Free.

But for us, all we cared about was basketball. And to us, the Spectrum was the palace of hoops. They all played there… all of the greats. Wilt and Russell. Bird and Doc. Barkley and Moses. Iverson crossing over Jordan all highlighted by some of the best basketball teams and games ever played.

Moreover, the Spectrum was a place where technology came to be. Actually, a brother from Lovetron, Darryl Dawkins, smashed up his second backboard at the Spectrum, which he called, “Get-Out-of-the-Waying, Backboard-Swaying, Game-Delaying, If-You-Ain’t-Grooving-You-Best-Get-Moving Dunk.” The difference between the one at the Spectrum opposed to the one in Kansas City, famously called, “The Chocolate-Thunder-Flying, Robinzine-Crying, Teeth-Shaking, Glass-Breaking, Rump-Roasting, Bun-Toasting, Wham-Bam, Glass-Breaker-I-Am-Jam,” was that in Philly, Dawkins also pulled the bolts from the rim out.

Kids from the 1970s and ‘80s remember watching Sixers’ games on TV where the phrase, “Gusto Dunk!” would suddenly appear on the screen after such a thing.

Frankly, if they wanted to get the Spectrum torn apart quickly, they should have just unleashed Chocolate Thunder on the place, though, as a citizen of Lovetron, he’s probably practicing his “interplanetary funkmanship,” as he called it.

Aside: Why can’t we find more ballplayers from Lovetron?

See, a building is only as good as the people who visit it. That’s what Tuesday’s pomp and ceremony over the wrecking ball belting into the south side of the Spectrum was about. It was a simple hat tip to all the games, concerts, and shows that went on in that little spot in South Philly and it was really no different from when any other old building is reduced to souvenir bricks to be sold for a few bucks. The commerce and economics are really what a building’s usefulness come down to anyway. The Spectrum was just a place where some really cool things happened. But then again, some really cool things happen everywhere and the games that are played and the people who get together for them are more important than any old building.

There will be something new where the Spectrum once stood relatively soon. That’s the way it works. Then again, you’ll remember the people you were with in the old place just the same way you will in the new joint.

Halladay almost too good to be real

Roy Halladay has been away playing golf in Mexico before he reports to Clearwater to begin his Spring Training on Dec. 1, so there’s a pretty good chance he hasn’t seen the commercials depicting him striking out hitters in a video game. In fact, the makers of Major League Baseball 2K11 thought enough of Halladay’s body of work in 2K10, that they put him on the box of the game.

Certainly if there is one guy in the big leagues who has no time for playing video games it’s Halladay. After all, he was the guy who kept the press waiting for nearly an hour because he had to complete his post-game workout after he tossed a perfect game. So needless to say, Halladay has things to do. He’s not the kind of guy to sit in the clubhouse working a crossword puzzle before batting practice, plotting elaborate pranks where a dimwit gets traded to Japan or jerking around on some sort of mobile device.

In other words, Halladay is not like most of us. He doesn’t waste time. Hell, he even starts Spring Training three months early.

Though Halladay probably won’t wile away the time playing video games in which he is the main star, he did something quite remarkable in winning the 2010 Cy Young Award…

He made the Baseball Writers Association of America come to a harmonious, unadulterated consensus that seemed downright cute in this day of instant reaction and indignant anger over the most trivial of issues and obscure statistics. Better yet, Halladay’s 2010 season was so good that there wasn’t even the one voter doing his damndest to get attention by being different for the sake of it. You know, like that guy who voted for Javier Vazquez for Cy Young in 2009 because… well… who the hell knows. Maybe it was a gag like a hidden whoopee cushion or hand buzzer, or maybe it was one of those things where someone was trying to be different just like everyone else.

It’s a mystery.

So as a guy who has enjoyed poking fun at the BBWAA for the sport of it, this is actually quite refreshing. Give the voters credit for being correct. Besides, the name calling and laughing at the group of baseball voters is a lot like recycling old jokes about politicians in that only the names change. It’s almost like peace in the Middle East or something in that it’s a concept that seems rational, but is always just out of reach.

Of course the civility Halladay spawned might not last as the rest of the awards are handed out. In fact, some have grumbled about Bud Black taking home the manager of the year award when his team folded and missed the playoffs when the Giants slipped past, or the fact that Charlie Manuel came in fifth despite 97 wins. There likely will be some bemoaning the American League Cy Young Award winner when it is announced on Thursday. Felix Hernandez, the young star ace for the Mariners is expected to win the award even though he finished the season with a 13-12 record. Oh sure, he lead the league in ERA, starts, innings and was second in strikeouts, but even King Felix to keep Seattle from losing 101 games.

Actually, Hernandez could be this generations’ version of Steve Carlton in 1972 without all the wins. It was during that season where the youthful Phillies, with Larry Bowa and Greg Luzinski as well as rookies Bob Boone and Mike Schmidt, went 59-97 yet Carlton still figured out a way to win 27 games while pitching 30 complete games in 41 starts to win the Cy Young Award. Sure, Hernandez was approximately 100 innings and 14 wins off from Carlton’s effort in ’72, but a guy ought to get some credit for going out there every five days knowing he was going to have to do it all himself.

Still, it could be tough for Hernandez simply because of that 13-12 record. Though a win-loss record is often out of the hands of a pitcher, the stat isn’t as completely valueless. For one thing, good pitchers often win a lot of games. There is a direct correlation to winning and talent. As my friend Dan Roche says, winning is a fancy metric that determines whether or not your team goes to the playoffs. Better yet, a win-loss record—the decisions—are important because it shows which pitcher is in the game when it’s all on the line. In that regard, Hernandez had nine no-decisions and Halladay had just two.

Then again, pitching for the Mariners had to be like dead man walking for guys like Hernandez and Cliff Lee. Imagine if Hernandez could have joined Lee in Texas or Halladay in Philadelphia…

Instead, Halladay was the great baseball writer unifier. A veritable Anwar Sadat, if you will. Oh sure, it’s one thing to win the award in both leagues, a feat pulled off only by Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez and Gaylord Perry, but to do so unanimously at the same time is something no one even keeps track of.

Oh sure, they count the guys who get all of the first-place votes. Actually, Jake Peavy did it in 2007 and there have been 13 guys to do it in the National League and eight in the American League. However, only one other pitcher has won the award in one league and then won it by taking all the top votes in another league.

Yes, it’s Pedro and Roy who are the only players to pull off a feat that no one knew existed.

What can’t he do? What can’t he do?

Always magnanimous in victory, Halladay, checking in on a conference call from Mexico where he was hitting the links with one-time Cy Young Award winner Chris Carpenter, Padres’ righty Chris Young, and teammate Mike Sweeney, humbly expressed surprise that he got all the first-place votes.

“This is special for me because of how close the competition was,” Halladay said. “So many guys had quality seasons. Coming into the final month, it was very close. It’s surprising (to win unanimously) and I’ll definitely take it. I’m honored it went that way. But a case could be made for four or five other guys.”

Come on… who is he kidding? A perfect game, 21 wins, a no-hitter in the playoffs... didn’t he see himself out there? It was like watching a guy play a video game.

Bedrosian finally gives way to Halladay

On the last day of August in 1987, Phillies lefty Shane Rawley pitched 8 1/3 innings at Dodger Stadium to improve to 17-6 for the season as his ERA dipped to 3.70. It was the third game in a row that Rawley pitched at least eight innings and it came five days after he got 10 strikeouts and allowed two runs in a complete-game loss.

The truth was Rawley looked very much like the Cy Young Award winner in the National League.

And why not? To that point in the season, Rawley very well might have been the most consistent pitcher in the league. After all, he had lost just twice going back to the middle of June and went 9-1 through July and August with a solid 3.50 ERA. In fact, Rawley even went on Roy Firestone’s interview show, Up Close, for ESPN during the trip to Los Angeles where it was agreed upon that the Cy Young Award was his to lose.

That’s exactly what happened.

Whether it was a curse or an injury or whatever, Rawley didn’t win a game for the rest of the season, going 0-5 in his final seven starts with a 7.82 ERA. Worse, Rawley struck out just 22 and walked 21 over those final seven starts. Four times he didn’t make it past the fifth inning and twice he barely made it into the second frame, including one start where he was pulled after giving up eight runs and four hits in the first inning.

But by that point the Cy Young Award had already escaped Rawley. Seemingly, so too did his career as the left-hander pitched two more seasons, winning just 13 more games.

“The last month of the season I pushed myself,” said Rawley, who these days owns Shaner’s Sports Bar and Pizzeria in Sarasota, Fla. “We started to sputter as a team the last month and I probably tried too hard. I tried too hard to get it.”

As a result, the 1987 Cy Young Award was up for grabs. That’s not at all like it is this year where Roy Halladay won his second Cy Young Award by collecting all 32 first-place votes. On the next-to-last day of August in 2010, Halladay pitched seven innings to fall to 16-10 for the season as his ERA rose to 2.27. The difference between Halladay and Rawley is that this time a Phillies pitcher finished the deal by going 5-0 with 29 strikeouts and four walks in 36 2/3 innings.

Halladay’s Cy Young will be the first by a Phillies pitcher since 1987 when Rawley let it slip away. Instead of the Phillies’ lefty starter taking home the most prized award in pitching, a right-hander reliever got it with the fewest amount of wins in the closest ever voting.

Yes, at 5-3 with 40 saves and a 2.83 ERA in 89 innings, Steve Bedrosian will have the phrase, “Cy Young Award winner” tied to his name. Better yet, Bedrosian capped off a run from 1980 to 1987 where Steve Carlton, John Denny and Bedrock won the award four times.

So how to Bedrosian do it while Rawley could not? Or how come it has taken so long for another Phillie to win it? Moreover, how has winning the Cy Young Award affected Bedrosian’s life now that he has been out of the game for 15 years?

Better yet, how was the zany reliever able to keep his stirrup socks in perfect position every time he took the mound?

Steady as he goes
To start, Bedrosian won it in 1987 because of his uncanny consistency. After all, Rawley was second in the league in wins, finishing just one behind Rick Sutcliffe, who went 18-10 with a 3.68 ERA for the last-place Cubs. In the final voting, Bedrosian slipped past Sutcliffe, 57-55, while Rick Reuschel finished with 54 points finishing third.

Bedrosian probably won it because the BBWAA voters could not give it to Nolan Ryan. Though Ryan led the league in ERA (2.76) and strikeouts (270 in 211 innings), he went 8-16 as a 40-year old for the Astros.

Did Bedrosian win it by default because there were no other standout pitchers in the league? Shoot, he very well might have put together better seasons in 1982 and 1984 with the Braves relying on a hard fastball. Later he was a key pick up for the Giants during their run to the World Series in 1989 and a solid bullpen piece for the World Champion Twins in 1991. In fact, Bedrosian was on the mound for the Giants when they closed out the NLCS in five games against the Cubs in ’89. Considering that the Phillies were 22-40 when they traded him for Terry Mulholland on June 16 of that season, the deal worked out pretty well for Bedrosian.

Everything went pretty well in 1987, too. Sure, some of the stats types have written off Bedrosian’s victory in ’87 as the worst Cy Young Award winner ever, but that’s missing the point. Though the rapidly aging Phillies won 80 games that year, Bedrosian saved exactly half of them. During one stretch he saved a game in 13 straight appearances and, taking away a blown save that turned into a win, Bedrosian went through a 20-game stretch where he saved 19 games and won one.

Back then it seemed as if Bedrosian only went into games where he was in line for a save, and there very well might have been something to that. According to a Sports Illustrated  story from the summer of ’87, there were reports that during the saves streak Bedrosian had twice refused to pitch in blowouts to preserve his shot at the record. That wasn’t exactly the case, according to Peter Gammons:

But in fact, manager Lee Elia had called the bullpen to ask Bedrosian if he wanted an inning's work because he hadn't pitched in a few days. Bedrosian said no thanks. “I felt I was pretty much in sync even without having pitched,” he says. “And my job is as a stopper. But heck, I'll pitch anytime.”

Closing time
Besides, that was a different time. Unlike when Brad Lidge went 41-for-41 in save opportunities, he never pitched more than three outs in any of his 65 games. However, of his 40 saves in ’87, Bedrosian got 22 saves of more than an inning and 15 when he pitched at least two innings. The way it worked for manager Lee Elia was for the Phillies to get the lead by the seventh inning before turning it over to his closer.

Tally it up and Bedrosian went 54 2/3 innings for his 40 saves with a 0.66 ERA in those chances. He also racked up 68 2/3 innings in his 48 save chances that season, holding opponents to a .238 batting average. By contrast, Lidge posted a 1.10 ERA in 41 innings in his 41 saves in 2008.

No, efficiency wasn’t the style in the 1980s. With 89 innings that season, Bedrosian wasn’t even the hardest worked reliever on the staff. Even though the Phillies had four starters pitch from 200 to 229 innings, Kent Tekulve appeared in 90 games for 105 innings. Up-and-comer Mike Jackson went 109 innings in 55 games—not the way they break in 22-year olds these days. Meanwhile, Tom Hume piled on 70 innings in 38 appearances before being released in August, weeks before Rawley tanked.

It worked out for Bedrosian, though. Actually, an All-Star appearance where he memorably tagged out Dave Winfield at the plate in a wild, 3-6-1 double play to keep the game scoreless in the bottom of the ninth, earned Bedrosian a $25,000 bonus. He also got and $100,000 for winning the Rolaids award as the league's No. 1 relief pitcher as well as another $100,000 for the Cy Young. When put on top of his $825,000 salary, Bedrosian got $1,050,000 in 1987 to become the 59^th player to earn over $1 million in a season.

He didn’t act like a millionaire in the clubhouse, though. In addition to solid pitching, Bedrosian continued the legacy of oddball Phillies relievers that started with Tug McGraw and was passed down to the likes of Larry Andersen, Roger McDowell, Mitch Williams, Ricky Bottalico and Ryan Madson. He also was a fan of the Three Stooges and was said to have the ability to recite episodes of the show by heart. Still, with 103 saves for the Phillies Bedrosian was the franchise leader until Jose Mesa passed him in 2003, but he likely will hang on to the No. 2 spot until Lidge surges past in 2011.

These days Bedrosian is somewhat affiliated with baseball. As the supervisor of the school board in Coweta County, Georgia, Bedrosian doubles as the assistant coach for the East Coweta High baseball team. That’s the team his son Cameron pitched for before he was the 29^th overall pick in the 2010 draft for the Angels.

Interestingly, just as Bedrosian was winding down his career in the big leagues, Cameron’s older brother Cody was diagnosed with leukemia. According to a story in Baseball America, Cody, then just 6, needed a bone-marrow transplant when it was discovered his two-year-old younger brother was a perfect match. Because of this, Cody is cancer free more than 17 years later and Cameron finished his first pro season.

In other words, it’s just fine by Bedrosian if he is finally replaced as “the last Phillies pitcher to win the Cy Young Award” now that Halladay has arrived. Actually, it’s about time.

Keep on closing
Having a long-term, consistent closer is not something the Phillies are known for. In fact, with 103 saves for the franchise in a little more than three seasons, Steve Bedrosian was the franchise leader from 1989 to 2003 when Jose Mesa took the all-time leadership. If Brad Lidge, with 99 saves, can produce a solid 2011 season, he not only will pass Mitch Williams, Bedrosian and Mesa, but also could be the first Phillies’ closer to hold onto the job for four seasons.

1970 – Dick Selma (22 saves)
1971 – Joe Hoerner (9 saves)
1972 – Mac Scarce (4 saves)
1973 – Mac Scarce (12 saves)
1974 – Eddie Watt (6 saves)
1975 – Garber/McGraw (14 saves)
1976 – Ron Reed (14 saves)
1977 – Gene Garber (19 saves)
1978 – Ron Reed (17 saves)
1979 – Tug McGraw (16 saves)
1980 – Tug McGraw (20 saves)
1981 – Tug McGraw (10 saves)
1982 – Ron Reed (14 saves)
1983 – Al Holland (25 saves)
1984 – Al Holland (29 saves)
1985 – Kent Tekulve (14 saves)
1986 – Steve Bedrosian (29 saves)
1987 – Steve Bedrosian (40 saves)
1988 – Steve Bedrosian (28 saves)
1989 – Roger McDowell (19 saves)
1990 – Roger McDowell (22 saves)
1991 – Mitch Williams (30 saves)
1992 – Mitch Williams (29 saves)
1993 – Mitch Williams (43 saves)
1994 – Doug Jones (27 saves)
1995 – Heathcliff Slocumb (32 saves)
1996 – Ricky Bottalico (34 saves)
1997 – Ricky Bottalico (34 saves)
1998 – Mark Leiter (23 saves)
1999 – Wayne Gomes (19 saves)
2000 – Jeff Brantley (23 saves)
2001 – Jose Mesa (42 saves)
2002 – Jose Mesa (45 saves)
2003 – Jose Mesa (23 saves)
2004 – Billy Wagner (21 saves)
2005 – Billy Wagner (38 saves)
2006 – Tom Gordon (34 saves)
2007 – Brett Myers (21 saves)
2008 – Brad Lidge (41 saves)
2009 – Brad Lidge (31 saves)
2010 – Brad Lidge (27 saves)

Pat Gillick, Tommy John and the Hall of Fame

The baseball awards season is upon us, and it got under way somewhat comically when the American League Gold Glove winners were announced. From this point of view it’s a tough call on what is funnier… the masturbating bear on the Conan O’Brien show or the righteous indignation folks put on display when someone like Derek Jeter wins a fifth Gold Glove.

It’s easy to understand why the masturbating bear is funny. That’s pretty obvious. However, the call on Jeter and the furor over certain award choices is only slightly more subtle than that poor, sadistic bear. Sure, we all know that Jeter is no wizard at shortstop and might be less worthy of a Gold Glove Award than Rafael Palmiero was in 1999 when he played just 28 games at first base, but really, who cares? These awards are nothing more than some coaches, managers, players and writers patting each other on the back.

Worse, sometimes the players get a little extra cash for just placing in the voting for some awards. If that doesn’t smack of a conflict of interests, there’s a not-so-subtle bear act you can check out on basic cable.

Still, guys like me watch the process with lots of interest. Mostly, perhaps, that intrigue comes from the idea that the voting and the results somehow validate or debunk the way a person views the game. The truth is nothing could be further from the truth. As a non-voting member of the writing baseball press, there is as much validity in simply casting a ballot that won’t be counted in a story or a blog post. Baseball is subjective like that—just because a shadowy consensus says Derek Jeter is a great fielder it doesn’t mean anyone has to believe it.

Better yet, no injustice has beset a better fielding shortstop in the American League. A fraudulent process validates nothing.

Nevertheless, the Veteran Committee voting process to elect new Hall of Famers at the Winter Meetings in December will begin a new, interesting process. Rather than a Historical Overview Committee and a ballot with players whose career began in 1943 or later and were no longer eligible for BBWAA election, the Veterans Committee streamlined the voting. Beginning this year Hall-of-Fame candidates are classified into three different eras from which their career sprouted. The Pre-Integration (1871–1946), the Golden (1947–1972) and Expansion (1973 and later) eras will rotate voting beginning this year with guys from the not-so distant past going first.

To be elected into the Hall of Fame, the potential inductees need to get 75 percent of the vote, and since there are 16 on the voting committee, 12 votes are needed to get in. As such, Hall of Famers, Johnny Bench, Whitey Herzog, Eddie Murray, Jim Palmer, Tony Pérez, Frank Robinson, Ryne Sandberg, Ozzie Smith; executives Bill Giles, David Glass, Andy MacPhail, Jerry Reinsdorf; and media folks Bob Elliott, Tim Kurkjian, Ross Newhan and Tom Verducci will determine who (if anyone) will go to Cooperstown in 2011.

Of course, the committee just can’t vote for any old ballplayer or executive. Pete Rose, as we know, is on the ineligible list and cannot be on the ballot. However, the BBWAA formed yet another committee, this one called the Historical Oversight Committee to come up with a list of 12 guys to place on the ballot. After the committee met, adjourned and probably went to a dark and depressing bar to talk about how the modern era of baseball writing is nothing like it was in the old days, the list of 12 was sent to the good folks at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, who issued a press release of those up for election.

The names on the list/release:

Vida Blue, won the MVP and the Cy Young in 1971. Won 20 games and the World Series three times with the Oakland A’s. 

Dave Concepcion, slick-fielding shortstop for the Reds and the longest tenured member of the Big Red Machine. 

Steve Garvey, clutch hitter for the Dodgers and Padres and MVP of NL in 1974. c

Pat Gillick, longtime general manager with Toronto, Baltimore, Seattle and Philadelphia. 

Ron Guidry, helped the Yankees win the World Series twice and went 25-3 in ’78 to win the Cy Young Award. 

Tommy John, pitched 26 seasons in the majors and won 288 games. 

Billy Martin, Yankees second baseman and manager of several teams. Mickey Mantles’ best friend and often a public nuisance. 

Marvin Miller, longtime head of the MLBPA. 

Al Oliver, perennial .300 hitter with the Pirates, Rangers and Expos. 

Ted Simmons, perennial All-Star catcher in the same era with Bench, Fisk and Carter. 

Rusty Staub, lefty hitter with Mets, Houston, Expos and Rangers. A great pinch-hitter late in his career

George Steinbrenner, owner of the Yankees 

Obviously, it’s a pretty good list with a handful of guys who slipped through the cracks of the initial balloting by the writers for one reason or another. However, it’s pretty weird to see the Veterans Committee list filled with ballplayers that I actually recall watching play. Of course some of those guys were at the end of the line, like Staub, who had that strange upright lefty batting stance and a body that didn’t quite fit into the ‘70s style uniforms of expansion teams like Houston, Montreal and the Mets.

Nevertheless, this is a tough ballot and here’s why…

Tommy John unquestionable impact 

Now, before we get started my criteria for what makes a Hall of Famer might not mesh with the conventional wisdom. For me, the greater variable is the impact the man had over statistics. Of course some stats cannot be ignored, like 500 homers, 3,000 hits or 300 wins. Still, I give points for guys who were the league's best players at their position for a bunch of years in a row. I also give kudos to players who have remarkable seasons/performances, etc. In that vein, though most of his career was underwhelming, Roger Maris would get my vote largely because of his 1961 season.

And that’s why Tommy John would get my vote.

John’s career mark was nothing to look past… far from it. He won 288 games, went to the World Series three times with the Dodgers and Yankees, has the eighth most starts (700) in big league history, and topped 200 innings in 12 different seasons. In fact, he piled on five straight 200-plus innings seasons and seven of them in the nine seasons after he underwent a revolutionary surgery to replace the ligament in his left elbow with a tendon from somewhere else in the body.

They call it Tommy John surgery.

These days it’s tougher to find a pitcher who hasn’t undergone Tommy John surgery than those without that severe-looking scar on the elbow. However, when Dr. Frank Jobe performed the first surgery on John, he was given a 1 in 100 chance at a return to his career. At age 31 when he went under the knife, John spent 18 months in rehabilitation, skipped the 1975 season, and then pitched until the age of 46.

Now, a player has a better than 90 percent chance to return from Tommy John surgery and often a pitcher returns from the surgery with a fastball that has a few extra ticks on the speedometer. So for a solid statistical ledger and for contributions to the game, John is in.

The same goes for the longtime director of the MLBPA, Marvin Miller. Actually, it’s a travesty that Miller hasn’t been inducted yet. Truth is, Miller has had more impact on baseball than any man in the history of the game. Ask any ballplayer who came into the game during the 1970s and after what Miller meant to the players. If they tell you they don’t know who he is or what he did, then they should return their paycheck, four-star accommodations on the road, chartered flights, right to test free agency, and more the generous pension. Those ungrateful slobs don’t deserve it.

 The big debate

There are a lot of close calls, but because we don’t want to go making votes willy-nilly, it’s very difficult to decide on catcher Ted Simmons, first baseman Steve Garvey, lefty Ron Guidry, or the smooth, left-handed hitting Al Oliver. After all, it’s not Simmons’ fault that he was overshadowed by better-known catchers Johnny Bench, Carlton Fisk and then later, Gary Carter.

But from a statistical view, if Carter is in then Simmons should be, too.

Garvey had a penchant for clutch hits, like that homer he hit in Game 4 of the 1984 NLCS. He also had the longest consecutive games streak since Lou Gehrig until that Ripken dude came around. Garvey also got 200 hits in a season six times, went to the All-Star Game 10 times, won an MVP Award in 1974, and appeared in the World Series five times with two different teams. Five times Garvey’s teams got to the playoffs and all five times they advanced to the World Series with ol’ Popeye arms getting 11 homers and a .338 average in 55 postseason games.

If Garvey gets in, then Oliver should, too. Largely for the Pirates and Rangers, Oliver batted over .300 11 times, went to the All-Star Game seven times and won the National League batting title with the Expos when he was 36.

How does one judge Ron Guidry? In his first full season he went 16-7 and helped the Yankees win the World Series. He did that again the next season, only he went 25-3 with a 1.74 ERA in 273 innings to win the Cy Young Award. Better yet, in an era where specialization was coming to the fore, Guidry completed nearly 30 percent of his starts, including 21 in 1983.

So if Guidry is Hall worthy, then so too is Blue. After all, if we’re talking about an impact on the game, Blue took it by storm in 1971 when he won 24 games in his first full season to win the AL MVP and the Cy Young Award. Actually, Blue’s impact went beyond baseball to the point that he accompanied Bob Hope on a USO tour of Vietnam. Later, however, his career became a cautionary tale for unfilled potential and wasted talent as he battled a drug problem. In 1985 he was part of the Pittsburgh cocaine trial with other major leaguers like Dave Parker, Willie Wilson, Keith Hernandez, Tim Raines and Jeffrey Leonard, among others.

The flat-out nays on the list go to Davey Concepcion, Billy Martin, Rusty Staub and George Steinbrenner. This is not to belittle their careers in any way, however, Concepcion was rather innovative as a shortstop and had crazy range, but he wasn’t anything to be frightened of at the plate.

Martin, while popular and talented, often wasted his talent and alienated his teams. Even though his teams were always close to the top of the standings, he won the World Series just once. His overall winning percentage (.553) and the number of pennants exactly matches that of one of his former players, Charlie Manuel.

So we have Tommy John and Marvin Miller as sure things, along with general manager Pat Gillick.

Oh yes, Pat Gillick is a Hall of Famer. It wasn’t too difficult to see that when he was running the Phillies, taking them to the playoffs twice in three years while capturing the franchise’s second World Series title. The fact is Gillick won everywhere he went and had the uncanny ability to find the one missing piece his teams needed.

Gillick as the best ever?

As a Hall of Famer himself, writer Peter Gammons, calls Gillick the best ever at his job. That’s debatable, of course, like anything else. Branch Rickey was pretty darned good. So was Frank Cashen, who built those great Orioles’ teams in the 1960s and ‘70s and then put together the ’86 Mets. Still, Gillick did it under different circumstances and in both leagues with an emphasis on scouting, player make up and an eye for talent. Even more impressively, Gillick’s first head GM gig was with the expansion Blue Jays where it took him less than a decade to build them up from scratch and get them to the playoffs.

By the early ‘90s, the Jays were a powerhouse and won the World Series back-to-back in ’92 and ’93.

Oddly, teams are never as good after Gillick departs. Toronto hasn’t been to the postseason since Joe Carter hit the homer to beat the Phillies in 1993. Meanwhile, the Orioles haven’t even had a winning season since 1997 when they won 98 games. The Mariners won an incredible 116 games in 2001 with Gillick in charge, won 93 in 2002 and 2003 in his last seasons there, but have had just one winning season since.

Only the Phillies have been able to survive the post-Gillick swoon… so far.

So here’s hoping John, Miller and Gillick get the call. But while we’re at it, let’s offer up the names Bert Blyleven, Jack Morris, Roberto Alomar, Tim Raines, Larry Walker and Jeff Bagwell.

That is if we’re really sure about Bagwell.

Don't expect Jamie Moyer to give up so easily

We all remember how it was when Mike Schmidt announced his retirement from playing baseball. Better yet, when Schmidty told everyone he was done that day in San Diego in 1989, there was no mistaking the intent. Sure, the blubbering, the emotion and the cracking voice were dead giveaways that he meant business. Oh, but there were better indicators than just the crying and carrying on.

Think about it… who wakes up in the morning and puts on a late-‘80s styled suit straight from a Tom Cruise movie, and then arranges his hair in a supremely coiffed feathered ‘do if they didn’t mean business. If I remember correctly, the theme from Miami Vice played Schmidt out of the room when the presser was over.

However, neither the walk-off song nor the fat lady has begun to sprinkle out those first notes for Jamie Moyer’s exit. No way. Baseball’s most elderly statesman isn’t going to give up the ghost of his career without a fight. That wouldn’t be his style.

So noting that Moyer reportedly suffered an injury last weekend while pitching in his third winter league game in the Dominican Republic last weekend with his 48^th birthday next Friday, it’s reasonable to think that the old man is done. Add in the fact that Moyer jetted off to California to visit with renowned orthopedist Dr. Lewis Yocum because of an injured elbow that reportedly swelled up to the size of a golf ball, and maybe this is how it finally all goes down.

Then again, that’s way too easy.

While the results of an MRI on his elbow are still unknown, those simply writing off the cagey, 24-year veteran lefty should think for a second. Hell, the easy thing to do would be to retire and that was something Moyer has had plenty of chances to contemplate. Considering that he’s been flat-out released three times, allowed to take free agency three more times, and then sent back to minors three more times on top of that. Even his father-in-law, former basketball coach Digger Phelps, told him to retire and go back to school. In other words, Moyer has had his chances to take the easy way out—there has been no shortage of easy exits.

In fact, there was the time he sat in his hotel room in Anaheim waiting to go to the ballpark to pitch in a meaningless game for the Mariners in mid-August, that Moyer says he and his wife had a 90-minute conversation over the phone about whether or not it was time to pack it in. The idea of playing another season with a mediocre team with no shot to realistically compete for a World Series was just too much for him to bear.

Enough was enough, he thought, until he was offered an interesting proposition…

“A couple of days later they came to me and said, ‘Hey, want to be traded?’” Moyer recounted earlier this year.

Five days after that phone conversation with his wife, Moyer was pitching for a Phillies team that was preparing to make the greatest post-season run in their history. Better yet, he was the pitcher who got the most wins during the past four years.

Still, Moyer has never been through the things he’s been faced with over the past 12 months. Last November he had three different surgeries to repair a torn groin and abdominal issues and even ended up in the hospital last Thanksgiving to clean up an infected blood clot. But even that wasn’t enough to keep him from reporting to spring training on time.

Then shortly after the All-Star Break, Moyer hurt his elbow in the first inning of a game in St. Louis, where the diagnosis was a sprained ulnar collateral ligament and a strained flexor pronator tendon. Typically the course of action for that type of injury is Tommy John surgery. However, because Moyer and John had careers that overlapped by four years, such an invasive surgery would have ended it all.

Instead, Yocum prescribed rest and Moyer followed it to the letter before he was given the go-ahead to begin throwing again. During the NLCS it wasn’t uncommon to see the old lefty in the bullpen throwing pitch after pitch in attempt to rebuild his strength and to prepare for the winter league season.

So to think that Moyer would give up so easily after heading to the Dominican Republic to pitch against up-and-comers and players looking to get more at-bats or innings says something about the man. Better yet, it’s about time people accept the fact that Moyer isn’t pitching for stats, money or fame. Sure, he has an ego like anyone else and chances are that if Moyer was digging ditches for a living and could retire whenever he wanted and remain independently wealthy, he’d do it. But Moyer loves the game. He loves pitching and he loves to compete. Still defiant and engaged in a fight with those who are resigned to accept outcomes and convention wisdom, it’s clear that Moyer’s goal was to keep pitching until it was no longer physically possible. He wasn’t slowing down and he wasn’t taking shortcuts, either.

He never lost it.

But he’s not blind, either. He’s not wishing for a perfect, lucky outcome in order to take one more spin around to celebrate some type of victory. Why should he? Moyer has faced his every day in baseball with a cold, hard shot of reality and that defiance. He’s celebrated the mundane and taken joy in the unbelievable fortune that comes to those who are lucky enough to throw a baseball for a living.

He wasn’t granted any shortcut when the Cubs, Rangers and Cardinals placed him on waivers, and he’ll be damned if he’s going to accept one now.

“Because once it’s over it’s over whether I just plain retire or if it’s due to an injury,” Moyer said after his injury in St. Louis. “I’ve always said that when that last day comes, I’m done.”

The truth is that for the better part of the past four decades, Moyer has played baseball, so why stop now?

“Some players get injured and others just lose the desire,” Moyer told me during a conversation in Washington two years ago. “Then some, for one reason or other, are told to quit because they reach a certain age or time spent in the game. Some just accept it without asking why.”

Moyer never accepted it. That’s why he won’t accept it this time unless Dr. Yocum tells him otherwise. No tears, no speeches, no nothing. Just baseball.

Pat Burrell is no Gil Hodges

This is the lull. Free agency doesn’t officially begin until Sunday, and the World Series was too painful for many to watch after the Phillies went belly up against the Giants in the NLCS. Of course it didn’t help that the Giants had a pretty easy time with the Rangers, either.

Still, there isn’t much that will be memorable about the 2010 World Series. The pitching duels between Cliff Lee and Tim Lincecum didn’t exactly pan out, and the Rangers’ offense that tore apart the Yankees, didn't show up.

Actually, the Giants’ offense didn’t exactly conjure memories of Willie Mays or Willie McCovey or even Will Clark. Edgar Renteria was the MVP because he hit two home runs and got seven hits against a team that had one run in its last three losses.

Hitting-wise the World Series was disappointing, though not an all-time worst. That’s excluding former Phillie Pat Burrell, who not only set a record for the most strikeouts in a five-game series (in four game, no less), but also appeared to be defying physics, geometry and basic biology by failing to put the bat on the ball.

How bad was Burrell?

Let’s take a look…

***

As the 1952 World Series bounced back and forth for a week during a tense, ping-ponging of leads and ties, people in the borough of Brooklyn went to church to light candles and pray for Gil Hodges. Watch any of those saccharine-sweet documentaries about the so-called “Golden Age” of baseball when the Dodgers still played in Brooklyn and the Giants were still in the Polo Grounds in Harlem and invariably there will be a segment about Gil Hodges and the ’52 World Series.

Hodges went 0-for-21 with six strikeouts and five walks during the seven game series against the Yankees, which very well could be the most famous slump of all time. In fact, Hodges’ epic oh-fer is one of those flashpoints in time for a lot of baseball fans. Shoot, even Charlie Manuel has spoken about Hodges not being able to get a hit against the Yankees in the World Series, a moment from his youth he recounted in pre-game chats with the scribes. Manuel was eight during the 1952 World Series and said it was unbelievable to imagine a hitter like Hodges struggling like he did.

Would Gil Hodges ever get a hit? The Brooklyn fans held up their end, including Father Herbert Redmond of St. Francis in the borough who announced during an unseasonably warm mass, “It's far too hot for a homily. Keep the Commandments and say a prayer for Gil Hodges.”

With Hodges batting sixth for the Dodgers in the Game 7 at Ebbets Field, he was able to tie the game in the fourth inning on a ground out. But with no outs in the sixth inning and the tying run on first base, Hodges grounded into a double play to further dishearten the Dodgers’ spirits. They got two more base runners for the rest of the game as the Yankees won yet another title.

It’s still easy to wonder how Brooklyn’s fortunes would have turned if Hodges had gotten just one hit in the World Series. Considering he led the team with 32 homers, 102 RBIs and 107 walks, the Dodgers’ success or failure was tied to Hodges’ ability to drive the ball. Strangely, in ’52, Hodges hit 15 fair balls in seven games and not a one of them dropped onto the grass for a hit.

Funny game.

But was Hodges worse than the 0-for-13 with 11 strikeouts Pat Burrell posted for the Giants in five games of the 2010 World Series? Think about that for a second… Burrell went to the plate 15 times, he walked twice, popped out twice and was benched once. So in four games he flailed hopelessly at pitches, rarely putting the onus on the defense to make a play.

He swung and he missed. And then he did it all over again.

Now the extremists in the religion of advanced metrics will tell you that a strikeout is just one out, no different than any other. They will also explain that instead of bouncing into a double play during the sixth inning of Game 7 of the 1952 World Series, Gil Hodges would have been better off striking out. And you know what? Technically they are correct.

But do you remember the feeling of what it was like to strikeout in little league in front of family and friends or in a legion game where your smart-ass friends were sitting a few rows up in the bleachers making wise cracks at every swing and miss? You do? Well, guess what… it’s the same thing for a lot of major leaguers. The feeling of crippling failure that a strikeout leaves one with never goes away, according to some of the guys who have done it in the big leagues. In fact, some guys don’t even want to talk about the strikeouts. When the subject was brought up to Ryan Howard after he set the single-season record for whiffs, the normally affable slugger clammed up and brushed off the significance of the strikeout.

“It’s just one out,” he said dejectedly.

It is just one out, but it’s also the greatest indication of failure in sports. It even looks nasty in the scorebook with that vulgar-looking “K” slotted next to a hitter’s name. For Burrell, his ledger was riddled with them, closing out his time with the Giants with seven of those ugly Ks in his last two games.

So in going 0-for-13 with just two fair balls against the Rangers, did Pat Burrell have the worst World Series ever? Hell, is Burrell the worst World Series player to win two titles? With the Phillies in ’08 and the Giants this October, Burrell is 1-for-27 with 16 whiffs. He has fewer hits in the Fall Classic than Cliff Lee and the same amount as pitchers Joe Blanton, Cole Hamels and utility man Eric Bruntlett—in far fewer at-bats, too.

Yet his 1-for-27 has come to two rings. That’s two more than Ted Williams and Ernie Banks and one more than Willie Mays, Jackie Robinson, Hank Aaron, George Brett and Mike Schmidt.

Nevertheless, it’s a tough to determine if Burrell’s performance is the worst because the Giants won the series in five games. They won it despite Burrell’s strikeout with two on and one out in the seventh inning of a tied Game 5. Burrell whiffed on a 3-2 pitch from Cliff Lee with first base open in what had been the biggest at-bat of the game to that point…

Three pitches later Edgar Renteria hit a home run to deliver the title to San Francisco for the very first time.

Indeed, Burrell, unlike others, was left off the hook. Maybe that was because the Jesuits at his alma mater Bellarmine Prep in nearby San Jose, Calif. lit some candles for him?

Evan Longoria was not so lucky. In 2008 he went 1-for-20 with nine strikeouts in a series where the Phillies won three of the five games by one run. Like Burrell and Hodges, Longoria was a middle-of-the-order hitter for the Rays who’s only hit of the series drove home a run in Game 5.

The one we remember all too well in these parts came during the 1983 World Series where Mike Schmidt dug in against the Orioles 20 times and got one hit in five games. Schmidt, of course, was the MVP of the 1980 World Series, but three years later he whiffed six times and came to bat 10 times with runners on base and four times with runners in scoring position, yet got just one chance to run the bases.

When Schmidt did barely loop one over the infield and onto the turf at The Vet, base runners moved, a rally started and a run actually crossed the plate. It’s funny how that happens.

Weirdly, Schmidt batted .467 with a homer and three extra-base hits in the NLCS before managing to eke out one bloop single in the World Series. That’s kind of reminiscent of the postseason experienced by Placido Polanco in 2006.

In leading the Tigers back to the World Series, Polanco batted .471 in the first two rounds of the playoffs, including .529 during the ALCS to take home MVP honors, only to hang up an 0-for-17 in five games against the Cardinals.

Odder yet, Polanco whiffed just once during the ’06 World Series. The same goes for Scott Rolen in ’04 when he went 0-for-15 with just one whiff against the Red Sox. Rolen very well could have been the MVP of the NLCS on the strength of a seventh-inning homer off Roger Clemens to give the Cardinals the lead they never relinquished. In fact, Rolen belted two other homers in the Cardinals’ Game 2 victory and had six RBIs in the series, which was dwarfed by four homers and a 14-for-28 showing from Albert Pujols.

Of course Rolen whiffed nine times in that series, too, yet still managed to get some big hits.

Not in the World Series, though. Better yet, both Polanco and Rolen put the ball in play to make something happen, but walked away with nothing. Kind of like Hodges.

Funny game.