There are reasons that Marson isn’t up here yet.. maybe they think that his 4 HRs and shaky defense aren’t as important as Ruiz’s 2 HRs and solid defense?

Ruiz needs to be Pudge Rodriguez X1000 defensively to keep sending his ass out there every night. Why wont the Phillies take a chance on Marson? I know this has been visited and revisited 1 million times on this site, but I’m so sick of seeing him come up to the damn dish!

clay condrey did a nice job last night though.

this is why you need innings out of your starters. im ok with happ doing what he did last night and kendrick doing what he does.

but moyer simply needs to give you more innings than he does. sometimes he gives you enough but usually its 5-6. eaton is worthless because he cant even gives you that without blowing up lately.

so you can leave happ in the rotation because he will give you more innings as he gets more starts. but after hamels the rest of the guys dont go 7+ innings on average.

that wears your bullpen down over time. just like i said it would.

therefore, a healthy bedard would help if he can go 7 innigns every time out. a mentally stable myers even would help.

now you still need a fresh bullpen arm in there on top of swindle who is permitted to stay to replace gordon who basically is done. theyll let him come back and try it but hes done. cant rely on that. rudy seanex doesnt even count and he shouldnt be on the team anymore. swindle can replace him when gordon comes back but gordon needs replacing too.

this is why you dont stand pat. bringing up the two call ups has been a big boost but now its time for a bigger boost.

your starters need to give you more innings, plain and simple.

I just hope that with Soriano out, Hart doesn’t get the automatic bid and Burrell might still lose in the votes to David Wright… I do think that Wright should be in the game, and Burrell should be in over Fukudome as well

I think someone here has already mentioned this. Happ kept his composure and for the most part successfully pitched
to contact and kept the ball in the yard… barely. He was hit hard and
often but at someone. Lady luck was looking over his shoulder. ;-)

I felt Manuel made a questionable decision in allowing Happ to bat for
himself in the 6th inning with a runner on and 2 outs. Of course, an
automatic out that kill any chance for a rally. It also meant that
Cholly gambled with Happ to start the 7th inning with his pitch count
near 100 and hittable. Why? Especially when you have available arms in
the bullpen that have a league leading low ERA. Maybe, with Gordon on
the DL; Romero is also fatigued and aching; Seanez reportedly “ailing” and the revelation that
Swindle is strictly a situational type reliever (not able to get
righties out), Cholly tried to stretch Happ to get to Durbin and Lidge.
It almost cost the game for the Phillies as the Cards scored two in the
inning. As it turns out, Condrey is being used in late innings of late
and turn in a surprising effort with a perfect 1-2-3 inning.. all
strikeouts! Also Lidge finally faced his demon by retiring Pujols on a
flyball with 2 runners on in the 9th inning. And finished with his 20th
save in striking out Ankiel for the last out.

Baseball is a wonderful game. :-)

Again, Howard came to the Phillies’ rescue with yet another clutch hit. The often maligned (on this site) run producer extended his hitting streak to 12 games (16-for-47) good for .340 BA. While the rest of the team is struggling offensively, he continues to produce big time with 6 HRs and 15 RBIs during his hitting streak. When it comes to RISP for the season, no one on the team is better than him. He is hitting .336 and with 2 outs with RISP…356 BA. His OPS (on base+slugging) with RISP is 1.097 !! One further note for emphasis; he now holds the team record for most RBIs before the All-Star break with 80 !! Howard Power!! Yea!

and pitching