Shallow | Center

Elbow Gloom

THEY HAVE lost to injury, for various lengths of time this season:

• Their best hitter
• Their best power hitter
• Their closer
• Their closer's replacement
• Their best starter
• Several members of the rotation and bullpen
• Countless role players

Yet somehow the Phillies continue to go out there and take their whacks. This incredibly likable and sadly star-crossed bunch is enduring the wrath of the baseball gods at every turn, but instead of collapsing they just shrug their shoulders and play the next game. Cole Hamels's sore elbow is the latest example of abysmal luck, and, given the lackluster state of the Phils' pitching staff, his loss could be the most damaging. His fill-in, J.D. Durbin, had a less than desirable start last night, which was compounded by mail-it-in performances from Jose Mesa and Clay Condrey, all of it leading to a discouraging pounding at the hand of the Dodgers. The Phillies remain what looks to be an insurmountable five games behind the Mets, but at just a game behind the Padres in the wild-card race with more than a month to play, I'm not ready to write them off yet.

Are You Ready for Some Football?

Shit.

Might be time to ease away from baseball and restart my annual interest in the Eagles.

Is Past Prologue?

WITH A 10-game homestand, the season's longest, about to start, it's gut-check time for the Phillies. Well, again. It seems as if once every month or two, we read stories about a "critical" or "crucial" or "defining" set of games -- a long road trip or homestand, a couple of series of games against key opponents -- that will make or break the team's season. And, inevitably, they'll go 6-4 or 7-3, maybe pick up a game in the standings, maybe lose one, and then meander along until the next "important" stretch. If recent seasons are any indication -- and for this franchise, past has most definitely been prologue -- these next 10 games will offer more of the same. The heart-wrenching collapse -- a sweep to a last-place team, a ninth-inning loss to a foe they're battling for a playoff spot -- isn't due for another couple of weeks yet. So relax, enjoy that very drinkable, flavorful Philadelphia Pale Ale, and don't worry; the worst is yet to come.

Wild and Crazy Guys

AFTER A .500 road trip that included dropping two of three to a very bad Pirates team, the Phillies have seen the gap between them and the Mets stretch to five games. For as valiant as their play has been in the face of debilitating injury, the best they've managed is to close to within three games. With six weeks to go, the Phils would have to outdo New York by a game a week to capture the division, and I just don't think they have the pitching to do it. The wild-card race is another matter -- a far more realistic goal to shoot for. Reach the playoffs, after all, and anything can happen.

Mailing It In

QUALITY STARTING pitching doesn't happen every day for the Phillies, so when it comes along, it's imperative for them to take advantage. They very nearly flushed away Kyle Lohse's solid effort in Washington Tuesday night; it took Russell Branyan's improbable eight-inning home run to pick up the rest of the stagnant offense. Last night saw the bats strangely quiet again; the Phils scratched out only five hits and whiffed a dozen times in losing to the Nationals, 4-2. Kyle Kendrick's line -- 5.2 innings pitched, 7 hits, 4 runs -- likely would have looked better had not Ryan Howard inexplicably stuck a second-inning grounder in his back pocket and waited far too late before flipping the ball to Kendrick. That play loaded the bases, and the Nats went on to score a pair of runs in the inning.

How Does the IRS Tax That?

THERE WAS a neat little passage in Craig LaBan's review of the Northeast BYO Rylei in Sunday's Inquirer:

A bigger question, though, was who would cook? The unlikely answer is Jose [Vargas], 26, a longtime waiter whose culinary education consists of studying cookbooks from the Inn at Little Washington and the French Laundry, Wikipedia queries into the elements of molecular gastronomy, and three years of trial and error at home. His volunteer sous-chef is his father-in-law, Terry Brennan, a retired state social worker who has never cooked, who wishes to be paid for his labor in beer (Victory Hop Devil preferred).

I'm not sure what's cooler: That a former waiter with no formal training is turning out such good food, or that his wife's dad is accepting nothing more for his help than just a very tasty pale ale.

Pinch Me, I'm Dreaming

EXCUSE ME, but Russell Branyan? Russell freakin' Branyan? Pat Gillick plucks a scrap from baseball's rusted-out heap, sticks a uniform on him, and the guy goes out and crashes a game-winning, pinch-hit dinger in his first at-bat with the team? This never -- I mean, never -- happens to the Phillies. They're always on the receiving end of such unlikely heroics. I don't think Branyan's homer can be seen as any kind of harbinger ... yet. But if things continue to stay close, don't be surprised to see the Phils accept it as an indication of their destiny. That kind of unquantifiable force can infuse a team with an awful lot of confidence, and teams that play with confidence tend to win more games than those that don't

Is Now the Time?

WOW, IS it ever tempting to look at the standings and the schedule and just dream. Forty-five games to go, including seven against the division-leading Mets and three against wild-card leader San Diego, give the Phillies ample opportunity to make something really cool happen. They've managed to tread water successfully after losing Chase Utley and Shane Victorino, and the return of Tom Gordon and Brett Myers means the bullpen isn't in quite the shambles it was a month ago. The starters, though, are the cold splash of reality. Only Cole Hamels is reliable. The rest are either quite young or quite inconsistent, and sometimes both, and Adam Eaton has been so wretched that two columnists have just called for his removal from the rotation. Utley hopes to be back in a couple of weeks, which would help everyone in the lineup, but I'm not completely ready to give my heart back to the Phillies. The state of the pitching staff is that little voice inside of me that tells me to go slow, to hold off a bit before falling head over heels ... again.

Dog-Tired Days

TRUE TO form, the Phillies are hanging around, neither making a charge for the top nor dropping like a stone to the bottom of the division. After two wins against the Marlins, one a blowout and one far tighter, the Phils remain four games behind the Mets, who can't seem to shake Philadelphia and Atlanta with any degree of permanence. I was at Tuesday's stomping of Florida, and while there was plenty to cheer for, including a strong start from Jamie Moyer and an 11-run explosion, the applause was almost rote, as if the fans, dampened into limpness by the humid night, were too tired to care much one way or the other. A more likely theory is that the Phillies, through their inconsistent play, have drilled the fire out of the large segment of casual fans who, had the team come roaring out of the gate, could have made Citizens Bank Park into a nightly cauldron of intensity and joy and fun instead of merely a great ballpark selling overpriced (if delicious) food and beer.

Anybody Paying Attention?

ASSUMING YOU haven't been sitting in a lawn chair next to John Street while waiting in line for an iPhone, you probably heard that the Eagles opened training camp. And thus has ended another failed attempt by the Phillies to wrangle some much-needed attention from the city's sports-minded public. At just five games over .500 and five games out of first with less than two months to play, they have only themselves to blame. The rest of August and September will see only increased football coverage in the papers and on TV and radio, dooming the Phils even further into the second-tier class in which they perpetually find themselves. They may claim that pennants aren't lost in April and May (a claim with which I fervently disagree), but fans certainly are.