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Bob Ford: Almost champions

How close? So close that all it will take to stop the incessant ticking of the championship drought clock is one more win.

Ryan Howard's two home runs helped bring the Phillies within one win of Philadelphia's first major sports championship in 25 years. (Yong Kim/Staff Photographer)
Ryan Howard's two home runs helped bring the Phillies within one win of Philadelphia's first major sports championship in 25 years. (Yong Kim/Staff Photographer)Read more

How close? So close that all it will take to stop the incessant ticking of the championship drought clock is one more win.

All it will take for the Phillies is one more World Series victory tonight, and they get to send Cole Hamels, perhaps the best homegrown pitcher since Robin Roberts, to the mound to get it.

"I'll say what I been saying," manager Charlie Manuel said. "We've got a game to play and we're going to play that game to win."

The drought isn't really the current team's burden to bear, this empty stretch of 28 years since the franchise's only World Series championship, or the stretch of 25 years since any major team in Philadelphia ended the postseason with a win. The 2008 Phillies can only play the 2008 season, after all.

But they can put an end to the drought nonsense tonight. They can break the curses of Billy Penn, Moses Malone, Von Hayes, Eric Lindros and Terrell Owens all at the same time. These Phillies can finally end the taproom time-waster of a question: Which local team has the best chance of winning the next championship?

After last night's romping 10-2 win over the Tampa Bay Rays, the correct answer is definitely Phillies. They've got a real nice shot right now.

They lead the best-of-seven World Series three games to one, and Hamels, the tall lefthander with the world-class change-up, can improve his postseason record to a perfect 5-0 if he sets off the champagne celebration in Citizens Bank Park tonight.

"We're confident in him," shortstop Jimmy Rollins said. "I call him 'Hollywood,' because when the lights are on, he's at his best, and the lights will definitely be on."

Last night's game was a must-win situation for the Rays, although they didn't play and weren't managed with that kind of urgency. Indeed, Tampa Bay played poorly. Starter Andy Sonnanstine walked too many batters, and the defense behind him wasn't very good, either.

Manager Joe Maddon let Sonnanstine stay on the mound as if it were the middle game of a three-night set in Kansas City in June rather than a game that would put his team in a three-games-to-one World Series hole with the other guy's ace coming around.

Maddon let Sonnanstine hang around until Ryan Howard's three-run home run in the fourth gave the Phillies a 5-1 lead and made it seem unlikely the Series will return to Tropicana Field.

Howard would homer again in the eighth inning, his third home run in two nights, to add two more runs of insurance on top of the growing pile and to give him five runs batted in for the game.

"Right now, we're where we want to be, up three to one with a chance to close it out in Philadelphia," Howard said. "We're going to come out ready to go."

Tampa Bay, meanwhile, didn't make much of a dent in Phillies starter Joe Blanton, who joined the team earlier this season. Blanton gave up just four hits and two runs in six-plus innings of work.

Blanton erased one of the runs all by himself by homering to left field, the first extra-base hit of his career. If he looked somewhat shocked as he circled the bases - the first pitcher to hit a World Series home run since Oakland's Ken Holtzman in 1974 - he looked stunned by the moment as he came out of the game in the seventh and was greeted by a towel-waving standing ovation from the crowd of 45,903 in Citizens Bank Park.

"It makes you feel you've done your job," Blanton said.

Stunning moments have been common recently for the Phillies, who got very hot at the right time late in the season. They have won 23 of their last 29 games since Sept. 11, including 10 of 13 in the postseason. At home, they are 6-0 in the playoffs heading into what could be the final game of the season.

Tampa Bay thought it was on that kind of a roll, too, as the Rays survived a near-collapse in the American League Championship Series against the Red Sox. But although the Rays - a last-place team since their inception - were a feel-good story, they haven't been a play-good story.

The Rays have batted just .187 thus far in the Series, their pitchers have issued roughly twice as many walks as the Phillies' pitchers, and they haven't fielded all that well. Two of the Phils' runs last night were unearned. Other than that, not bad.

By being a little bit better overall, and a little bit luckier at times, the Phillies have advanced to within one game of a clinch while batting just 6 for 47 (.128) with runners in scoring position. Four of those hits came last night.

Little of that statistical drivel will be remembered as the years stretch onward if Hamels wins tonight and the 2008 Phillies end the drought, break the curse, jump the shark and bring the Rays flopping into the boat tonight.

"If we get that game, I believe we will be happy, the city will be happy and there will be a big parade," Rollins said.

That will be remembered long after the stats are forgotten. What will be remembered is the feeling of that October night, because the feeling doesn't come around that often.

So close.

Bob Ford:

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