A guy from Bodog sent me these odds on different Eagles stuff.

For amusement purposes only, etc.


Odds to win the Super Bowl, 25-1.

Odds to win the NFC Championship, 10-1.

Odds to win the NFC East, 7-2.

Over/under on Donovan McNabb starts, 14.

Over/under on Brian Westbrook rushing yards, 1,230.

Over/under on DeSean Jackson receiving yards, 490.

Over/under on Trent Cole sacks, 11.5.

Over/under on Asante Samuel interceptions,  4.5.


Make of them what you will. Now, I'm not a big odds guy, but the over/under on wins is written like this: over 8.5 wins is -180, under 8.5 wins is +150. Which means, I believe, that the over is believed to be more likely to happen than the under.

Still, is that the right conversation point?

I mean, they're better than 8.5 wins, right?

What does it say about your league that you are so afraid to play your players in an exhibition game? What does it say about the state of the NFL that people would label you as crazy for even thinking about using a real player in the last preseason game of the summer? Which is the state we are all in tonight as the Eagles and Jets prepare to play.

What it says, among other things, is that there is no way the NFL can increase the season from 16 games to 18 games -- as many important people are now suggesting -- without increasing its roster sizes by a similar percentage. Teams barely hang on now because of injuries. Players are bigger and faster than ever, too big and too fast for their bodies' own good, and the use of the really good vitamins remains largely undetected -- which means that they are going to get even bigger and faster.

You cannot stress NFL bodies with more games without some kind of fallback plan  -- that is, more players. And that doesn't even get into the  notion that the players will  want to see their salaries and signing bonuses rise, too, if the number of real games rise.

I'd love to see more real football but I just don't know how they can pull it off. How many more backup quarterbacks would have to play if you increased the length of the season by 12.5 percent? How many more carries could a guy like Brian Westbrook take without breaking down -- or, for that matter, breaking in half?

They are all already drunk with money, both owners and players, absolutely cash-faced. Despite how unpalatable these final exhibition games are, does the NFL really need to run this kind of injury risk for more money?

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That said, do you think if  the Eagles had truthfully printed up the tickets for tonight's game -- if, instead of "Eagles vs. Jets," they had said, "Nothing Much Except Tony Hunt Trying to Learn How to Be a Fullback" -- would anybody outside of the Hunt family show up?

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So Taguchi: 5-foot-10, 170 pounds.
DeSean Jackson: 5-foot-10 (maybe), 167 pounds

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Over-under on Brett Favre not being able to get up off of the stool: Week 11.

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Who could have predicted that Michael Strahan would have enough integrity not just to take the Giants' $8 million and fraud his way through the season? Because that is what it would have been. You cannot just step off of a beach and onto an NFL defensive line. Jon Runyan would have killed him.

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Finally, does anybody care what language she speaks?

Didn't think so.

No runs, no hits, no balls hit in his direction -- that was how Carlos Ruiz's inning as the Phillies' third baseman began on Tuesday night. It was the top of the ninth inning of what turned out to be a 13-inning, 8-7 Phillies' victory. In order to preserve Eric Bruntlett as the last available pinch-hitter in the bottom of the ninth, they needed Ruiz to put away his catching gear and go inside and grab his infield glove for the first time in a major-league game.

It began with this conversation, Ruiz said: "(Bench coach) Jimy Williams, he was talking, he was looking right into my face, and he said, 'Hey, you go to third base.' And I (said), 'What?'"

Everybody laughed at the re-telling yesterday afternoon in the Phillies' clubhouse. It had been a short night for everyone after the 5-hour, 17-minute marathon. (Note: the difference between sportswriters and professional athletes is that the sportswriters look a lot more tired the day after a night like that one.)

Anyway, Ruiz said he kept asking shortstop Jimmy Rollins and seeking cues from coach Steve Smith in the dugout if he was positioned correctly. He said he was kind of hoping that a ball had been hit to him in his one inning out there, just to make the experience complete. (Rest assured, no one else on the team harbored such hopes.)

"Last night was a great moment," said Ruiz, who admitted he hadn't played in the infield since 1997 or 1998, except for during infield practice.

"I do it everyday," he said. "You never know."

After the big comeback, after the Phils erased a 7-0 deficit and beat the Mets by 8-7 in 13 innings last night, Phillies shortstop Jimmy Rollins strongly suggested that some unspecified-but-premature celebration by the Mets worked to ignite the Phillies' rally from oblivion.

"The other team gives you inspiration -- let's put it that way," said Rollins, who had five hits in his first five at-bats in the  game, including a home run. "And when you're able to take that and keep yourself motivated, it helps."

What did the Mets do?

"You've got to watch them," Rollins said.

Something they said or did?

"Just watch 'em," Rollins said. "Just watch 'em. If you were a player, you're looking over in that other dugout, you'll feel a certain type of way...You try to find something on any team, but especially these guys."

Body gestures? Something like that?

"Rewind the game," Rollins said. "Rewind the game."

The other shortstop (Jose Reyes)?

"Just watch the game," Rollins said. "That's all I can say -- watch the game."

Rollins would offer no other evidence. But what clearly is a rivalry between teams that genuinely don't like each other just saw the writing of another chapter.


------------------------------


From a wild night at the Bank:

1) Strategic move of the game was having catcher Carlos Ruiz play third base in the top of the ninth inning, preserving Eric Bruntlett as a pinch-hitter in the bottom of the ninth. Bruntlett cracked the game-tying double. Phils manager Charlie Manuel said he chose Ruiz because he could see the pitcher's spot coming around in the order, and because Ruiz actually had been an infielder as a prospect, way back when. But what you probably didn't see on TV was one of first baseman Ryan Howard's practice ground balls between innings totally flummoxing Ruiz. He knocked it down with his chest.

2) Comic relief came from Brett Myers (.045 batting average) in the bottom of the 13th, sent up to the plate with bases loaded and nobody out under orders from Manuel not to swing the bat. Myers played it up theatrically, including the unfurling of an exaggerated, Sadaharu Oh leg kick. He did everything but wave his arms and scream, "We want a pitcher, not a belly-itcher." But he worked a long count before striking out, and he did not swing. And Manuel said he told him after the at-bat, "You can follow orders."

3) How often have you seen a guy go 4-for-4 in a game that he didn't even enter until the eighth inning? That's what Chris Coste did, including the game-winning RBI in the 13th.

4) Third base coach Steve Smith is on a really hot roll lately with sending guys in tough spots and having it work out. Last night, he was waving Jayson Werth all the way from first on Bruntlett's ninth inning double.

5) Kyle Kendrick was going to be the next pitcher into the game last night, which is a little unusual considering he it tonight's starter against Johan Santana. Kendrick threw 40 warmup pitches and says he is fine and, well, we'll see. But they almost certainly have to bring up a body from the minor leagues for tonight, just in case.

After the big comeback, after the Phils erased a 7-0 deficit and beat the Mets by 8-7 in 13 innings last night, Phillies shortstop Jimmy Rollins strongly suggested that some unspecified-but-premature celebration by the Mets worked to ignite the Phillies' rally from oblivion.

"The other team gives you inspiration -- let's put it that way," said Rollins, who had five hits in his first five at-bats in the  game, including a home run. "And when you're able to take that and keep yourself motivated, it helps."

What did the Mets do?

"You've got to watch them," Rollins said.

Something they said or did?

"Just watch 'em," Rollins said. "Just watch 'em. If you were a player, you're looking over in that other dugout, you'll feel a certain type of way...You try to find something on any team, but especially these guys."

Body gestures? Something like that?

"Rewind the game," Rollins said. "Rewind the game."

The other shortstop (Jose Reyes)?

"Just watch the game," Rollins said. "That's all I can say -- watch the game."

Rollins would offer no other evidence. But what clearly is a rivalry between teams that genuinely don't like each other just saw the writing of another chapter.

Consider:

J.D. McGillicuddy
J.D. Durbin
J.D. Salinger
S.A. Paolantonio
J.R.  Monaghan
J.C. Romero
P.J. Whelihan
T.J. Bohn
V.S. Naipaul
J.T. O'Sullivan
R.J. Swindle
M.G. Missanelli
P.F. Chang
J.A. Happ
R.L. Stine


The list above contains the names of five Phillies, four restaurants, three best-selling authors, two wayward Philadelphia sportswriters and one starting quarterback in the National Football League. How hard could it be to figure it out -- without Googling, that  is?

The 0-2 pitch to Jeff Kent was a strike, by all television appearances. The 1-2 pitch was a strike, too. But the umpire disagreed. Top of the seventh, bases loaded, one out, Brett Myers was holding a 3-0 lead over the Dodgers last night. Kent should have been struck out twice but the count was 2-2. This was the Myers crucible.

On television, Chris Wheeler framed it exactly right: this was going to be a test for Myers and his composure. This was going to be an enormous test of all that Myers reconfigured about himself when he was exiled to the minor leagues this summer. He has been tremendous since coming back but this was the kind of moment that he needed to make his, a time when the umpire had squeezed him and emotions where high and focus was demanded upon the task at hand.

We all have seen Myers over the years. To strip him of his emotion is to neuter him. He will always walk a line that way. When he and manager Charlie Manuel had their screaming match in the dugout recently, a line was crossed, yes. But it still beats the zombie-like alternative. So it is all about harnessing that emotion for Myers, about channeling, about focusing, about chapters three through seven of every self-help book ever written. And this was the moment against Kemp -- because we have all seen Myers react to uncooperative umpires before, with a glare or a wave of the glove in disgust or worse.

The reaction this time? Placid determination followed by a hard, biting curveball, low and out of the strike zone, that Kent chased for strike three.

After Kent, Myers got out of the inning when Manny Ramirez lined to rightfield. But the Kent at-bat told you more.

Last year, Time magazine did a Q&A thing with the spouses of Democratic presidential candidates and Jill Biden was asked to name the TV show that she and her husband tried not to miss. She said, "Philadelphia Eagles games!"

Which makes you wonder, now that Joe Biden is preparing for the adventure of an eventful life, a vice-presidential run at Barack Obama's side:

Has a national political candidate ever been a fan of a Philadelphia sports team?

Bill Clinton liked Arkansas basketball -- in 1994, he was the first sitting President ever to attend an NCAA Tournament game when the Razorbacks played in a regional final game in Dallas. (I remember thinking what a pain the metal detectors were; simpler times.) George W. Bush used to own the Texas Rangers, so you assume some loyalty there. Gerald Ford played football at Michigan. I'm sure there were others.

But did FDR ever root for the Steagles? Did Truman like the Whiz Kids? Did LBJ think Joe Must Go? Did Dan Quayle like the Crazy Eights? Did anyone ever have a Philadelphia rooting interest?

In his day job, as senior Senator from Delaware, Biden has not always been the NFL's friend. About 10 years ago, he co-sponsored a bill along with Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, that would have forced the league to kick in more money for stadium construction and protect local municipalities from extortion. (It didn't pass.) About 20 years ago, he got into a dance with the league on anti-trust issues -- a dance that the NFL felt was a little bit too close.

But on Sunday, he apparently roots for the Eagles. Which raises the question, given Biden's new running mate: do Super Bowl aspirations for the Eagles this season qualify as the audacity of hope? Or just audacity?

(Oh, and given the size of those mitts, has he ever played wide receiver?)

August 10th passed this year, as usual, without comment. But it remains the anniversary of one of the great days in Phillies history. On that day in 1980, between games of a doubleheader in Pittsburgh,  Phils manager Dallas Green unleashed the tirade that launched a World Series. It was loud enough that the writers were able to hear all of it through a closed clubhouse door (although whether it was Green's intention to allow them to hear remains an unsettled question). The key quote, which crystallized Green's season-long battle with a talented, veteran team that was bobbing around a bit above .500, went like this:

"You've got to stop being so bleeping cool. Get that through your bleeping heads."

It is amazing, the things you think about when watching Shane Victorino take an extra base on Dodgers leftfielder Manny Ramirez in the bottom of the 11th inning of a game that never seems as if it is going to end.

It is an extra base that became moot when Pedro Feliz, who tied the game in the bottom of the ninth with a two-out single, hit a three-run homer to win it at the end, 5-2. It became moot, except as a symbol.

Now, this is not then and this team is not that team. This Phillies team is not so much cool as it is confident. It is not so much cool as it is insistent on insulating itself from the panicky football mentality that rules so much of this city. It really is a long season in baseball, and one-game snapshots tend to be so terribly out of focus.

But we are now into the urgency portion of the schedule. The games do start to matter now like football games. Moments will now decide who wins the National League East -- moments, individual efforts, plays born more out of desire than ability. And so, there was Victorino, busting it out of the box, probably sensing that Ramirez would have a hard time anyway if he used his speed and then receiving the gift of a less-than-insistent throw to second base. Runner on second, nobody out.

Now, he wasn't the only one. Earlier in the game, I saw Ryan Howard make the best defensive play I've ever seen him make, diving and catching a foul ball on the dead run, a long way into rightfield. He covered a ton of ground and then totally laid out for the ball -- just a great play. In the innings thereafter, it is hard to recall what was more disappointing: when Howard got picked off first base in the bottom of the 10th inning, or when he changed the shirt that he had made so wonderfully filthy. Doesn't he realize the value in this town of a shirt like that? Short of breaking your face on the outfield fence, an honestly-earned dirty shirt is honored around here.

Anyway, with 32 games to go, the Phils are now even in the loss column with the Mets. What seemed fated from the beginning, a gut-struggle for the division, is set up just that way. But these are the pictures you are starting to see: Howard's shirt, Brett Myers going crazy in the dugout after Feliz tied the game in the ninth, Victorino standing on second and clapping an insistent, let's-go clap. It's time.