Lidge Has That Winning Feeling
The Phillies beat the Texas Rangers last night, 8-6. Brad Lidge thinks the Phillies are starting to play better baseball. The Phillies hope he's right.
Lidge Has That Winning Feeling
Todd Zolecki
Brad Lidge has a funny feeling the Phillies are about to start playing much, much better than they have played the past couple weeks.
I'm sure Phillies fans hope he's right.
The Phillies beat the Rangers last night at Rangers Ballpark, 8-6. Here's why Lidge is optimistic: the offense. The Phillies have scored 15 runs in their last two games. They had scored just 15 in their previous eight games. Chase Utley went 3 for 5 with two doubles and a home run, his first homer since June 13. He is hitting .444 (8 for 18) in his last four games. Ryan Howard hit a two-run home run, his first homer since June 16. Jayson Werth had two RBIs.
The Phillies scored three runs in the second inning to take a 3-2 lead, thanks to a Howard walk and consecutive singles by Greg Dobbs, Pedro Feliz and Werth. It's the first time the Phillies had hits in three consecutive at-bats since June 13, when they collected four in a row in the eighth inning of a 20-2 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals.
That's 12 games without stringing together three hits.
"It's about time," Charlie Manuel said.
This team is built around its offense. If it can't score, its pitching isn't good enough to carry it. So Utley, Howard, Jimmy Rollins and others need to start hitting. Lidge thinks they will. Time will tell.
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It looks like the Phillies could skip Brett Myers' turn in the rotation this week.
“He’s trying to find it,” said Charlie Manuel, who had a lengthy talk with Myers yesterday afternoon. “Everything he does, it seems like it doesn’t work. Our game is not an easy game. This game bites you in the ass every day. You’ve seen guys walk up to home plate and look like they can hit everything up there. And that same hitter a month from now, he can’t even wipe his ass with a tent pole.”
That’s Myers at the moment. Myers, Manuel and the rest of the Phillies hope that changes.
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Bob Ford offers his take on Ed Wade getting grabbed by the neck and chucked to the ground.
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In the Phillies Notebook, Geoff Jenkins talks about his 2-for-41 slump.
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In The Inquirer's Sunday baseball column, Jim Salisbury tells us what's going on with maple bats ... and more important, why are maple bats such a big deal to players? Also check out Extra Bases, On Deck, Stats 'N' Stuff and Trade Deficit.
Lidge has been pretty rock solid all year.....if he can keep up the superhero work, we have a chance.....however, this offense is just as likely to score 2 runs today and lose, same for the next series....they scored 7 the night before ans still lost so your story about hitting and winning carrying the pitching is simply not true, at least not on a consistent, winning basis.......as far as Myers, he should have been skipped long ago...IMO, it won't help him either, he may be done.....perhaps nothing more than a servicable 1-2 inning guy from now on.....and I still say his shoulder is bad.....just one's sports med physical therapist, former pitcher's opinion.— Mark1npt- Guess I can no longer say we haven't beaten another teams ace, can I? Oh wait it was only Padilla.....but I guess since he was 10-3 (which is way better than our aces) it does qualify......let's see, we shipped out Floyd, Padilla and didn't sign Lohse......that's nearly 30 wins right there!!!!! But we kept, Eaton and Myers.....hmmm, that's about 20 losses.......can we actually call the Phillies braintrust a braintrust?....or do I have the wrong definition of the word?.....— Mark1npt
- How much is it gone to cost to keep Lidge ? Were not the Yankees. We may end up with Myers as our closer of the future. If all players played as well as they do on contract years, it would bring baseball back to the glory years ! It's nice to dream anyway...— pat h
- Why bother skipping Myers. He does not want to start. It's that simple. Let him set up in the 8th. Flash is done anyway. DL him until the rosters expand in Sept. Call up Happ. He has similar numbers to Kendrick when they called him up last year about this time. Happ has pitched well in his last 5 starts going 3-1 with a no decision in a 7.2 inning, one run effort last night. He is averaging a strike out an inning over this time. Kendrick at Reading had a 1.23 WHIP compared to Happ's 1.27 WHIP at the Valley. Seems like a no brainer to me.— Dull
- Who saw the play today when they had a guy picked off, but the throw from Howard to second was late? How bad was that? Howards fault I take it???— Clinton, NJ
- PHILLIES AUSSIE CONNECTION: The Phils are now highlighting their Australian scouting initiative and their products such as Brad Harman and Drew Naylor. Historically, the Phillies have been roundly criticized for their failure to recruit Hispanic players, which culminated in Bill Giles firing the entire Latin America scouting contingent in the 1990's. Phillies scouting in Japan? None. Phils scouting in Korea? None. How many Australian players have been able to get out of their own way in the history of MLB? None. Why the emphasis upon Australia to the detriment of Latin America and Asia? WHITE ANGLO SAXON PROTESTANT. Whose influence? Dave Montgomery, Jerry Clothier, Bill Giles, & Susan Ingersoll. What do they have in common? WHITE ANGLO SAXON PROTESTANT. One championship, 130 years. Wonder why?— Nick from the Northeast
- My mistake.....1 run tonight for this offense again....against a nobody pitcher and an old bullpen.....what a joke.......so they've scored 16 runs in 3 games and lost 2...what say you now, Todd?— Mark1npt
- Ryan (2 run) Madsen strikes again.......suddenly the BP can't keep the games close either.......just what is this team doing well, right now?— Mark1npt
- Who was it that said the Phils' offense is back on track? Eight innings, five hits, one run...against a no-name pitcher with a high ERA. The Phils can say all they want, but it's ....well, what's the use in complaining. Apparently very little will change. Yes, Madson gave up some runs, but most 1st basemen in the league would have scooped the low throw by Feliz. Again it is proof that one semi-decent game per week is not the stuff of champions. Arrrrgh, c'mon Phils!!!— MrPhillie
- The Phils offense would make Brett Myers look like a 20 game winner! Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo— Clinton, NJ
- forget abotu Lidge. The Phils are in thea worse slunmp thanthe Mets fold of last year. Anyone keeping atats? it cost Willie his job. Any chance it will cost Charlie his?— jdmatthes
- Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo— Clinton, NJ
- You guys are forgetting to look at things the Wheeler way. Good pitchers are always "on" against us. Can't do much about that. Lefties are "tough" on our left handed bats and shut them down because it's tough to stay in against them. Pitchers we have never faced before keep us "off balance". That's just the way this game is sometimes. Other times we're just "scuffling" to score runs. This is a very difficult game to play. The rest of the time we're a very potent offense. Once we get it going, look out. It's a long season and these things have a way of working themselves out.— bski
- Is this a W I P blog ? I'd rather have bad times in June than later in the schedule..Stop the crying. We have to take care of the teams in our division. If they have a problem there, then we can break out the PUFFS..As for winning a championship, get to the play-offs , The team that gets hot usually wins the Worlt Series.. Example; St Louis ..If we sit Myers,shouldn't Dr "K" have splinters ?— pat h
- I like the "Wheelerisms." I don't wish anything bad on the guy, but Chris Wheeler is really just a dorky guy who likes baseball...probably like me! I'm not sure why the Phils employ him as an analyst...he is better suited to play x play. Also, I understand he is basically working for the Phillies, but would it hurt to criticize the team even a little bit when they deserve it? I mean, it is crazy to think that all of these pitchers just happen to pitch their best against the Phillies the past three weeks. Be professional about it, but call out these million dollar players when they are stinkin' it up. I know Chris Wheeler has no bearing on whether the Phils win or lose, but complaining about the play of the team has pretty much reached its limit. How many different ways can you say that the team is in a ridiculously terrible slump?— MrPhillie
