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Pardon our Frenchy

Even umpires like feistiness displayed by Phillies Jeff Francoeur

Jeff Francoeur and Ken Giles celebrate their win over the Toronto Blue Jays.
Jeff Francoeur and Ken Giles celebrate their win over the Toronto Blue Jays.Read more(Yong Kim/Staff Photographer)

THE PLAYERS had retreated to their respective benches. Calm had been restored, the Phillies retired in order to end the seventh inning. Hanging over the dugout rail, Jeff Francoeur had already washed away an unfamiliar angry face with his more familiar happy face when Cameron Rupp returned from warming up the pitcher with one final message from harassed plate umpire Dan Bellino.

"He said, 'Tell Frenchy we all love him,' " Francoeur was saying at his locker before last night's game. " 'And that's why he's still in the game.' "

Larry Bowa? Not so much. Jumping from the dugout in part to take some heat off of Francoeur, Bowa got the heave before he even reached full throttle. Took one for the team was one second-day analysis, to keep Francoeur in the game.

Larry being Larry was another. "There's a right way and wrong way to quick pitch," Bowa was saying last night, still sounding a little steamed. "Two nights in a row the hitter's head was down, they're taking the bat back and the ball's right there. This is about hurting somebody. And ending someone's career."

Or in Francoeur's more concise parlance, "Chicken[bleep]."

The lingering visual from Tuesday night's hard-fought, 6-5 loss was of both men barking side by side, and backing the last-place Phillies whose greatest motivation - besides establishing themselves individually as major leaguers - is to gum up some other team's pennant hopes with their feisty and unyielding play.

In his 11th major league season and first with the Phillies, Francoeur has become a nightly spokesman for that effort, assuming and embracing the role as this team's play-the-right-way veteran to complement Bowa's play-the-right-way coaching.

It's a role that has bought him at least one more month with a team he doesn't want to leave, a team for which he has made significant contributions to both on and off the field.

Earlier in the week, the Phillies removed Francoeur from waivers after an undisclosed team claimed him. The surprise wasn't that Francoeur was on waivers in the first place - just about every Phillies player on the roster reportedly was. No, the surprise was that the Phillies decided he was more valuable to keep.

"I think it's something where they looked," Francoeur said. "If they could get anything they could get back. If it helped. For me though, I'm glad. I've really enjoyed my time here. Even moments like [Tuesday] night."

Especially moments like that. To see Francoeur at the top of those steps, to see the entire Phillies bench on its feet taking a cue from that, is to see some of the oft-mentioned intangibles the 31-year-old rightfielder brings.

Francoeur didn't even play in the game. He was on deck to pinch-hit when the final out was made. Last night, though, pinch-hitting in the eighth, he punched a single into centerfield to pull the Phillies to within two runs in their 9-4 loss.

"Practically our entire bench had something to say," Phillies manager Pete Mackanin was saying. "Which is good, sticking up for your teammates and all.

"It's nice to see, he gets into it. He's not in the game, but he's still into it. He pulls for everybody. He's on top of things like that."

The question Mackanin can't, or won't, answer is whether that will be deemed needed next season, whether it will be worth it for the Phillies to invite him back into what is likely to be an outfield suddenly crowded with prospects.

Heck, Mackanin can't even tell you if he'll be here.

A compelling argument can be made either way. No Francoeur means more at-bats for contending prospects (he has 254 this season). But no Francoeur also leaves the onus of veteran leadership on Ryan Howard and Carlos Ruiz - assuming they are not moved this winter.

Neither player has seemed comfortable with that role in the past.

Francoeur revels in it. He already feels a tie-in to this team, and to the town.

"I loved everything about [Tuesday] night," he said. "When I played in Philly all those years with the Braves. That's fun. That's juice. I always tell people you only get that in this area of the country. The Northeast. I've always said it, man, that the Northeast, for pro sports, it's the best place to play. There's no doubt about it.

"I think if you're a Phillies fan and you were going home [Tuesday] night, you've got to be proud of the way the team fought. And the direction it's heading . . . You go into the offseason, and whether I'm back or not, you get a couple other veteran guys to mix in with these young guys and you just play as hard as you can and keep going in the right direction until it's time to take that next step."

Frenchy would love to be one of those other veteran guys. He "hopes," he said, that by pulling him off waivers the other day, the Phillies were thinking beyond the next month of baseball, and into the next season of it. That they, like those umpires he riled the other night, all still love him and want him in their games.

On Twitter: @samdonnellon

Columns: ph.ly/Donnellon