Despite blown call, Phillies squandered several chances

Everybody knows the Phillies were the recipients of a blown call. The Phillies know it, the Milwaukee Brewers know it and even the umpires know it.

So instead of losing 4-3 in nine innings as the Phillies did on Saturday to the Brewers, the game should have gone into extra innings.

As all know by now Kyle Kendrick was called out on a pickoff play in the ninth inning at second base and then Cesar Hernandez hit a double that would have driven him home. For more details, here is the story.

This is another embarrassment for MLB, which keeps saying that it needs to perfect replay before expanding it.

That aside, despite the blown call, the Phillies are squandering too many chances.

They scored three runs but had 11 hits. The Phillies were 1 for 10 with runners in scoring position. They left 10 runners on base.

Injuries or not, blown call or not, they should be doing better.

"We had chances to definitely tie the game up," manager Charlie Manuel said. "We just couldn't pull it out."

Lack of clutch hitting continues to plague the Phillies.

Yes, they are banged up, but that is what happens with old teams. The bottom line is that they still have the ability to compete.

Milwaukee entered Philadelphia with six consecutive losses and that is a team that is fighting to get back to relevance.

So even though a call was blown, this was one of many games the Phillies let slip away.

Now at least they have Cliff Lee going on Sunday against Mike Fiers (1-3, 6.62). That should be a positive sign for a team that hasn't seen too many lately.