Series 6 Pack: Feeling The Brotherly Love

For the upcoming Cards-Phils series, I went on to do another Series 6 Pack with Justin Klugh of the Fansided Philadelphia Philles site That Balls Outta Here.

We discuss various issues surrounding the current status of the two teams atop their respective divisions going from the Philly Phanatic all the way to “piss pants” Jeff Francoeur.

Apparently yesterday was full of NL Central hostility for myself personally when the story of the Reds writer came up, but what are you gonna do (I have been losing my mind in my finals work with school so I will just apologize now).

1. Cole Hamels just reached 1,000 K’s. He is not even #1 in the staff currently, when all is said and done where will he rank in pitching?

With Cole, its all about maturity. He’s got confidence. He’s got self-control. He trusts his catcher. He trusts his defense. He can hit. He reads books about the Civil War between innings. If he keeps it up, he could be a serious contender for the NL Cy Young. Not that it would surprise anyone to find the 2011 NL Cy Young winner on the Phillies’ staff, but that it would be Cole is kind of a surprise. He still doesn’t get a ton of love from the national media, though. But that’s okay. Philly’s got more than enough love for him. The rotation is like a bunch of friends Cole Hamels invited over to the Phillies, and since he’s the only one that grew up here, we’re the toughest on him.

2. Halladay, Lee, and Oswalt….Can they keep the Cardinals bats at bay?

You and I both know that anyone or two or all three of those guys could slam the door in your face, repeatedly. Oswalt’s faltering at the moment, but you guys are without Pujols. Which isn’t to say Holliday and Berkman aren’t formidable, but it does say you are the team that Albert Pujols plays for and despite this, we will not see him in this series. To me, that’s a huge advantage.

3. Polanco goes below .300 and they are acting like it is the end of the world. Is this the beginning of the end or momentary lapse?

No, what I’m most worried about is Polly starting the All-Star game. He’s the only one whose got a shot in voting, because you know Bochy isn’t going to be generous with his Phillies picks for the roster.

4. The Phillies left fielder is still Raul “Father Time” Ibanez…..Still?…..Really?….No, seriously?

What do you want me to say? Raul may not be fast, or accurate, or competent at times, but he is certainly still alive, and his May was white-hot. His April sucked. June’s pretty bad too. Thus far, there is no permanent replacement, and Charlie likes him, and its like, I don’t know. You know? I feel like if our record was significantly worse than these glaring holes would be a bit more obvious. As long as Raul can appear barely capable when it counts, he will live out his contract in left field.

5. We all are familiar with the strange, furry, green Phillie Phanatic guy running the field….the hell is he? Cardinal birds are pretty straightforward but what are you working with here?

The Phanatic hails from the jungles of the Galapagos, but there’s a pretty noticeable gap in his history between then and his arrival in Philadelphia. We’re forced to assume that he was once a horrific, feral beast that had to be sedated and crated for transport, after which he slowly assimilated to the Philadelphia culture surrounding him. Since then, he’s been voted “best mascot ever,” routinely breaks shit on the field, tries to get girls to take their clothes off, and attempts to have David Wright arrested. He’s the embodiment of us all.

6. How is your DL only consisting of 4 guys?? Can we lease your training staff for the time being???

In 2008, Jeff Francoeur found some media and whined at them:

"The Phillies have done great, I understand.  But, God, they have not had the injury bug. Not one guy has been out the last two years. Bless them, I’m not praying for them to be hurt, that’s great. But you feel it’s got to kick up sometime."

After that, our players started faceplanting all over the DL, and that continued into 2011. You’re looking at it right now and it’s got four guys on it, but that’s a place that everybody’s been for significant time in the past three years. We were without key members of our lineup multiple times this year, and that was after starting the season without Chase Utley. And somehow we have been in first place the whole time. It sucked to see Wilson Valdez hitting second or Michael Martinez doing anything, but in the end, it illustrated our depth (and pitching) (Mainly the pitching).

We take solace in the fact that Jeff Francoeur is off somewhere, pissing his pants at this notion.

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