We may be three weeks away from the Autumnal Equinox, but around these parts September means

Fall, and with Fall comes Philly’s citywide
obsession with football; often at the expense of our noncontending baseball
team.  This year is a little different -
fans have been ambivalent about the Birds team and have sold out the Bank all summer
- but with the guys in green just days away from their first taste of blood and
the Phillies starting to tail off just a
bit it’ll be interesting to see if this baseball team has really won over
the city – or if it has just been place-holding for the real Philly passion.

bill watterson

I guess what I’m getting at is we’re about one Eagles win and one more Phillies series-loss from seeing if Phils fans are the frontrunners Jimmy says they are.

“Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I
assure you, it’s much more serious than that.” – Bill Shankly

Three lines on their world:

1. College Football season is underway.  This year’s App State
   is … nobody.
2. As the U.S. Open heats up Rafa, Roger, Andy and rest of the big-name guys are still alive
   
3. and Cliff Lee, who might actually be decent, all but locks up the AL
   Cy Young

Three lines on ours:

1. Kyle Kendrick got roughed up in D.C.
2. And might lose his spot in the rotation because of it
3. The Sixers added Donyell Marshall

Phillies, Birds, Sixers, Flyers and more (sigh) Fall after the jump

PHILLIES

The Game: Phils lost in Washington, 7-4.  Recaps from Murphy HERE, from Randy Miller HERE, from Kevin Horan HERE, from Washington’s side HERE, and the AP HERE (with video).

The Goat: Kyle Kendrick was unable to locate his pitch (not a typo),
giving up six in just four innings

The Chase: The Phillies fell to 75-63. Coupled with the
Mets win, they are now two games back in the East and five and half in the wild card. They have 24 to play. 

What else: It’s September, which means expanded
rosters.  Welcome back J.A. Happ, and Adam
Eaton, and new welcomes to Greg Golson and Lou Marson. Les Walrond, Jason Donald, Mike Cervanak and Andy Tracy are expected to join the team as well. 

Other Notes …

• With the win – their seventh straight – Washington now has the longest current
  winning streak in the Majors
• And still have the worst record in the bigs
• Philadelphia
  still has yet to record a win streak of longer than five
• Every Washington
  starter had at least one hit
• Jimmy hit his 10^th home run in the top of the 9^th.  He is the 7^th Phillie with at
  least 10
• Tim Redding took an unconventional no-hitter into the sixth.
   He had allowed two walks and hit two
  batters with pitches
• Four batters with hit by pitches (two on each side).  Remember that the last time these team’s faced
  each other that wasn’t seen as an accident.  

Now, who said what …

Jim Salisbury says that Kyle Kendrick doesn’t have the “good face” anymore, and that could cost him. READ

Salisbury’s notes look at Adam Eaton’s role, the September arrivals, and more. SKIP

David Murphy’s notes focus on possibily moving Cole Hamels up in the rotation, the state of the Phils’ roster and more. READ

Salisbury looks at the NL MVP short list.  READ

Okay, normally when Bill Conlin writes his “King of the World” column it gives me a nice chance to skew his words and frame his points as absurd. For example, this week he wants the Phillies to hire Rays exec Gerry Hunsicker as their GM – I would turn this into something to the effect of “the Phillies will poach from the decade’s worst team.”  The problem this week is that 1Chair’s rant is so nonsensical that I’ve found it literally impossible to

synthesize

it into coherent sentences that I can then make fun of. Seriously, this is one wish, unedited:

When I’m King of the World . . .

Penn State will never, ever, sink so low as to schedule another Coastal Carolina.

When they put the Chanticleers on the schedule, I wondered, what the
hell is a Chanticleer? So, what’s next for JoePa in his dotage, picking
wings off flys, adding Rowan to his pre-Big Ten gantlet breather
schedule? Oh, I remember: A chanticleer is a friggin’ rooster . . .

Speaking of birds, I never, ever, thought I would write this during my
career, but here goes anyway. This is the most athletic and talented
Temple football team since the Wayne Hardin era. OK, it was only Army,
a football program three wars removed from its glory years. But Al
Golden’s slick and energetic team – still young enough to improve a lot
- went into Michie Stadium, a hallowed house where Heisman trophies
were won, the scenic place where Earl Blaik coached and Doc Blanchard
and Glenn Davis were Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside while capturing the
national imagination. Now, all the Owls need is about 50,000 bodies to
upholster the Linc seats for those gripping MAC scrums against
unnatural rivals located in the Midwest . . .

Anthony Hewitt update: The Phillies’ first-round draft pick continued
to struggle with live pitching in the rookie Gulf Coast League. Hewitt
finished the regular season with a 2-for-32 flourish festooned with 16
strikeouts. The pride of Salisbury School finished with a .197 average.
He had one homer, nine RBI and 55 strikeouts in 117 at-bats. One
scout’s terse opinion: “Overmatched.” Amaro’s more soothing comment:
“Patience.” Even at professional baseball’s lowest entry level, hitters
don’t see many grooved batting-practice fastballs. The good news is
that the Phils’ GCL enty, dominated by players from last year’s strong
Dominican Summer League team, won the North Division and then the
playoff championship series.

No such luck for last-place Lehigh Valley, 34 games under .500,
last-place Reading, 36 under and fifth place Clearwater, 12 under.
Lakewood finished second in the Sally League North and led the SAL once
more in attendance with a tremendous 425,166 showing. It is the eighth
straight season the Blue Claws have drawn more than 400,000 fans. The
fourth-place Williamsport Crosscutters are 36-33 as the New York-Penn
League season winds down. Clearwater’s miserable season under manager
Razor Shines was highlighted by massive outfielder Michael Taylor stepping up to the high-Class A level without skipping a
beat. The small forward-sized Stanford product finished his season
yesterday batting a combined (Lakewood/Clearwater) .346 with 170 hits,
39 doubles, four triples, 19 homers, 89 RBI and 15 stolen bases.

?! So when he’s in charge Penn St. won’t act like a normal D1 powerhouse and instead Temple will draw fans and he’ll provide minor league recaps?

ugh. SKIP

Paul Hagen says that at this point in the year the Phils can’t be dealing with a Kyle Kendrick cold streak. READ

Randy Miller looks back on Pat Gillick’s mistakes. READ

EAGLES

Les Bowen reports that Lito Sheppard remains unhappy with his role, and everyone else continues not to care. SKIP

John Gonzalez says that Lito is looking for a fight, then he gets Dr. Z on the horn. All good stuff, if only because now, if I ever want to throw down Gonzo by the swingset outside of the press box I know how to get him to fight me. READ

Mark Kram gets kick returners to talk kick returning. READ

Bob Brookover says that it is time for for Chris Clemons to show and prove. SKIP

Les Bowen writes that Tony Hunt has won the fullback job. SKIP

Bob Brookover reports that Tank Daniels, back with the Birds, is happy he still gets to hate Dallas. Sounds like a winner to me. READ

Reuben Franks looks at the unglamorous life of practice squadders like Chris Patrick. READ

The Browns claimed former Eagle Scott Young. SKIP

SIXERS

Phil Jasner reports that Donyell Marshall is a Sixer. READ

FLYERS

Ed Moran is sad that Eric Lindros hasn’t gotten over the whole ‘the Flyers almost killed him’ incident. READ

TODAY and MORE

Welcome back from the long weekend and the the unofficial end of summer.  Today we should be looking at another take on Philadelphia frontrunners, the Lito Sheppard mess, the Donyell Marshall signing and more.

As always, feel free
to email
with any questions, suggestions, comments or complaints.  

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008 at 8:58 am and is filed under Morning Rounds. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.