Stinker at the Trop
How do you feel now?
For a city that hasn’t won a major championship since Ronald Reagan’s first term as President, and a baseball team that has totaled one title in its 125-year history, an awful lot of Philadelphia fans were pretty cocky after the first game of the World Series.
The Phillies are gonna roll! We’re gonna sweep! Tampa’s young and rattled.
How are you feeling now?
The thing about the World Series, it’s the first team to win four games. Not the first team to win one.
Sure, the Phillies are coming back home. But now they’re relying on 45-year-old Jamie Moyer — who got shelled in his last two postseason starts — to be their stopper in Game 3 against Matt Garza, the guy who shut down the Red Sox twice.
The Phils follow up with Joe Blanton in Game 4.
Feeling good?
As for the Phillies’ going 1-for-28 with runners in scoring position over the first two games, it’s natural to assume they’ll turn things around at the plate and start driving guys in. But that’s only if you assume they’ll continue to get on base, and that’s a big assumption.
I’m not saying the Phillies won’t win the Series. I think they will. Just don”t expect it to come easy, because championships never come easy.
As a Philadelphia fan, you should know that by now.
Thriving on your criticism: Philadelphia fans aren’t the first ones to doubt the Rays.
Signs of life: At least the Phillies put up a couple runs late in the game, getting to the Tampa Bay bullpen a little bit. A shutout would have been more disheartening. But Charlie Manuel should have shown more signs of life in arguing that strikeout/appeal call, which eventually led to a run and changed the complexion of the game.
No angst in sunny Florida: There is lots of love for Joe Maddon and his Rays, every one of them, in the Tampa Bay area.
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