Myers breathes some fire back into the Phillies

By Bill McFarland

If the Phillies could bottle and sell the potion that turned Brett Myers' season around, they would have the best pitching staff in baseball. The right-handed hurler turned in one of the finest outings of his career when he threw a complete-game shutout Sunday night to complete the four-game sweep of the Milwaukee Brewers.

Anyone who is around the team knows that the volatile Myers can get angry easily. In the first three months of this season, that anger usually led to long balls, and his 3-9 record earned him a demotion to the minor leagues. Since his return, Myers is 7-2 with a 1.80 ERA. Somehow, he has managed to channel these pent-up emotions into more positive results, and regardless of how one feels about him as a person, he's one guy you want on your team during a stretch run.

Interestingly, the same formula didn't work for Adam Eaton. After going 3-8 with a 5.71 ERA, he also was sent out, but after seven starts at three different levels in the minor leagues, Eaton went 0-4 (7.02 ERA).




Have you ever wondered just how good this team could be if it operated on all cylinders? The Phillies got off to a good start this season despite the fact that the first two hitters in the lineup at the time — Jimmy Rollins and Shane Victorino — missed several weeks with injuries and cleanup batter Ryan Howard was mired in one of the worst slumps of his career. At that time, Chase Utley and Pat Burrell carried the team offensively. In fact, Utley got off to such a great start that people were anointing him by Memorial Day as the next National League MVP.

Utley had a torrid first half and started his third straight All-Star Game, but his power numbers, and those of Burrell, have been down in the last few weeks. After the midseason break, I wrote that Utley, Burrell and Howard should each finish with 40-plus homers. Howard has already done so with 44 dingers heading into the current series in Atlanta, but Utley and Burrell, with 31 each, are long shots to reach 40 round-trippers. (All stats are as of Sept. 15.)

On the other side of that coin, Rollins and Howard are both hot right now, and both have traditionally had strong Septembers. I should point out that only Utley's home runs are down. (He had 20 on June 1.) He was hitting .290 heading into the Braves' series.




Reporters who cover major league baseball get a media package from both teams at each game. This is where writers get the interesting tidbits that appear in print or on the Internet. For instance, Rollins hit .462 on the last home stand, and he's hitting .407 over the last 20 games.

These media packages, by the way, are now available to the general public on the Internet. Go to your favorite team's Web site and click on "Press Box."

One item about Rollins caught my eye a few weeks ago, and manager Charlie Manuel finally spoke about it during the weekend series with Milwaukee.

"Somebody brought to my attention what happens when Jimmy gets on base and scores," said Manuel. "Our record's pretty good."

The Phillies are 38-14 this season in games when Rollins scores at least one run.

"I think it's kind of amazing," continued Manuel. "When he gets on base, he definitely sets the stage for our offense."

"Jimmy's a catalyst," said Howard.

And that's what the Phillies need during the stretch run in order to clinch the Eastern Division. Everyone on this team stated a preference for winning the division, rather than getting into the playoffs as the wild card. Like it or not, Rollins is the leader of this team, and he's going to have to continue his hot streak if this club wants to get to the postseason.

If the pitching holds up and the clutch hitting continues, I like the Phillies' chances for repeating as division champions.




That's my opinion. What do you think? Click on the "Comments?" link below and let me know.

Next post: Oct. 1

© 2008 www.Bill-McFarland.com

This column was posted on Sept. 17, 2008. It may not be reproduced anywhere else without permission.

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