Yo! Philly!

Chill out about the Phils, ok?

We are 4 games through a 162 game slog. We have 97.5% of the season left, and folks are pushing the panic button.

Yes, the starting pitching has been bad. All 4 starters who have taken the hill have been hit around pretty good, including King Cole. Yes, Ryan Howard and Jimmy Rollins are not hitting yet.

This is nothing new. The Phillies have been notoriously slow out of the gate. In 2007, a 3-10 start included Charlie Manuel practically kicking Howard Eskin’s ass at a news conference. I’m pretty sure the Phils won the NL East in 2007. Last year on this same day, we were 2.5 games behind the Marlins. Today, we are 3 games behind the Marlins. Last year we won the whole goddamn thing.

So, chill out, Philly. We don’t need to run out and empty the farm system for Jake Peavy. We don’t need to release Jamie Moyer because he’s 85. We don’t need to start thinking about how the Phils may engage in a firesale at the trade deadline.

Good Lord. Are we really this jumpy? Or is this just all of the bandwagon types who just realized last October that we’ve got a great baseball team here in Philly? If so, please leap from the bandwagon as soon as posible so we can get back to some intelligent discourse about 2009.

Some of the expectations for the Phillies are just over the top. 100+ regular season wins? The Marlins are not going to suck. They proved themselves last year to be a cheaply paid but resilient bunch of scrappy major leaguers. The Braves are better this year and so are the Mets. We are going to play one-third of all our games against these 3 teams. The 2008 Phillies were not the ’27 Yankees, and guess what? Neither are the 2009 Phillies. Expecting the Phillies to win more games this year than last year in a hotly contested division where we may have done the least to improve the club is like chasing fool’s gold.

2009 is going to be a challenge, and should the Phils win the division again this year, it won’t be a walk in the park. If you’ve been following this team for more than 6 months, you already know that. It ain’t gonna be easy. Hell, it’s going to be maddening.

So, set aside your notions of 100 regular season wins, and give this team an opportunity to put something together. Let’s get nervous sometime in mid May if this team is buried behind their competition and no one is hitting and Cole Hamels can’t touch 90 on the radar. Then I’ll take notice. Right now? Damn, I’ve barely gotten into my seat yet.