I doubt I am the only person who is yearning for one game – just one – where the Phillies could win a game that did not qualify as a save situation. Lately, every game seems to reach the 9th inning with Charlie Manuel looking like he is about to barf his pre-game meal. I certainly can empathize as I do likewise from my Lazy Boy.

Today’s 10-9 loss to the lowly, offensively bankrupt Mets was easily one of the 3 worst losses of the year. Moyer gets shellacked in the first, then recovers and pitches lights out while his offense puts 9 runs on the board. Ball gets handed to Brett Myers with a 4 RUN LEAD in the 8th inning against a team that has less heart than the tin man from the fucking Wizard of Oz and the Phillies lose?

David Wright, who has had a year-long power outage, hit 2 home runs to increase his total to 10 for the year?

A loss like this just cannot be happening in mid-September against an also-ran while we are trying to stave off a push from the Marlins.

I recognize that tomorrow is another day and the Phils are still in the driver’s seat and are in much better shape today than they were last year on this day. BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH. I don’t care about all of that. Bottom line is this game counted and they lost it and they had no business doing so.

There is no way the Phillies are going to go deep in the playoffs, let alone the World Series, if they don’t settle the bullpen down and fast. We have practically no viable left-handed option right now, Ryan Madson has blown 47% of his save opportunities, which actually makes Lidge’s 26% blown save % look downright Rivera-like.

The only excuse I can see with Madson is that he has pitched a lot this week, and perhaps this would have been a good game to give him a break. My guess is he wasn’t coming anywhere near this game had Myers and Park gotten the job done in the 8th. Manuel was obviously not confident giving the ball to Lidge with a 1 run lead. But what about tomorrow? Madson will most likely be unavailable regardless. The Phils have a double header with Kyle Kendrick pitching one of the games tomorrow. You think we’ll need the ‘pen a lot?

Yeah, me too.

My expectations for tomorrow are low – a split would be nice.