I turned to my Dad in the late innings last night as we shook excess rain off of our ponchos from Sect. 420.

“It’s hard to believe that on the one-year anniversary of the parade, Cole gets booed on his way off the mound”.

Jason Weitzel at Beerleaguer wrote that last night’s start used up any remaining goodwill that Hamels had built up from 2008.

Being an athlete is akin to having a banking relationship with your fans. You make deposits and withdrawals. The truly great players keep their accounts consistently in the black, making huge deposits consistently and only withdrawing small sums here and there.

Cole’s 2008 was a massive deposit. So much so that his atrocious 2009 cannot ever take away the magic that was his 2008 postseason. But Weitzel is right that the extra love that comes along with being a World Series hero one year can vanish in a subsequent fall failure. At this point, we must grapple with the duality of Cole’s October fate: 2008 hero. 2009 heel.

We’ll always have 2008, Cole. In 20 years, I suspect we’ll remember a lot more about last year than we will this year if 2009 doesn’t end with flatbeds on Broad.

But if the Yankees do go on to claim another World Series championship this year, Cole will be as much the goat for this year as he was the man for last year.

He’ll have company though, as several Phillies players are coming up very small on baseball’s biggest stage. Ryan Howard, Chase Utley and Raul Ibanez are hitting a combined .194 as the Yankee hurlers have come with outstanding gameplans to shut down our lefty bats. Howard, Utley and Ibanez have 2 hits among them in the last 2 games. The Phils simply will not win the World Series if these guys can’t get untracked.

Hamels was outstanding through 3 innings. He worked quick, looked confident and the sense in the crowd was that we were seeing a rejuvenated, focused Cole who would build on his solid start and the offense’s 2nd inning success off of Andy Pettite.

But danger is always just one questionable ball/strike decision away from turning Cole’s steely resolve to jello.

After a shutdown 3rd inning after the Phils took a 3-0 lead, Hamels retired Johnny Damon before running into trouble. A walk to Teixeira on a close pitch was followed up by Alex Rodriguez’s disputed home run off of a stupid camera that was dangling beyond the right field wall. Because a $100,000 camera needs that extra foot for zooming.

Cole settled down to get the next 2 outs, but his 5th inning started off bad and just got worse. Double to Nick Swisher down the 3rd base line, a Cabrera strikeout, a single by Andy Pettite, Jeter single, Damon two-run double, Teixeira walk.

Hamels done. Boos ensure. Schmitters begin unnatural digestive gyrations in stomachs.

The Phillies bullpen fared no better, allowing 3 more runs that proved to be the difference after another Jayson Werth homerun to left and a 9th inning shot to left-center from Carlos Ruiz, who needs to do a better job of taking command of Hamels’ starts.

The Phils are not out of this by any means, and a solid start by Joe Blanton tonight couple with the Phillies lefties getting to CC Sabathia could knot this series at 2 with our ace going in Game 5. Counting out the Phillies in October is risky business.

But there is an uneasiness about where we’re at right now. Perhaps you think that the Phillies have the Yanks right where they want them. Perhaps you’re still trying to forecast which day you’ll need off for the parade.

Me? I think the Phils are staggering around the ring right now, and they’d better have their gloves up to defend the knock-out blow. This is as on-the-ropes as we’ve seen this team during this 2 year World Series run.