Sunday, October 05, 2008

Still rolling!

Phils win!  Phils win!  Phils win!

Thanks to the big stick of Pat the Bat and surprising effective mound work by midseason acquisition Joe Blanton, Philadelphia beat the Milwaukee Brewers this afternoon by a score of 6 - 2, thereby winning their National League Division Series, three games to one.

Their next game will be at home on Thursday, against Los Angeles.  The Dodgers swept Chicago, ensuring that those futile lovable, cuddly Cubbies will go yet another season without a World Series appearance (this makes it 63 straight years) and that they’ll begin a second century since they last won the Series.

I know that Linkmeister has a strong rooting interest in the Dodgers, and suspect he’ll be commenting here soon.  I’m looking for the Phils to avenge the awful NLCS events of 1977 and 1978, particularly the top of the 9th of Game 3 in 1977 (emphasis in original):

DODGERS 9TH: Baker grounded out (third to first); Monday grounded out (second to first); DAVALILLO BATTED FOR YEAGER; On a bunt Davalillo singled to second; MOTA BATTED FOR RAUTZHAN; Mota doubled to left [Davalillo scored (error by Sizemore; assist by Luzinski), Mota to third]; Lopes singled to third [Mota scored]; ground ball off turf-seam hit Schmidt in knee and caromed to Bowa who apparently threw to 1B in time; Froemming said safe; Lopes was picked off first but was safe on an error by Garber [Lopes to second]; Russell singled to center [Lopes scored (unearned)]; Smith grounded out (pitcher to first); 3 R (2 ER), 4 H, 2 E, 1 LOB.  Dodgers 6, Phillies 5.

Neither the strange Schmidt-Bowa play—and yes, the throw did beat Davey Lopes to the bag—nor the botched pickoff was the worst event of that inning.  No, it was that “double” off the bat of Manny Mota.  All season long, manager Danny Ozark had replaced Greg Luzinski in left field with defensive specialist Jerry Martin when the Phils led in the late innings.  Inexplicably, The Bull was still on the field with the good guys leading 5-3, two outs, and nobody on base.  After Vic Davalillo’s bunt single, Mota hit a deep flyball to left.  Martin would have been standing at the wall to make the game-ending catch, but the slow Luzinski was still on the move as he reached for it, banged into the fence, and dropped the ball.  Calling it a double was extremely charitable to Luzinski (it was clearly an error, though whether to charge it to Luzinski or Danny Ozark remains unsettled), but the play was extremely painful to all of us phans.

Beating the Dodgers in the 1983 NLCS partially made up for 1977 and 1978, but it isn’t enough.  They need to be defeated again, here in 2008.

Let’s go, Phillies!