The Phillies are a struggling mess right now, so of course we’re hearing the predictable nonsense about clutch or “situational” hitting. They’re not hitting, period. In the last seven days, during which the Phils have lost six times, they’re hitting .160, and are last in the NL in battiing average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage and, naturally, runs scored, and you’re telling me the problem is “productive outs”?
Anyway, Chris Wheeler is driving me nuts. Wheels can be an earnest analyst of the game, but he’s got a narrative in his head about the recent slump as if it’s some mysterious baseball force in the universe, and he’s just pounding it to death, no matter what.
I’m watching them in Oakland right n0w. First inning, the Phils get Jayson Werth and Chase Utley to second and third on a double steal with one no. Burrell hits a fliy to medium-shallow center, and Werth tags and goes. The A’s outfielder makes a strong throw on one hop, but the catcher misses the ball. He lunges immediately forward to make the tag, though, as if he had caught it cleanly. Werth easily and clearly beats the phony tag.
So Wheels goes into this riff about how Werth was “dead meat,” if the catcher had made the catch, and the Phillies have finally caught a break and broken the slump-spell or something.
Groan.
