The Braves went to Philadelphia this week after a week off, with a 3.5 game lead in the NL East.
The Phillies have won the firstthreegames in the series and are now just a half a game back, with the fourth and final game in the four-game series tomorrow night.
We’ve had a few threads this season about the Phillies amazing and phabulous run, such as these :rolleyes:-worthy threads: Exhibit A and Exhibit B.
I gotta admit, The Phils (or should I say Rolen) handed us our ass three days in a row now.
And I’ll eat some crow here, I didn’t think the Phils would be here this late in the season (C’mon – some honesty here – you didn’t either, did you?). They’ve played tough as shit and deserved all three of those games and deserved to win them all. Even if Ray Sanchez (thats who it was, wasn’t it? I was at a bar watching with no sound) was clearly safe at third base. But no sour graping for me. I decided several weeks ago that the Braves season officially sucks ass and that they don’t deserve thge playoffs. But, god, I still hope they get there.
Scared? No. A tad nervous? Maybe. OK, OK, yes, I am nervous. But in all honesty, this is when it is the most fun being a baseball fan … down the stretch with the pennant on the line. I had tickets for one of the Braves/Phils games that was cancelled last week, and I am going to the makeup game on October 3rd. I hope it is still this close then – I will be the drunken fool screaming my head off. Look for me on TV.
The Phillies finished two games behind Atlanta. Not counting games that they played head-to-head (I think they finished 8-8 against each other, right?), the Phils blew way too many games they should’ve won, culminating on Labor Day when they blew up against the Mets.
There was that week where they gave up 4 walk-off homers. There was all of June and July when they let themselves be swept by the Devil Rays.
Ahh well, it was a good year, though, and next year will be better.
Well, I freely admit I’m nervous. The Braves had just about the worst season a division champ can have:
[list]
[li]Four teams in the league have better records.[/li][li]The Braves’ record is equal to the Cubs, who are in third place in their division![/li][li]The Braves’ have a losing performance at the Ted.[/li]
No other team has won their division ten years in a row. Fine; props all around. But they’re not the team they’ve been in seasons past, and I predict a short, unhappy run of post-season play this year.
However, I’ve said it before – I am clinging to the hope of some sort of Kharma-payback plan for the Braves. All those years they finished the best team in baseball, only to piddle away in the playoffs. Maybe this year now that they suck, they will dominate the playoffs.
