Quick Stains: June 25th

The Phils take two of three from St. Louis after losing both of their AL series'. Have to say, I'm with this outcome. I would feel a lot better if we'd gone three for six against the Indians and Tigers, but they are two of the best teams in baseball.

A lot has been made of Cole Hamels' struggle with the long ball, a natural result of his throwing around the plate. I'm not going to join in, as I have been more than pleased with our ace, who is projecting 225 or so innings this year.

Also, Chase Utley has been on a tear. I know, I have him on my fantasy team.

So, that's the ok news. Obviously the bad news is Jon Leiber, joining the long list of Phillies pitchers on the disabled list. Lieber has been amazing (a la his complete game shutout vs. Kansas City) and terrible (plenty of his other games), but he has been eating up innings, something that has been getting harder and harder for the Phillies to do. When our starter leaves the game early, as you would expect, we are getting destroyed. Absolutely annihilated. We can't even keep it respectable in those games, and with Lieber going down, it's going to be that much harder to make it through 6 innings without hitting the pen in a lot of games. Good luck out there, Kendrick.

Moyer looked good on Friday, shutting down St. Louis and also starting the Phils' run production. Hats off to him.

Phils take a day off, and then hopefully sweep the Reds. Should this occur, expect prompt mockery of Plumpy's Ghost. I'll be at the game Thursday night, and I hope to bring my broom along.