Quick Stains: Phillies Phodder for June 27th

Phils win last night, knocking Homer Bailey out in the early goings. This is one of those situations where you look at Kendrick, and you look at Bailey, and unless something drastic happens it's pretty clear who is going to have the better career, but for one night at least, the underdog came out on top.

Howard hit a dinger, and Ruiz just kept on driving in runs (or, you know, stealing home), further reinforcing that Rod Barajas should really never catch for our team beyond once every five games. We're currently 2 1/2 games back on the Mets. Assuming this number stays the same between now and the weekend, we have a HUGE series coming up with the Mets. 4 games against the team whose heels we are currently nipping at. The Phillies have a huge opportunity, and should we get hit bad in this series (as in get swept), I think the chances of us recovering (just as we didn't last year when the Mets pounded us) are indeed quite minimal. But, as Plumpy's Ghost pointed out, they're just going to have to play the games to resolve this whole mess. I, for one, will be watching closely.