Midnight’s Children

The Phillies are approaching the all star break after a weekend series with the Diamondbacks. They are hanging on to a slim 1-1/2 game lead over the surging Mets who have won 7 in a row while the Phillies are not playing good baseball. They have only won one series in their last ten and have wathced their record drop form 12 games over 500 to a mere 5 games. The hitting has been the main reason for the decline with the pretty much the entire lineup in a slump for the last month. With Jimmy Rollins not getting on base like he was at this time last year you can see it affecting the rest of the lineup. He is the catalyst for this team and as he goes so does the rest of the team. Ryan Howard has been the only bright spot in the last month as he has taken over the home run lead with 28 and rbi ttotal is now at 84. Howard’s average has risen to .234 whidch doesn’t sound impressive but remember he was hitting .190 in May. Brett Myers was sent down to the minors to work on his mental approach to starting. What a bunch of crap that is. Either you adjust to your role and accept it or find someone who wants the job. The Adam Eaton is back to normal as he has been absolutely bombed his last two outings. They Phillies are probalby not going to pick up a prime starter to help out for the stretch run so they better get their act together internally and figure this thing out or they will be blowing a real chance to repeat as National League East Champions. The Mets are waking up and will do exactly what the Phillies did to them last year if they get the opportunity. The Phillies are in the weakest division in baseball and should be up by a wider margin.