Marlon Anderson Is A Team Player

It was a sad day in Dodgerville when Marlon Anderson was given his release a week ago. Why? Turns out he was the model teammate:

Upon his arrival from Washington, he informed new teammate Brad Penny that the pitcher had been tipping his breaking ball, and almost every hitter in the National League knew it.

While Penny couldn't tighten his mechanics in time to help the Dodgers last season, a few offseason adjustments have led to his Cy Young Award candidacy in this one. Anderson said he actually watched a couple of Penny's bullpen sessions late in the season.

"If I'm on a team with a guy, that's something I'll do for him," Anderson said. "I've always been that way."

And so shall the Phillies rue the day they dismantled their Duo of SuperMarlons. Especially since Anderson ("The Tall One") was picked up by the New York Mutts. Say hello to Endy Chavez for me, Marlon!

Dodgers-Phillies Extra: The Boogeyman, otherwise known as Roberto Hernandez, was surprisingly picked up by the Dodgers this past week to shore up a bullpen that didn't really seem in dire need of assistance (Beimel/Broxton/Saito looks pretty darn good to me), just in time to turn his Suckitude up to 11 against the Mets. I can only assume that this is an incredibly shrewd attempt at sabotaging the Phils' last remaining hopes of winning the division on the part of Los Angeles. The rivalry lives!

Five and Fly 7/20/07 [Yahoo! Sports]

I Love LA (Whenever I Don't Hate It)

Though I've cooked up a title that would be great for a Larry Andersen lovefest someday, it's just that time of year when I must return to the West Coast. Commentary from afar is kind of neat, especially when the games end before 8 PM, but it's tough not being able to watch the games (the Phillies at least; the Eagles get surprisingly decent coverage). Considering the first two months of this blog's history, the Baker Bowl expects to spend some time on a handful of non-Philly pieces in the not-too-distant future. That being said, don't be surprised if the Baker Bowl goes dark until reliable internet access can be secured. (Read: at least a 1-2 week hiatus)

I do have time for last hurrah--I'll be attending the Kendrick/Billingsley match-up on the Phils' last day at Chavez Ravine on Wednesday. After being there for a Dodgers-Giants game, I think I've seen Dodgers fans at their most intense...and they don't scare me. Unless they are tall, muscular Mexicans.

But I really do wish Dodgers-Phillies still meant something. It's one of the most underrated rivalries in baseball--the death struggles for the NL pennant in the late 1970s, Tommy Lasorda's feud with the Phillie Phanatic, this incredible comeback with a bunch of names I'm too giddy over to even type here (ok, just a couple: Dale Murphy on the Phils! Juan Samuel on the Dodgers!). I'm not sure if you can call it a rivalry anymore, but weird or unique or emotional moments tend to happen when these two clubs get together. If nothing else, it's a chance to see our beloved Mike Lieberthal again, as the odds are good that he'll start a 12 PM day game after a 7 PM night game.

And then I'll boo him. Duty calls.

Loathesome Losers: The Anatomy of a Phillies Fan

I have decided to stop shouting into the wind long enough to acknowledge the Phillies "official" 10,000th loss tonight, a 10-2 decision to the St. Louis Cardinals. The Phils failed to plate any runs before the bottom of the ninth after scoring a combined 23 runs in the past two games, and Brian Sanches surrendered four home runs (including one to Lil' Adam Kennedy) all by himself. That sounds about right.

A final word on the "milestone"--a lot of people are chalking the losses up to "longevity," perhaps trying to deflect attention from the fact that they have chosen to write about/cover/root for a franchise that, by all accounts, is a born loser. Yes, the Phillies are old, but the next closest squad (the Braves) is more than 300 losses away from 10,000. They have finished under .500 seventy-five times, accounting for 59 percent of their total 127 major-league seasons. They have won a single World Series, the fewest among any team that is at least 100 years old. They have had exactly one window of consistently competent ownership in their entire history, but their few glories have occurred in relatively recent memory and thus their struggles are generally overlooked.

The fact is that the Philadelphia Phillies are far and away the worst franchise, pound for pound, in professional baseball. The failure to acknowledge this awful truth, I believe, is one of the big reasons that Philly fans are stereotyped as boorish louts rather than "lovable losers" (like Cubs fans) or priggish-yet-sympathetic martyrs (like Red Sox fans pre-2004). We get so defensive about this losing legacy--one that we consciously chose to adopt as our own--that we don't deserve much sympathy. We're like the burnout who eats a dozen Big Macs a day and then blames McDonald's for making him fat.

So to all the Phaithful who are getting their underpants in a bunch over the celebration of 10,000 losses (notably the 700 Level), I have one question: When are you going to move to St. Louis? Because if you want to plaster a lobotomized grin on your face whether your team is on top of the world or at the bottom of Tony LaRussa's gin and tonic, playing your fiddle while Busch Stadium burns, then that's the place to be.

Me, I will welcome a little public embarrassment--the type that should rankle an invisible ownership, if it has any decency left, into paying some more attention to the W/L columns than to the bottom line. I will recognize that cheering for a loss--one highly unique, historic loss--isn't any lower than the lowest moments that Phillies fans have created. I will continue to risk my mental and cardiovascular health rooting for the guys in red pinstripes to win, as I have every day of my doomed fanhood.

But right now I will most definitely celebrate 10,000.