1:35 PM on PHL 17

STARTING PITCHERS:

Roy Halladay (7-3, 2.56 ERA)

PHILLIES: I can’t believe I’m going to type this next sentence. Roy Halladay  takes the mound today in hopes of preventing a sweep of the Phillies by the Pirates. It seems like the Phillies have trouble every time they go to PNC Park and I guess this year is no different. Whatever, the team is still 10 games over .500 heading into this game.

James McDonald (3-3, 4.85 ERA)

PIRATES: This series has been defined by the Phillies offense making mediocre pitching look like All-Stars and Cy Young candidates, and that’s just hard to watch.

7:05PM on CSN

PITCHING MATCHUP:

Kyle Kendrick (3-3) 3.18 ERA

PHILLIES: You’ve got to be kidding me.

Charlie Morton (5-2) 2.51 ERA

PIRATES: How embarrassing will it be if the “Mommy! Mommy! I wanna throw like Roy Halladay!” guy beats us?

Thanks to James Fayleez for the opposing pitcher pic

7:05PM on CSN

PITCHING MATCHUP:

Cole Hamels (7-2, 3.01 ERA)

PHILLIES: YARRRRRRRRR Matey! The Dread Pirate Hamels sails down the Three Rivers and is on a mission to loot and pillage the Pittsburgh Pirates who are coming off a game in which they choked away a 7-0 lead and eventually lost to the Mets by a run. This is a series that everybody should feel pretty good about, but after dropping two of three to the Nats, I guess you never really know. Either way, like we did in Washington last weekend, the land of the Yinsers should be populated with tons of Yousers as PNC Park becomes Citizens Bank Park West for the next few games.

Jeff Karstens (3-4, 3.58 ERA)

PIRATES: I’m sure Jeff Karstens is a nice guy and everything, but holy crap is he goofy looking. When I do these things, I usually try to find the most embarrassing picture of the opposing player I can and a lot of times, they’re making a doofy face during their delivery. The Karstens cat makes that exact same face every time he throws the ball. It’s hilarious. That’s the kind of in-depth analysis you can only find right here at THE FIGHTINS DOT COM.

So I guess this is a new commercial that PHL17 will soon be running…once they finish it. You see a bunch of Phillies fans frozen in carbonite most of the time with small clips of stills with poorly written text of “animate me”. Now, I know a lot of you can do good video editing, so I need people to animate the blanks spaces. Best one gets a cookie.

(H/T to the one and only 700 Level)

1:05PM on CSN

PITCHING MATCHUP:

Roy Oswalt (3-2) 2.60 ERA

PHILLIES: For some reason it doesn’t feel like Oswalt is pitching every 5th day. More like every 2 weeks or something. I know he was on a mission trip and then the DL and all that but still. It’s weird.

John Lannan (2-5) 4.40 ERA

NATINALS: He is still winless against the Phillies. Please let them keep it that way.

Oswalt pic courtesy of The Good Phight

Also, apologies for nothing but game threads lately, seems to have been a slow week. But we all know Wheels and T-Mac can only go so long before giving us something to work with.

7:05PM on CSN

PITCHING MATCHUP:

Cliff Lee (4-4) 3.50 ERA

PHILLIES: I think MLB.com’s scouting report pretty much says it all: Lee is 2-2 with a 2.98 ERA in six May starts. The Phillies scored five runs for him in those first five starts before scoring 10 runs for him Thursday in a victory over the Reds. Lee is 3-0 with a 1.44 ERA in three career starts against Washington.

Jason Marquis (5-2) 4.26 ERA

NATINALS: The above number with a hat on is Jason Marquis’ ERA against the Phillies the past 2 years. Yea.

1:05PM on CSN

PITCHING MATCHUP:

Roy Halladay (6-3) 2.35 ERA

PHILLIES: Roy wants to get this game over as fast as possible so he can first run up and down every step in Natinals Park and then finish the day by grilling the entire team food. He’s mostly grilling whatever Roy Oswalt killed yesterday, but I’m sure Kyle Kendrick will ask for some pussy ass veggie burger or something in which case Halladay will just stare at him until he walks away feeling stupid.

Livan Hernandez (3-6) 3.71 ERA

NATINALS: Sticking with the grilling/cooking theme, this is Livan Hernandez as Guy Fieri. Guy Fieri is a pretty humongous douche. So what I’m trying to get across is Livan Hernandez is a douche. That is all.

1:10 PM on PHL 17

PITCHING MATCHUP:

Vance Worley (2-0, 2.14 ERA)

PHILLIES: The Phils look to complete a sweep of the Mets on the one-year anniversary of Roy Halladay’s Perfect Game. If you want a laugh, take a look at the starting lineup for the good guys today. According to my man David Hale from the Wilmington News Journal, five of the nine Phils starters today were not on a big-league Opening Day roster in 2010. One way or another, today’s game should be good for a laugh.

Jonathan Niese (3-5, 4.33 ERA)

LOLMETS: The Mets really suck. They’re awful and they’re stupid. Nobody likes them. My great-grandmother’s dying words were “Jesus Christ, I fucking hate the Mets.” The crazy part about that was that she was Pennsylvania Dutch and hardly spoke any English. I didn’t even know she liked baseball. The Mets suckery transcends boundaries that way.