Is anyone else nervous for the big game tonight?

I’m not talking about the Phillies game, silly!  I’m talking about my big game as I do battle with other semi-famous blogging luminaries from the internets in Carbon Poker’s 2nd Blogger Invitational Tournament. 

You know what “invitational” means, don’t you?  It means you have to be fucking INVITED to play.  So if that’s your thing, champ, I suggest you start a blog and then get a bunch of people to start reading it and then perhaps one day the fine folks at Carbon Poker will notice how everybody on the internet is talking about your cool new blog and then they won’t have any choice but to invite you to take part in their 3rd Blogger Invitational Tournament.

I’m just playing, I sent the guy an e-mail practically begging him to let me play in it. But he said yes! It starts at 7:00 tonight!  And I could win real money!  Wish me luck!

UPDATE: If you want, you can follow along with the poker action in the live chat. If you want.

• In this week’s edition of We’re Going Streaking, BLS scribe Alex Remington takes a look at our boy Cole Hamels.  In Cole’s last seven starts, he has posted a 2.22 ERA and struck out 47 big leaguers while walking just 11 of them.  Keep that up, Cole, and I promise never to bring up the puppy backpack again. [Big League Stew]

• There aren’t too many internet people whose opinion I really trust when it comes to baseball (don’t be offended, I don’t even like my own opinions) and one of those few is Bill Baer from the Alley.  So if Bill says we should rest our players in preparation for the postseason, then by golly let’s rest some players. [Crashburn Alley]

• I’m not sure whether that is one of the funniest pictures ever taken at a baseball game or one of the most disturbing, but I do know one thing — whoever whipped their camera out just in time to take a picture of a young lady’s crotch as she was walking up the aisle is a perverted genius.  [Flickr]

• MLB Network’s Victor Rojas (son of Cookie!) showed up at J-Roll’s BaseBowl charity event a couple weeks ago with a film crew, shot a segment, and Tweeted the final edit for all to enjoy.  See, the good thing about Twitter is, when I was watching the piece and saw his bowling shirt said ‘Yo Daddy’ I was wondering if it had anything to do with his father, Cookie.  So instead of sitting around and wondering like a complete asshole, I @’d him and asked.  Turns out, it didn’t. [@VictorRojas29]

• This, ladies and gentlemen, is irony at its finest. [Who Does He Play For?]

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In other words, the site got fucked up the other night.

These tech people that my tech guy was e-mailing back and forth with wound up identifying the problem, and it had something to do with exceeding the bandwidth allowed for my server package. So I had to upgrade my package (heh-heh) and when the site finally got restored sometime yesterday evening, it was missing two days worth of material. So unfortunately, all of your brilliant comments and observations, along with my posts had disappeared. Because of my trusty Google Reader that I never use, I was able to dig up the missing posts, but the comments are lost forever. Unless, of course, you remember what you wrote and in what order you wrote it. If that’s the case, feel free to rebuild the comment threads just as they were. I’m particularly gonna miss some of the emotional rants in the R.I.P. Brad Lidge post — those were lolzers.

Boring, right? I know, I wish it were more interesting too. That’s why I’ve decided to add some non-boring links to the post. Thanks for your patience, and a special thanks to the four of you that e-mailed me because you were concerned about our welfare. You four were always my favorites anyway.

• I don’t know how much time I want to spend endorsing Brett Myers as the Phillies closer, but goddammit, I just love the guy.  It’s spreading… [Big League Stew]

• Anytime you can draw a parallel between a fight at a Phillies game and South Park, THEN splice the video together and upload it onto YouTube, you’re getting a link. [The 700 Level]

• I had to double on the Stew links because Morning Juicer David Brown thinks Jay Happ was taught a valuable lesson in last night’s loss to the Buccos, and those excuses won’t fly come playoff time.  Don’t get me wrong, forehead-hair pitched a helluva game, but I tend to agree. [Big League Stew]

• My Twitter buddy John Finger (@jrfinger) examines the blowing of a save, specifically from the Phillies perspective. [Finger Food]

• Yes, those two gentleman in the photo above made a customized WFC boxing robe and a matching title belt and flaunted it in the hallways of Turner Field the last time the Phillies played in Atlanta.  I’m still not sure if I’m jealous, or if I feel sorry for them.  [Flickr]

• Has anyone noticed how often the Phillies have been featured on The Onion lately?  Well Dave from TGP has, and he has conveniently stored them all in one place for easy clickins. [The Good Phight]

• beelove.  Gorgeous pictures.  Go. [Maule of America]

• Rarely do I toot my own horn, but I wanted to share my joke from last night’s Phillies game with the masses.  It’s one of the many reasons I’m going to hell, sure, but more than a couple people got a chuckle out of it.  [meechone's Twitter]

I ain’t got no time to chit-chat.  Straight to the links…

• The genius that is The Dugout posted their Jokes and Jokes monthly recap yesterday featuring the comedic stylings of Charlie Manuel and Bobby Cox.  It’s truly one of the funniest posts from the greatest concept in the history of the internet.  Do yourself a favor… [The Dugout]

• On July 13th, contributer to The Fightins R. Bradley Maule (a/k/a beelove) took his trusty digital camera and embarked on a sight-seeing trip across the country.  Since then, he’s been providing daily updates from his various stops along the way.  It’s entertaining as shit, the pictures are gorgeous, and I see no reason why you shouldn’t spend the next 20 minutes-or-so immersing yourself in the archives.  GO! [Maule of America]

• I’ve recently been hipped to a new baseball site that tries to gather the very best of the strange goings-on that occur on a daily basis in the majors and put them all in one place for our enjoyment.   Which is basically my favorite part of baseball games.  Check it out. [MLB Oddities]

• I couldn’t imagine being out of town — let alone away from the computer — this Wednesday when the whole Cliff Lee ordeal went down.  Thankfully, I was off work that day and got to sit at home and feverishly click the F5 button on MLB Trade Rumors while ignoring my hungry children.  The same can’t be said for MattP from The 700 Level, who was stuck in Maine all week, but he wrote a nice eloquent post describing how he managed to make it. [The 700 Level]

• Nothing makes me happier than seeing a Phillies fan wearing a Birdland x The Fightins t-shirt at opposing stadiums, but it’s extra special when that stadium is on the other side of the country and that Phillies fan is an attractive young lady holding a beer.  Thanks, @PhilliesGirl29:

• Speaking of Birdland Philadelphia, after buying a fashionable tee, why don’t you social networking mutherfuckers go and Book their Face?  They’re eager to make new e-friends. [Facebook]

• Speaking of social networking mutherfuckers, most of us here at The Fightins are Tweeting our little hearts out each and every day.  Follow us, we’re lonely.  [@TheFightins | @meechone | @DashTreyhorn | @mistertug | @LONG_DRIVE]

Check this out:  I’m going to attempt to compile a bunch of good links in one place and NOT ONE of them will contain the name of a pitcher that the Phillies supposedly have interest in.

Think it can’t be done?  Fucking watch me.

• HEIDI HAMELS IS ON A MISSION.  And on this mission she’ll give birth to babies, adopt babies, purchase baseball equipment for kids in Turkmenistan (TONS of untapped raw MLB talent in Turkmenistan), design t-shirts, and most importantly — make Cole carry their
  hyperkinetic, 3-year-old miniature Maltese, Royce Hamels in his backpack. [The Inquirer]

• Who are the better fans — Dudes wearing ‘rasslin masks or a girl in a bikini?  YOU make the call. [The 700 Level]

• A former colleague of mine, Landon Evanson from B&C, scored a nice interview with that guy from Major League.  Not Charlie Sheen, that other guy.  Nah, not the black guy from the State Farm commercials.  No, not Corbin Bernsen either.  Yeah, the old guy with that rubs Crisco on himself.  Fucking took you long enough. [Bugs & Cranks]

• I love graffitti, and I love the Phillies, so imagine my excitement when I saw this fantastic piece combining the two:

• Some uppity old broad wrote some shitty story that quotes some jaggov Philadelphians about the sad death of David Sale on Saturday Night at The Bank.  Surprisingly, she doesn’t bring up throwing snowballs at Santa, but she does end her article with this:

In times like these, there may be some use in crying over spilt beer.

Around the time the guys from Fishtown and Lansdale were pummeling the living daylights out of each other, Jimmy Rollins blasted a 97 m.p.h. fastball into the right-field seats for a grand-slam homer in the sixth inning.

And while David Sale inhaled his final breaths, the Phils won over St. Louis, 14-6.

I’m pretty sure that is the most insensitive, shitty writing I’ve come across in my life.  [The Inquirer]

• This is almost a week old now, but the third base coach for the Mets, Razor Shines, was the manager for the Phillies Class-A affiliate last year.  Because of that, he got a shiny World Series ring that he promised to never wear around his new team.  Well, ladies and gentleman, Razor Shines broke his promise.  [New York Times]

If you’re an avid reader of The Fightins dot com, you may notice that I don’t often opine on the inner-workings of the Phillies front office.   It’s not because I don’t have opinions — believe me I do — I just feel that 95% of people out there don’t give a shit what a hacky blogger thinks about the current state of the team.  And if I just frivolously toss my reactionary commentary around every day, it kind of loses its luster.  That being said, I can no longer sit around and watch Antonio Bastardo throw a low 90’s fastball down the middle of the fucking plate anymore.  WE NEED A FUCKING TOP OF THE ROTATION STARTING PITCHER.

Nothing against young Tony the Bastard, I’m sure with some fine-tuning and a better arsenal of off-speed pitches he’ll be just a dandy major leaguer some day.  But the Phillies are the defending champs.  They sell out practically every home game.  They are literally printing money down at The Bank.  They lost their #2 starter for the season.  GO GET A FUCKING TOP OF THE ROTATION STARTING PITCHER.

“Well, meech, how are they gonna do that?  You don’t even know who’s available!” you may say.  My response?  That’s not my fucking job.  The league is filled with stupid GM’s who would love nothing more than to dump some pitcher’s salary and get a few half-decent prospects in return.  It happens every year.  Find one of those dummies, give them.. oh, I dunno.. Carlos Carrasco, Jason Donald, and some other shitty prospect, and get a deal done.

As we learned in 2004, if you trot out the Paul Abbott’s of the world every fifth day, no postseason for you.

It’s really not that difficult to figure out.

Now here’s some links, you disgraziato.

• Hey!  Once we finally get one of these new, shiny pitchers, they’re gonna have to eventually wear the Phillies uni, right?  Thanks to Chris at Long Drive and the magic of teckmology, we can now see how cute they’ll look.  I think Roy Halladay looks especially handsome in red pinstripes! [Long Drive]

• DMac of PhillyWillDo is trying his darnedest to fill the void left in our hearts when Kris Liakos decided to leave us at Walkoff Walk.   His current weekly project is reviewing each episode of the Phillies reality TV drama, The Pen.  Episode 1 review can be found HERE, ep 2 is located in between these brackets: [Walkoff Walk]

• Speaking of The Pen — helllllooooo, Miriam Taschner:

• Since I’m so healthy and shit, I was reading this month’s issue of Men’s Health while doing some lunges the other day and came across a (not-so)interesting article on Cole Hamels.  BUT the internet version of this article, features a little how-to guide on throwing pitches just like Hollywood.  It’s kinda interesting, I guess.  [Men's Health via The Zo Zone]

• Did you ever play in the World Baseball Classic?  Did you ever play in the World Baseball Classic… on weed?  I ♥ Geovany Soto. [Big League Stew]

• NEW ROOTS MUSIC, SON! [Okayplayer]

• Tweet, Tweet.  [@meechone, @DashTreyhorn, @mistertug]

BREAKING NEWS: We interrupt your regularly scheduled ‘Laziest Post in Blogging’ to bring you the news that Brad Lidge has been placed on the 15-day DL with a sprained right knee, retroactive to June 7.  Catcher Paul Bako has been called up (???) to replace Lidge on the 25-man roster. [Phillies.com]

And we now rejoin our original post already in progress…

As you may have been able to tell from the “faggity ass 403 error” that has randomly popped up the past few days when you try and access The Fightins dot com, we’re having some server issues ’round these parts.  For all those who don’t understand what server issues are, go Google it or something, I don’t have time to explain that shit.  Just be aware that we know about it, we are addressing it, and we’ll have it resolved (hopefully) by this weekend.  And by “we”, I mean “someone other than me”.

In the mean time, enjoy these choice links to prepare you for the upcoming Mets series, won’t you?

• Chipper Jones has some SCATHING words for Citi Field.  David Wright constantly tracks Chipper down to agree with him.  I think.  Wait… is “nice park” demeaning?  [Walkoff Walk]

• In his very first appearance in the majors, Dodgers reliever Travis Schcklichting got BLLAPPED by Ryan Howard.  That home run ball was caught by a fan and famed YouTuber ‘Dodgerfilms’ caught it on tape.  Do you believe the dummy threw it back!? [YouTube]

• Busta-buss Olney ponders whether or not Jose Reyes has reached his full potential as a ballplayer.  Meanwhile, Jose Reyes is sitting at home thinking up new handshakes. [Buster Olney Blog]

• Thanks to The Hills aficionado Todd Zolecki, we found out that someone sent Ryan Howard a few “Watch Out, Bro” t-shirts which he proudly displayed in his locker.  You’re a good man, Zolecki. [@ToddZolecki]

MORE BREAKING NEWS: Leonardo DiCaprio and Bar Rafaeli have split up because — get this — she wanted to move in with him. You’re a better man than I, Leonardo DiCaprio. [The Superficial]

Shitty game last night, huh?  Oh well, CHOKE ON THESE!

• A remorseful ‘Duk pens his apology letter to RAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUULLLLLLLLLL!  He has yet to receive his “apology accepted” response. [Big League Stew]

• More on RAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUULLLLLLLLLL! [Philly Skyline] [WSBGM's]

• Bill Baer always does some fantabulous work on his site, and the other day he done graphed EVERY SINGLE HOME RUN GIVEN UP BY PHILLIES PITCHERS IN 2009.  Maybe it’s because I wouldn’t have the slightest clue how to even going about doing something like that, but I find it utterly fascinating. [Crashburn Alley]

• While I was at the Charlie Bobblehead game the other night, those Levelers were holding a contest to see who could take the most creative/funny/interesting photo with their Charlie bobble.  Miss Bee of Phillyist was the clear cut winner; and me being a biased Birdland representer, here’s my personal favorite.  [The 700 Level] [Birdland Philadelphia]

• One frequent The Fightins commenter (Chris) has brought along the services of another frequent The Fightins commenter (Tug Haines) to write on his blog.  It’s an entertaining site, I recommend you bookmark it (or RSS it, or put it in your Google reader, or whatever the hell you do to read websites).  [Long Drive]

• Say it ain’t so –  Buddy Ryan’s son is a complete jaggov!  My boy from my old digs, Davey Chalk, screen capped the son of the former Eagles coach and new man in charges of the J-E-T-S, Rex Ryan, wearing a fucking Mets cap turned inside out and backwards during the ninth inning of a game vs. the Marlins.  How’d that rally work out for you? [Bugs & Cranks]

• Finally, there aren’t too many interesting Twitter accounts out there (take mine for example), but there is one person that would cause me to sign up for an account even if I weren’t on it already — CHRIS WHEELER.  If you tell me it’s fake I will punch you in the face. [THE_REAL_WHEELS Twitter account]

• Oh shit.  Sarge is on there, too.  [G_Sarge_M's Twitter account]

Today is the day your WFC Philadelphia Phillies finally receive their World Series rings.  The ceremony is set to start around 2:15 this afternoon (Live! on CSN Philly) where this top secret design will be unveiled before a packed house in South Philly.  Expected to be in attendance are ex-Phillies Pat Burrell & Geoff Jenkins, as well as suspended reliever J.C. Romero.

Unless photgraphic evidence of the ring leaks online earlier than that (highly doubtful), keep checking The Fightins dot com between the hours of 2:00 and 3:00 where I will have the crispy HD screen grabs of ‘em as soon as humanly possible.  Tell your friends.

Here’s some first-class linkage to hold you over until then…

• OBAMA!  The Phillies are preparing for their presidential visit next Tuesday when a day off between meetings with the Nationals will leave them ample time to give Barack his own ‘OBAMA 44′ Phillies jersey and pose for photographs.  [The 700 Level]

• In case you’re still down from the dreadful 0-2 start to the season, here’s a message from Philly graf artist Seus: [Flickr]

• The honorable John R. Finger of CSN Philly reports on the news that a certain Phillies pitcher is the proud owner of the most flailed at pitch in baseball.  I’ll give you a hint, it’s not Lidge’s slider, Moyer’s breaking ball, OR Cole’s changeup.  Check it out.  [CSN Philly]

• Every time Yoooney Escobar gets a hit against the Phils and tosses his bat, a runner gets thrown out at home. [Long Drive]

• Over on WSBGM’s, the fellas think they have the solution to the Phillies April woes:  CITIZENS BANK GEO-DOME!!!  According to their proposed archetectual layout, most of South Philly would also be underneath it.  If the dome doesn’t work, I got an idea — STOP HITTING BALLS 1,000 FEET IN THE AIR AND START HITTING LINE DRIVES.  [WSBGM's]

• Two of the four The Fightins dot com contributors are now up on Twitter.  Here’s me[echone's Twitter] and here’s Dash [Treyhorn's Twitter]

What an exciting day it ’twas in Clearwater on the roster tweaking front.  Let’s discuss, shall we?

Geoff Jenkins got released

Not a surprising move in the least, especially considering the Phillies have now cemented themselves as the type of team who don’t mind eating $8 milly+ in salary if it means that roster spot will be used for a bigger need.  (Ask Eaton)  The bottom line is the Phillies had an excess of left-handed hitting, part-time outfielders and I guess they prefer the pinch hit BOMB potential of Matt Stairs.    I kinda feel bad for Jenkins — he was a likable fellow — but at his new reduced rate of $400,000 a year, he shouldn’t have much trouble finding a new home somewhere in the American League.  Thanks for that double off of Grant Balfour to start Game 5b though, pal.   I was fist-pumping with ya.

Chan Ho Park named the 5th starter

In a battle that began with four contestants, the field was quickly whittled down to two as J.A. Happ and Chan Ho Park took the competition for 5th starter into the final week of spring training.  Besides the fact that Chan Ho out-pitched J.A., the Phillies would’ve been awfully vulnerable with a starting staff consisting of three lefties.  I don’t think it would help Happ to sit in the bullpen and come in for some long relief mop up duty type-shit, so he can wait patiently in Lehigh Valley until Cole Hamels’ inevitable trip to the DL.

Plus, a bad precedent for future veteran free-agent pitchers would have been set if someone came into Phillies camp, CLEARLY won the job that he was told he was competing for, and still got relegated to long man in the bullpen.

Gary Sheffield rumors run rampant

With the release Gary Sheffield (a/k/a Gaekwon the Shef) from the Detroit Tigers being announced just prior to the release of Geoff Jenkins, it seemed like the obvious move for the Phillies would be to sign Shef on the cheap (400K), which would sorta justify the Jenkins dumping while bringing our much-needed RH bat to the Phillies bench.

The only problem here, folks, is this particular RH bat comes attached to a fucking crazy person who would NEVER be satisfied getting one pinch hit every other day.  Face it — Sheffield is a complete asshole.  Not only that, but he’s a complete asshole whose skills have deteriorated to the point where he can’t play the field, hit for average, OR present a consistent power threat.  We got a fucking World Series title to defend; we don’t have time to deal with Sheffield’s insecurity issues.  And if I saw a group of jaggovs at The Bank with chef’s hats on their heads I think I’d be forced to turn on my own fanbase.

Beelove of Philly Skyline summed it up quite nicely in an anti-Sheffield e-mail exchange from earlier today: “The dude is practically tailor made for the Mets – he’s old, he’s an outfielder, he’s an asshole. Who gives a shit if we’d pay him the league minimum to crank 15-20 HR off the bench. He’s still Gary Sheffield, and Gary Sheffield ain’t no Phillie.”

CHUUCH!

Brett Myers tabbed as the Opening Night starter

Break out your gold-trimmed jersey, Myers.  Fuck the Braves.

After the jump, those links I promised…

Read more »

You know what’s the best part about writing a blog on a daily basis just because you enjoy watching a team so much that you feel the need to spend an inordinate amount of time searching for random news about that team and then publishing the results in hopes others will like it as well?

When you decide to take a few days off and then get chastised in the comments section for not posting.  It’s honestly the most rewarding aspect of blogging.  If, for some reason or another, I was ever forced to retire from the glamorous world o’ blogs, that’s the one thing I would truly miss.

I think it means you care.

And remember in the comments section when I said I was tending to my fevered son and figuring out how to work my fancy new video thieving machine?  Well, guess what — I lied.  I was fucking sitting around in my pajamas all weekend playing MLB 09 The Show for PS3.  And it was fucking great.  If I had enough cash stashed away, I’d take the next three months off from work and do nothing but play this game.  It’s honestly the first *perfect* sports game I’ve ever played.  I’m pretty sure I’m addicted to it.

Anyways, while I was sidetracked, there were plenty of other sites you could’ve went to for news.  These are just some of them:

• Speaking of MLB 09 The Show, my former B&C adversary and fellow video game head, Brad Bortone, does a terrific job of pitting the PS3 game vs. it’s XBox 360 competition, MLB2K9.  I completely agree with everything he says. [Bugs&Cranks]

• Speaking of MLB2K9, IT FUCKING SUCKS.  Here’s proof. [YouTube via Pasta Padre's Twitter]

• Never in my life would I think an interview between a fantasy baseball site and the head of fantasy operations at ESPN could be even remotely entertaining.  Boy, was I wrong.  I dare you to read this and not laugh.  [Razzball]

• Todd Zolecki continues to go where no beat reporter dares and writes about the near-murder of two Phillies employees from a Ryan Howard foul ball.  Fortunately, no one was hurt, but it did do some major damage to the Bright House Field press box drywall. [The Zo Zone]

• Good news, ladies.  Eric Brunlett grew his beard back!

• Finally, those fellas who think they should be GM’s dug up a bunch of pics of Ryan Howard entertaining the ladies and caps their post off with the legendary Maddux/Glavine “Chicks dig the long ball” commercial.  DYK? That commercial was filmed at Veteran’s Stadium. [WSBGM's]

• Heathcliff Slocumb on Another Phillies pitcher set to marry a ‘Survivor’ contestant
• Heathcliff Slocumb on You Could Field An Entire Team With Ed Wade’s Ex-Phillies
• Phylan on Making A Case For Joe Beimel
• BD on Another Phillies pitcher set to marry a ‘Survivor’ contestant
• RicoBrogna on You Could Field An Entire Team With Ed Wade’s Ex-Phillies