Saturday, August 22, 2009

Philly Sports 101

Posted: 22 Aug 2009 02:29 PM PDT

Andy Reid said today that Michael Vick will make his Eagles debut Thursday night against the Jaguars. If everything goes well over the next few practices. I guess that means, unless Vick gets injured, he will appear in the game this week.

Reid: "I want to see how he does this week. He worked throughout the week here as we went to the game [in Indianapolis]. He did a couple of workouts here and was here yesterday on the players' day off and worked hard. He's getting through that soreness and we'll just see how it goes for this week as he goes through practice.

"I think he wants to get in and play again. I can't tell you right now how much he is going to play. But he's shooting to play this game.

"It looks like -- I'm talking the football side -- it looks like he's in pretty good shape. You could tell he's done some running and some lifting. It looked like he started out a little rusty throwing the ball and as the week went on that smoothed out for him a little bit."

Good. I will be watching for Vick. It will definitely be exciting to see how Vick can play. Some people have suggested that Vick won't play because Reid doesn't want him to be the focus, but the team because of their sloppy play two days ago.

Hamels Must Improve

Posted: 22 Aug 2009 01:52 PM PDT

The Phillies hopes of repeating as World Series champs rely on Cole Hamels. Hamels has been average at best this season, after winning 15 games last year and earning the World Series MVP award. Hamels is 7-8 with a 4.78 ERA this season. Last night he pitched 5 innings and gave up 4 runs on 10 hits against the injury-depleted Mets.

Hamels is 0-3 in August with a 6.75 ERA. By comparison, Cliff Lee is 3-0 in August with a 0.75 ERA. There should be no debate who the ace of the staff is now. Some people thought Hamels would be pressured by Lee to pick up the pace. Apparently he didn't get the message.

If the playoffs started today, I don't think Hamels is in the rotation. I would go with Lee, Happ, Blanton, then Pedro. I don't know what's wrong with Hamels. He basically throws only 2 pitches 95% of the time (fastball and changeup). Maybe he is tipping his pitches and the batters just use a process of elimination.

It also seems like he is having control problems. He hit the Mets pitcher, Mike Pelfrey, last night with two outs. He could have gotten out of the inning because the Mets scored a run after that.

I don't know why Hamels is struggling but I do know he must improve for the team's sake. If Hamels becomes the pitcher we know and love, the Phillies will have a deep rotation. If not, the Phillies better hope their hitters are hot come playoff time.

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