Phillies host Nationals with eyes on NL East prize

Game chat: The co-division leaders turn to ace left-hander Cole Hamels as the Phillies embark on their final three games of the 2007 season tonight at Citizens Bank Park. Tim Redding is scheduled for Washington. Discuss the action, including Mets/Marlins, right here. Go Phils!

Comments

[CJ]

Let's do this!

[Ben Rivera]

Keep on Phightin Baby! Three wins to go!

[brother]

GO PHILS!

[bsg]

Let's hope for a big night from chase 2nd game in a row with the tablesetters j-roll and shane back in the line-up and chase hasn't worn the collar for three games in a row all season long. . My regular season supply of rolaids is almost running out! Go Phils!, Go Fish!

[Mike H.]

Let's rough up Redding fast and win in a laugher tonight. Let's make them use their pen in the third inning and weaken it ASAP.

[Ben Rivera]

Is it weird that I'm ambivalent about wearing my Chase jersey out tonight? I didn't want to mess up the karma and my roommate threatened to kill me when he saw it. I need Beerleaguer approval.

[Mike H.]

Without objection, it is so ordered, Ben.

[Ben Rivera]

Awesome. Go Phils!

[bsg]

Ben, What is your roommate a Mets fan?, SCREW "em WEAR IT !!!!

[Ben Rivera]

Oh no, he's a Phils fans. He's just as superstitious as I am. Although I'm sure I will run into more than a few Mets fans in my travels in upstate NY.

[Mike H.]

BTW, I loved the throwing of the towels down onto the lower deck/playing field. Great stuff.

The line at the park was ginormous at 4 PM today.

[bsg]

Yeah i hear you Ben I might be going to the game on Sunday and i might have to turn the rally towel into the shlling towel depending on how the B.P. is doing, i'm just hoping by the end of the game i can do my Danny jackson t-shirt/muscle flexing celebration!!,... uh considering i have the John kruk physique maybe i will just keep my shirt on!

[Parker]

Any reason that I'm not picking up the game on Extra Innings yet?

[bay_area_phan]

Anybody have big plans for Friday night?

[Ben Rivera]

You sir are very lucky. I approve your Danny Jackson celebration, if it gets to that. It's been 14 years my friend. Live a little.

[RSB]

I wore my Phillies shirt yesterday and they still won. That *never* happens.

[Ben Rivera]

BAP, I've got to celebrate a friend's 21st. Hopefully the bars will have Extra Innings, if not I'll have to check up on ESPN Bottomline.

[Mike H.]

Gary Darling is tonight's umpire.

Whoa - great hustle.

[J.R. King]

Calm down cole.

Gotta keep the ball down in the zone.

[regalmeans]

I recently relocated to DC so I'm watching tonight's game there, with the Nats announcers. They were upset that the crowd boo'ed the Nats lineup and said after what the Nats did to the Mets Philly should have rolled out the red carpet for them. Interesting. They also said they hope to see a weekend/crowd like this in DC sometime in the (near) future.

[Parker]

nice

[jhart]

I think getting through the first is the toughest inning for Cole. Now that we got throught that, we can settle in and start to stick.

[Mike H.]

11 pitch first inning. Beautiful, Cole.

The wind is going to make things interesting, especially with their rookie center fielder out there tonight.

[RSB]

Looks like the Mets/Marlins are delayed.

[fljerry]

Hamels seem to be alittle high on his pitches but an out is an out

[Mike H.]

The Mets game is delayed. Too much suckage on the field.

[stjoehawk]

bap - Got a six pack of Octoberfest (and a sixer of Yuengling Light for the fiancee, when she arrives from Towson (assuming that she doesn't get so into the radio broadcast on XM that she gets lost on the way here)). Got the laptop with the Muts / Fish gamecast. Got the TV going on the Phillies game.

Let's do this!

[The Other Kevin]

Not sure what Ronnie Belliard was glaring at Victorino about after that bang-bang play at first. I guess he thinks he's above being thrown out? What a douche.

[CJ]

Who has the best reason for the Mets delay?

It's called "Wet Grounds"... I think the fans cried too much last night.

Or perhaps they can't find a major league pitcher on the Mets staff.

[The Other Kevin]

Since the Mets/Marlins are delayed, it'd be great to get on the board early and really put the pressure on NY. I'd love to see them psychologically playing catch up all night.

[The Other Kevin]

Real glad to have Shane's speed back.

[J.R. King]

Does Flores have a good arm? Anyone know?

[RSB]

With the wind blowing in, this might play like a game at the late RFK Stadium.

[CJ]

Did we forget how much we liked a healthy Victorino while he was hurt? Is that a testament to the job Werth did? Does it speak to the character that neither guy has made noise about going in and out of the lineup?

[J.R. King]

T.O. Kevin: I couldn't agree more. Make the Mets think they're behind.

[Mike H.]

Perhaps a ball to right field will play like my drives off the tee - a gratuitous slice toward the end...

[Mike H.]

Restarted again in New York.

[Sophist]

is anyone else having mlb.tv problems?

[CJ]

No buggier than normal.

[Sophist]

I can't even get window to come up when I click the link. . . Just have to keep trying.

[Mike H.]

It's a little jumpy. The broadcast is on Philly 57 tonight. Would that have something to do with it?

[Mike H.]

Try logging in from the "Scoreboard" page on mlb.com

[JD]

Go, PHILS !

[Mike H.]

OMG, the right field ball girl is gorgeous...

[AFish]

2-0 Marlins

[jeremy]

Your Ricoh Defense Player of the Game is: the Phillies ball girl.

[fljerry]

fish 2-0

[Dizzle]

2-0 Marlins!

[jeremy]

I suppose that should be "play" not "player."

[Parker]

Mike H., don't tell that to clout. J/k

[stjoehawk]

WOO-HOO!! FISH!!!

[drake]

hermida homerida!

[Mike H.]

OH YEAH!!!! 2-0 FISH!

[The Other Kevin]

Come on Cole – settle down. The Fish are helping us already, so let's help ourselves.

[Mike H.]

Don't tell him she's gorgeous? Why?

[Parker]

Hermida huh, off a left hander. That is sort of surprising.

[slackerjoe]

Haha! The fans are loving that score!

But now we need Hamels to settle down here.

[Parker]

Mike H., he was joking a couple of weeks ago that Philadelphia had the worst looking women in the world (or some geographic area).

DP!!!!

[The Other Kevin]

STRONG!!!!!!

[stjoehawk]

Love the fist pump from Howard after the 6-4-3.

[slackerjoe]

Huge DP!

[jeremy]

Hamels has had 4 baserunners in 2 innings, given up zero runs, and managed to throw only 23 pitches.

That's throwing strikes (18 of 'em, in fact).

[Ed K]

Times when I love the national league (grew up in New England): pitcher hits into double play when opposing team has bases loaded with one out.

Yes!

[BooSanta]

Live down in South Florida. Forced to watch the Phils gamecast, but have the Marlins/Mets game on. The crowd went absolutely dead the second the ball left Hermedia's bat on the HR. It was fun.

[JD]

Settle down, Cole..

[Mike H.]

Love the fist pump from Hamels after the 643, too.

[Parker]

Mike H., BTW, I wasn't buying it, and I think I've seen that same ball girl. The Dude and I were talking about how good the Braves girls looked, but they have nothing on one of the ball girls for the Phils.

[jhart]

Reyes struck out looking. When he is in a funk, the Mets O is dismal.

[stjoehawk]

re:ballgirl - This is one of those times when there are even more benefits to seeing the games in HD.

[stjoehawk]

Why am I getting the history of the Honeymooners?

[Parker]

LoL st.joe,

Fish: I dont have a lot of faith in a guy with the first name Byung.

[BloodStripes]

Good eye Pat. Gotta work Redding and get the pitch count up. Make him work Phils!

[jeremy]

Chris Wheeler was talking incessantly about the Honeymooners and Sarge and Harry didn't seem to know what to say.

[Mike H.]

Nicked the corner.

[BloodStripes]

Way outside umpire!!!!

[Parker]

Man, as bad as Redding has made lefties look, I wouldn't have minded seeing Helms. And where was that pitch to Ruiz????

[BloodStripes]

Wheels was goin' all Vin Scully on us.

[Run Up The Score]

Crap! Anyone else in Harrisburg? I can't find this game on TV anywhere!

[Parker]

Ok, note to Cole: throw crap because Darling is your best friend.

[kevin]

2-0 Fins!

[JD]

Wheels wishes he was Vin Scully

[RSB]

Redding is tough.

[JD]

Yea, Redding looks good so far.

[Mike H.]

She'd do very well for herself down here in the land of the beautiful people (Orange County).

Looks like the bats still have no answer for Tim Redding. There has to be some way to get to this guy. There's no way BK Take Out is going to hold the lead up in Queens.

[fljerry]

Redding is only 3-5 and has been with lots of teams - why can't we hit him?

[Hope springs eternal]

Run up: Not on 15. I don't know why. It is on MASN out of DC on Dish Network. Amazingly, not blacked out.

[Parker]

Darling is getting a bit ridiculous.

[Zach Morris]

Of all nights for mlb.tv not to work

[jeremy]

Sarge on Hamel's strike out curve ball: "That's a bowel locker right there."

Hilarious.

[Mike H.]

That's such a Cole Hamels thing to do. I bet he's like "Yeah, ump, you effing blew the first one, so here it comes again..." I like it.

[stjoehawk]

That's the California attitude from the previous thread. Or something like that...

[ZT]

Lets see, a 20 year college student, on a friday night, what is he doing? Sitting on his butt watchin the Phightins with his fellow beerleaguers! Its great to be a Phillies fan right now. And Cole sure is throwing strikes tonight.

[Parker]

Sneaky Vic, sneaky, lol.

[Ed K]

Oh yeah. Hamels is starting to look scary!!!!!!

[The Other Kevin]

Nice job, Cole. Nice job.

[JD]

Nice inning, Cole!

[fljerry]

mets scored 2-1

[Parker]

Cole in a three game series is really like throwing out 93' Schilling.

[kkreider13]

Mets need a hit by the pitcher and an error to score a run

[THe Dude]

Do you believe in Miracles?

We need to start getting Redding's pitch count up...obviously we have problems with every Nats starter for some reason...at least we have a shot if we can get to the Nat's pen in the 5th/6th innings