Jamie Moyer (10-7, 5.32) will fire the Phils’ first shots tonight in a three-game series against the Colorado Rockies. Opposing him will be Jason Hammel (5-6, 4.66), who, not surprisingly, has a lower ERA than Moyer. What is surprising is that his ERA is lower than his near-namesake and fading ace, Cole Hamels (4.68). Well at least it’s close.

Just because Cliff Lee made the Giants look like a bunch of circus monkeys last week in his much-hyped debut doesn’t mean we’re all sold on the state of the Phillies pitching. Sounds like Ruben Amaro is however. The way things currently stand the best-possible playoff starting rotation would be Lee, Hamels, Blanton and Happ. Of course, there are many out there who would argue that Jamie Moyer should be in the rotation because he’s from Souderton. Oh well, either way that rotation is out-matched by St. Louis and San Francisco. To that effect Bill Conlin chimed in earlier today.

I don’t want to get too down on the Phillies. After all, they always manage to beat bad teams (provided they’re not A.L. teams). And I’m really not trying to knock Ruben Amaro; the guy’s done a pretty good job in his first year (see Raul Ibanez and Cliff Lee). But there are big question marks in the starting rotation as well as in the bullpen, most notably Cole Hamels and Lights-On Lidge. Hopefully, when Condrey and Romero return from injury and Pedro is ready to go (whatever that may mean), Charlie Manuel Rich Dubee will be able to fit the puzzle pieces correctly.

Apparently J.C. Romero doesn’t appreciate dumb-ass comments from mindless Floridians. According to Tampa police, Romero was signing autographs outside Tropicana Field Thursday night when Rays fan, Robert Eaton, solicited him for his Hancock. When Romero passed him over, Eaton said something about steroids at which point Romero told him to “shut the fuck up.” J.C. then proceeded to grab Eaton by the neck and choked him like Tim Tebow will choke in the NFL draft.

Nobody fucks with J.C. Romero (except Bud Selig). I like the fact that Romero did like any reliever worth his salt would do: he went right for the throat. Here’s to hoping Brad Lidge will follow suit.

In today’s Inquirer the poll question is “Phillies (sic) ace Cole Hamels has a 4.48 ERA. Should the team be concerned?” I voted and found out that 47% of respondents said yes (his ERA was 3.09 last year) and the rest said no big deal. Sure, Hamels isn’t pitching his best but we all know what he’s capable of and he has a history of getting better as the season progresses.

The area where this should be troubling is the relationship Hamels’ performance has to the pitching staff overall. Currently, J.A. Happ has the best ERA among starters with 3.53. The inactive Brett Myers is at 4.66 followed by Joe Blanton at 5.17, Antonio Bastardo with 5.25, and Jamie Moyer with 6.35. The best ERA in the bullpen belongs to J.C. Romero with a 1.08. Other significant bullpen pitchers are Ryan Madson at 2.16, Scott Eyre with 2.57, Clay Condrey at 3.44, Chad Durbin with 3.89, Chan Ho Park at 6.08 and the disabled Brad Lidge with a 7.27. Since his return to the Phillies, Kyle Kendrick has amassed a 13.50 ERA.

On a pitching staff that hasn’t found its way this year, it is concerning that Hamels has been mediocre because a top team needs a guy whose starts can be relied upon. True, the bullpen has had its bright spots but over 9 (or more, as of late) innings, team ERA is more important that starting vs. relief ERAs. The NL average is 4.27 and the Phillies are about a half run worse at 4.75. Only the Nationals are worse in the National League with a team ERA of 5.28.

At some point this season the Phillies are going to have to get this ship righted. They aren’t getting bailed out as much as they were last year by the offense. To boot, Lidge’s perfect season is a distant memory at the back end of the rotation. As it stands, you’d like to see your ace (not J.A. Happ) taking the reins and leading your pitching staff into a stronger middle third of the season.

As I’m sitting here on my deck on a bright, beautiful early summer day the Phillies are .5 games behind the Mets in the NL EAst. The Phils’ record is 26-20 after beating the Nationals last night 5-4. This means they’re now 8-2 against the Nationals and the Nats are 13-34 on the season, an absolute disgrace.

The Phillies are averaging almost 13 hits in their wins against Washington this year and 11.4 hits in all 10 games against the Nats. It’s almost depressing that 30% of the Phillies’ wins this season are against Washington; it feels like a tarnished record. Then again, you go out and play the schedule you’re given and win the games you should. But really, the Phillies stranded 13 runners last night and still won. The bad news is that once this series ends there are only 6 more games against the Nationals all season.

There are two very postive happenings for Rich Dubee’s pitching staff. What if I told you the Phillies added a pitcher yesterday with a record of 1-0 and a .125 BAA, a .43 WHIP and an ERA of 0.00? Would that be something you might be interested in? Well, if that pitcher were LH Sergio Escalona and that record came on 2.1 innings pitched this year your ears would certainly perk-up and your trousers would push outward, forming a tent shape around your lap.

More importantly, Brad Lidge was perfect last night for the first time since April 11 against the Rockies (unless you count his 2 pitch appearance against the Nats on May 17th). He struck out Christian Guzman and Nick Johnson to end the game, no small feat considering they’re hitting .329 and .335 respectively. With a powerful setup man in Ryan Madson, a returning J. C. Romero and a re-established Lidge, the back end of the Phils’ pen could get real good real soon.

The image above is the logo for the 1944-45 Philadelphia Blue Jays baseball club. I found it on a most peculiar site, entitled “Tom MacMahon: The Strategy of Bingo. The Excitement of Chess.” Anyway, 3 Phillies questions I don’t have the answer to. Perhaps you do.

1. How much longer while grandfather-status protect Jamie Moyer’s roster spot? Seriously.
2. Whom will the Phillies DH this weekend when they play the Yankees (they’ll be facing at least two lefties in Sabathia and Pettitte)? Their bench hasn’t exactly, um, been good.
3. Where will Chan Ho Park fit into the Phillies’ bullpen? This question becomes even more interesting when you consider J. C. Romero’s impending return.

The middle series of the Phillies’ 10-game road trip begins tonight against the Reds at Great American Ballpark (whatever that means) in Cincinnati. The pitching matchup between Johnny Cueto and Cole Hamels promises to be dandy. Some good numbers for both pitchers below:

• Johnny Cueto is 4-1 with a 1.93 ERA. He’s amassed 36 Ks and only 13 walks in 46.2 innings this year. He’s won 5 of his last 6 starts and given up a total of 7 runs during that stretch. His WHIP this season is 1.01, almost a half point (.42) better than the league average. Cueto’s BAA this season is .205.
• In 2008 against the Reds, Cole Hamels was 2-0 with a .56 ERA and only one earned run in 16 innings pitched. Lifetime at Great American Ballpark (whatever that means) he’s 2-0 with a .86 ERA is 21 innings. Hamels also made his Major League debut there in May 2006. In his previous outing last Thursday against the Dodgers, Hamels allowed 1 earned run and struck out 9 in 7 innings.

Some other things of note on this fine Tuesday, courtesy of mlb.com:

• After the Phillies demolition of the hapless Nationals this weekend, they’ve improved their road record to 12-4, best in the majors.
• J.C. Romero joined Triple-A Lehigh Valley yesterday in preparation for his return from suspension.
• The Phillies have come from behind to win 15 of their total 20 wins this year. Obviously, this leads the majors.
• Off all major league players who played in 2008 and are playing for a different team this season, Raul Ibanez’s 13 home runs are tops in baseball.

Let me start my defense of Manny Ramirez by saying two things: one, my argument is based on the information we have at our disposal only a few hours after news of his suspension for failing a drug test was announced. And two, had J.C. Romero not been suspended 50 games earlier this year, perhaps we’d have a different take on the Manny situation as we wouldn’t already have debated a suspension for very similar circumstances. With that said my defense of Ramirez is directed at the issue of his legacy, specifically his worthiness for the Hall of Fame.

In its panic-driven fervor to create the image that baseball is doing something about steroids, MLB has to make examples of players who violate its drug policies. I get that and agree with it. The problem from a perception and legacy perspective for players like Ramirez is that the policy includes so many banned substances, ranging from over-the-counter and prescription additives to drugs and supplements to outright anabolic steroids. Therefore, if a player is to be remembered for violating the policy, he will probably be remembered as a juicer, which in Ramirez’s case (and Romero’s) isn’t accurate.

The point I’m making here is that there’s a world of difference between knowing, deliberate and on-going use of a substance that’s primary purpose is to alter the athlete’s physique and performace and unwittingly putting a banned additive in your body. If we believe his story, Ramirez’s positive test was a result of a drug he took after his doctor not only prescribed it, but according to Peter Gammons, initially believed it to be baseball-safe. Yes, just like J.C. Romero, it is incumbent upon Ramirez to check every last ingredient but if a player can’t trust his doctor’s advice, whom can he trust?(newsday reports that the substance in question is a women’s fertility drug, human chorionic gonadotropin)

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I am about as biased as anyone in favor of J.C. Romero when it comes to his suspension. Well, the Puerto Rican Express has fired back today, this time at the manufacturer of the supplement that got him suspended as well as GNC. I like the fact that this relative little guy isn’t going to go away quietly in the face of Bud Selig’s shameless witch-hunt against minor subtance violators. While Roger Clemens sits in front of Congress with syringes in his ass, Romero is losing almost $2 million for taking Flinstones. Winning this lawsuit has nothing to do with proving MLB wrong but at least he’d have some relief from his significant loss of income. Good luck, J.C.

After winning 2 World Series games out of the bullpen, Phillies reliever and liberator of Puerto Rico, J.C. Romero, is speaking about his ordeal on 610 WIP right now. He is the only athlete I like who constantly talks about God. That’s probably because he is God.

As it turns out, Romero’s suspension is kind of like being on house arrest: apparently he can do everything a team member normally would except for playing in the games. So he will be in uniform to get his World Series ring and will still have time to dissolve cyanide in Bud Selig’s Diet Dr. Pepper.

I was happy as hell to see J.C. Romero trot out to the mound last night and pitch against his typical 3-batter set. He gave up one hit in Puerto Rico’s 2-0 loss to Venezuela. Romero and his Puerto Rico squad will face Team USA tonight in an elimination game.

It’s deliciously ironic that Romero is pitching in an event that uses the IOC’s blood-testing for PEDs and yet he’s currently serving a 50 game grounding from Major League Baseball for eating chewable Flinstones. I hope Romero throws a wild pitch tonight and konks Bud Selig in the head–he’ll probably be easy to find since there are about 350 fans in attendance for each game (consistent with the typical South Florida baseball crowds).

Speaking of fans, I liked the fact that the Venezuelan fans have been booing Maglio Ordonez for supporting Hugo Chavez. In his typical Stalinist fashion, Chavez responded by saying (in Spanish, presumably) “Viva Maglio and all our compatriots!” Chavez is this hemisphere’s version of Kim Jong Il, a blowhard sensationalist who thinks of himself as the next Fidel Castro (whose son, incidentally, is Cuba’s team doctor). Chavez is a deplorable, rabble-rousing, self-promoting despot who (in a timely NCAA kind of way) looks a lot like Marquette coach, Buzz Williams. This is why I will not be rooting for Marquette.

Now that we’ve come full circle, I hope Romero pitches well for Puerto Rico tonight but not well enough to beat the American team. I’m really hoping for a U.S.-Venezuela final. If that happens, stayed tuned for a quote from Chavez.