Wrong hat, I guess

What a busy weekend for me to miss! I've been up in Massachusetts for three days and missed an epic amount of Philly sports. (By the way, I've always suspected this, but this is the first time I've been able to confirm it firsthand: the Red Sox up there are like the Eagles down here, except times 10. Every other person I saw was wearing a Sox hat or shirt or jacket or pants or something. I'd be pissed off about it, but they're on their own turf, so I've got no real problem with it (just the fake problems of jealousy, vindictiveness, being a general jerk, etc.). It's only when "Red Sox Nation" [cut to me vomiting profusely] starts bleeding into every other region of the country, that's when those people get reprehensible. I think since October 2004, not a SINGLE DAY has gone by that I haven't seen somebody in a Red Sox hat... and I live 300+ miles from Boston! I'm not sure how much longer I'll be able to take these people before I start committing hate crimes.)

(On the subject of Boston scumbags, Bill Simmons has a new column this week - uncharacteristically about hockey - which might be the most despicable thing he's ever written. Just a bunch of arrogant, hypocritical, poorly argued, poorly researched garbage. But that's all I'm going to say about it, because I'm trying to wean myself off of getting upset about that guy's dumbass rantings. I'm not even going to link to it, for which you should probably thank me. (Though if you really want to see another installment of "Dumb Things That Bill Simmons Said", I do take requests.))

Where was I before I started complaining about irrelevant things like a jerk? Oh yeah. So, I missed both Flyers games, and they lost both of them. I'm certainly not suggesting that my presence is required in Philadelphia for them to win, because that would be crazy talk. On the other hand... I'm just sayin'. I've returned home to find a Game 7 waiting for me. Puck-dropping occurs at 7 PM and that's where my eyeballs will be pointed.

I have no idea what happened in those two games but at the very least I'm upset about the loss of momentum, hockey being a game of having and/or not having momentum. Actually, I guess that describes pretty much all sports. I'm not sure what my point is beyond just saying that if the Flyers go back to playing some good ol' Flyers hockey, and not let Divey McScoresgoals take over the game like he seems to feel the need to do, they should be okay. Let's do it!

Meanwhile, I asked Andrew to text me Sixers score updates on Sunday night while I was busy at the seder. And then, of course, I completely forgot that I has asked him that, so when I finally checked my phone at like 1 AM there were eight messages from him relating the weekend's most thrilling narrative: the Sixers' win over Detroit in Game 1! Fantastic stuff. I'm very excited about Game 2 tomorrow, but having said that I can only concentrate on the Flyers right now, so thoughts about the Sixers will have to wait.

And then there's the always perplexing Phillies. I made kind of an ass myself at the game on Friday, which I'm not proud of. Greg Dobbs hit a huge home run to cut the Mets' lead to 5-4, so I turned toward a big section of Mets fans nearby, gave 'em the finger, and started a "NEW YORK SUCKS!" chant. There were probably a few f-words in there somewhere too. Anyway, then I turned to my dad, who was just sort of shaking his head, and he said "We're still losing, you know." And of course, he was right, and we never took the lead at all. My dad's not big on displays of poor sportsmanship. He's a good guy, and a better man than I.

Anyway, turns out Johan Santana is really good. I'm not ready to hand the Mets the division title or anything, I mean I'm not Tim Kurkjian over here, because they still have to win on the other four days Santana's not pitching. I still think we match up really well with them, and I suppose I'm looking forward to our next matchup with Santana to see how that goes. None of this, of course, can help the fact that he shut us down on Friday and we lost.

And then they lost the Saturday game, and won the one on Sunday, and won the one last night. They're 10-10. Who are the real Phillies? The home run hitting powerhouse with the much better than expected pitching? Or the clumsy, error-prone, non-hitting, non-pitching sloppy dudes? I have no idea. It's April 22. Give 'em time.

Not happy about Jimmy on the DL, and I reserve judgment on the various gaggle of callups that happened in my absence. I've sort of written myself into an obvious hole with this ridiculous Husker Du song thing, but I'll give it a try with the new guys:

Chris Snelling: "From the Gut"
T.J. Bohn: "Friend, You've Got to Fall"
Brad Harman: "Too Far Down"

Puzzle over that, won't you? Gotta go.

GO FLYERS!!!

4/5 Reds 4, Phils 3

What happened: One of those weird games where they don't play well enough to win, but not poorly enough for me to get crazy and write long, angry essays that no one will ever read. Adam Eaton looked okay, which is promising. The hitting is still not quite there, though Utley is amazing so far. Is Chad Durbin that horrible, or was he just tired? I'm going with tired for now.

Brad Lidge is officially on the team! Tim Lahey, we hardly knew ye (didn't know you at all, in fact). Brad Lidge's song... hmm... I'll say "First of the Last Calls" because he's the closer, so he's the "Last" pitcher, and you make a "Call" to the bullpen... eh??? Yeah, it's terribly lame. Next year I'll try Rush songs, so he can have "Closer to the Heart".

Next: More of the Reds; baseball will be played.

4/2 Nats 1, Phils 0 (!); Pens 4, Flyers 2 (@*$!!?!?!)

What happened: The Phils decided to spend the first two games of the season teaching us a valuable lesson: baseball is an extremely cruel, stupid game.

Just spent an extremely frustrating evening watching the Flyers and Phils lose. The Flyers had no answers for the faster, better-goaltending Penguins; the Phils rarely hit anything and when they did it was directly and I mean directly into the gloves of the Nats' fielders. It was pretty horrendous. There's plenty of time left for the Phils, of course, but the Flyers are hanging onto that 8th seed by a thread with only two games left.

Why do I do this to myself? How many novels would I have written by now if it wasn't for sports? Would I be living in a mansion? The mind boggles.

On the plus side, Pedro Feliz had a hit, like I told you he would.

The Phils picked up veteran reliever Rudy Seanez. I'll give him the Husker Du song "Standing by the Sea", just to go with the lame pun on his name. Meanwhile, the Phils cut Wes Helms, so let's salute Wes Helms for a moment. So long Wes, I'll always remember... hmm, I can't remember anything, really. He really had the most unremarkable year here last year. I mean, I even have one or two fond memories of David Bell and Abe Nunez, for crying out loud, but none of Wes Helms.

I do remember one time Helms actually lost his shoe trying to field a ball at third. Yeah, he just... he just wasn't very good.

Next: Two more games for the Flyers, 160 for the Phils. Mark your calendars.