👋 Good morning! You merely adopted the dark, I was born in it!

Well, gang, no sugarcoating that weekend... even with my better-than-expected Bane impressions. Those few days absolutely stunk. An old-school, terrible Philly sports week.

And look, particularly with the two franchises that we will most focus on today, things have been pretty good over the last few years. The football team won a championship this calendar year. And sure, this baseball team does not have a trophy, but they have revived baseball in Philadelphia and consistently been in the mix. I promise, plenty of other cities would trade with us in a heartbeat. But this weekend was a perfect reminder that being a fan also means, even during the good times, some degree of pain. Those scars make the triumphant moments truly worth it.

Alright, let’s go through it all. We will get through this, you and I. And who knows, maybe we will even laugh a few times.

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As always, you can reach me at [email protected]

Well, that sucked. Post-game show is here. Jim’s story is here.

If you would have told me that these two things happened in Game 1…

I would have felt great! So, yeah, an especially frustrating one to lose. And while the season is not over and I will continue to bang that drum until it actually is over, the numbers are the numbers (per Sarah Langs): In the Division Series with the current 2-2-1 format, teams to win Game 1 on the road have advanced 34 of 46 times (73.9%). The Phils are gonna need to be great tonight and go from there.

Hindsight is 20/20, and I am not in the business of automatically playing the results and second-guessing the manager for every move that backfires. That said, I did not like sending David Robertson back out for the start of the seventh inning in the moment. The guys talked about that decision here.

I have been surprised by how much I enjoyed Robertson down the stretch of this season. He has pitched well, especially for a guy who was hanging out in Rhode Island with his family until July. I have no problem running him out there in a high-leverage spot, either. But Robertson is 40 years old and a finicky pitcher, and when he is asked to do something unusual (pitch on back-to-back days, go multiple innings, etc.), it often goes poorly. Rob Thomson should know this better than anyone. So, when Topper summoned D-Rob to get the last out of the sixth inning, I think he needed a different seventh-inning answer than, “D-Rob for the next two batters after he sits down for 10-15 minutes.” It just felt extremely risky to me.

What would you have done? Probably one of these two things…

Not perfect solutions, but I just did not trust D-Rob to pitch after a break. Let’s not see that again. Now, I fully admit that the Phillies’ lack of trust in Orion Kerkering played a huge factor in the decision-making here. That part is understandable, Kerk was not very good down the stretch! So, while I admit this was not an easy call, I like to go through hypotheticals. It’s how I grieve bullpen meltdowns.

Baseball is a game with such small margins. Strahm was tasked with an impossible situation once Robertson allowed the 8-9 hitters to reach base: Protect a one-run lead with two runners on, nobody out and Ohtani-Betts-Hernandez due up. Strahm got the first two stars, and he was one pitch away from a legitimately remarkable hold. In fact, if Strahm gets Hernandez out and the Phillies win the game, I would have started calling it, “The Hold.” Too bad, maybe another time Matty.

But Strahm missed with a fastball, and Hernandez took him deep. Again, game of inches. And speaking of Hernandez, I felt like the ball was lying on that homer after the lolly-gag routine he pulled on J.T. Realmuto’s triple. That is the type of thing you see when a single wins the game in walk-off fashion, an outfielder letting the ball harmlessly roll to the wall. Bro, it’s the second inning, cut that thing off!

The Dodgers’ top-three hitters went 1-13. But that “one” was the biggest swing of the night. The “one” below was a Bryce Harper single, which is just not gonna cut it.

I saw a lot of takes flying that these three guys are postseason chokers. Playoff baseball makes us all emotional, I get it, but that is not really true. Trea Turner and Kyle Schwarber were not very good against the Mets last year, but over their Phillies tenure, all three guys have pretty good postseason numbers. Bryce’s numbers are astronomical, you cannot poke holes in his playoff resumé. But they were all certainly bad in this crucial game, and the Phillies cannot afford another one of these collective stinkers from the top of the order.

You know why? Besides the whole “scoring runs” part, Citizens Bank Park is just not intimidating if the opposing pitcher is racking up 1-2-3 innings. It got this reputation as a raucous madhouse in 2022 and 2023, but that was in large part because balls were flying out of the yard. When the bats are this silent, so is the ballpark. The Phillies have now lost four of five playoff games at CBP, and that should never happen.

Give Ohtani credit, his curveball was nasty. Give the Dodgers credit, a Glasnow-Sasaki bullpen pairing is diabolical. Could be worse, you could be the Yankees. Must-win game tonight, though.

Denver 21, Eagles 17: Well, that sucked x2. Post-game pod is here.

Let’s start with some #RefTalk. Here are some of the things I believe about officiating…

(1) Over time, I do think calls tend to even out. There is no way I can prove that, mind you, it’s an anecdotal feeling. But the Eagles have had a few high-leverage calls go their way this season, like the false starts on the Tush Push… and although you could argue they should be encroachment, you know what I mean.

And I appreciate that Nick Sirianni takes that approach publicly. Seriously, the entire Eagles organization deserves credit for how they publicly handled the James Bradberry call.

(2) But pretending officials do not exist is also silly. You have definitely heard this line of thinking. Only losers complain about the officials. They don’t decide the game. What do you mean? Of course they can! It depends on the game.

Two things can be true at once. Like one, the Eagles have been playing with fire all season and they finally found out. And two…

(3) The Eagles got a tough whistle yesterday. There is no way around it.

After every high-leverage moment seemingly went against them for four quarters, there were three huge calls that went against them in the guts of the game…

You might agree with one of those calls, sure, but three?

Baun’s personal foul call might have been the most defensible of the bunch. But it’s also a play in which I do not know what Baun is supposed to do. That was not a dirty play, he was trying to make sure the guy did not get a game-changing first down. You can say “hold up,” but if the runner’s knee stays up for a split-second more, it’s a necessary dive. I feel for NFL defenders, it’s so hard to play with disciplined precision at the speeds they are required to move and make decisions at.

Anyway, Eagles fans would also like to see the team end this game long before the final drive. I have a very random historical comp for this game: Carolina 21, Eagles 18 from 2018. In that one, the year after a Super Bowl win, the Birds got outscored 21-0 in the fourth quarter after dominating most of the game. In this one, the year after a Super Bowl win, the Birds got outscored 18-0 in the fourth quarter after dominating for most of the game.

I do not feel all that different about the Eagles than I did after the first four weeks: They more or less played one good half of football (1.1, technically), they more or less played one pretty bad half of football. There was some weird A.J. Brown stuff, and the game was a coin flip at the end. They just happened to lose this one, which is what can happen in coin-flip games.

Critics are gonna point to the passing volume — 38 passes to 11 runs — and yes, ideally you would want to run the ball more. Last year, such a number would have been unthinkable. But the Eagles running game has not looked sharp for most of this season (Saquon finally hit a home run, but it was through the air), and Brett Toth was in at left guard for most of the game after Landon Dickerson left with in an injury. Add in that a few of Hurts’ passes were run-pass options (a good thing!), and I am not too hung up on the run-pass ratio from this specific game.

My framing for this game, and this early season: The Eagles, who have spent so many resources on the trenches over the past few decades, are finally looking mortal on both sides of the line of scrimmage. Some of that is due to injury (Dickerson and Jalen Carter, in particular), some of that is due to retirements and free-agent departures, some of that is due to the best resources being spent elsewhere. But through a combination of internal improvement on both lines, external additions via trade, and the other levels of the offense and defense stepping up, they will have to work around sub-elite line play for a while.

That is why the weird, unproductive start to A.J. Brown’s season has come at a particularly bad time. Ideally, the elite skill players could pick up the slack for the offensive line to a degree. This would have made the score 24-3, the knockout blow, and he… just stopped running.

Still a long way to go for these Eagles. Lots to sort out, and luckily for them, they get to play on Thursday night in New Jersey. Maybe the best way to sort it out is to just go play again.

Union 1, NYCFC 0: Well, at least someone had a nice weekend.

Great accomplishment for the Union in Bradley Carnell’s first season. And unlike three years ago, if they make it to the MLS Cup Final, it will be played in Chester. Regardless of what happens, the Union will not play a road game in the playoffs. Incredible accomplishment for a team that was 27th in MLS’ preseason power rankings.

Jesús Luzardo vs. Blake Snell (6:08 p.m., TBS). Need, need, need to run deep counts against Snell, it can very much be done. And hopefully Harrison Bader is good to go.

Your tentative Monday schedule at ​PHLY​:

Let's make it a good one.

Rich Hofmann
Daily Newsletter Editor
PHLY SPORTS