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103 miles per hour, with that movement.

And that is his second-best pitch!

Not a perfect series for the Phillies this weekend at The Bank against Detroit…

All that said, a very nice series win over the very good Detroit Tigers for the Phillies this weekend. As I alluded to above, Jhoan Duran was the common denominator with a couple of saves.

Rob Thomson had a legitimately interesting decision on Sunday night. With a two-run lead after the 38th Schwarbomb of the season (and another one off a lefty), Topper could have sent The Incredible Cris Sánchez (that is his full name, until further notice) out for the ninth inning. Sanchy had thrown eight scoreless, and was sitting at just 84 pitches. My guess is that Sanchy would have finished the game, too.

But unlike two weeks ago, when Topper sent Sánchez out for the ninth inning against Boston, he had this coming out of the ‘pen.

103? What the hell?! Duran went at the Tigers with two different game-plans this weekend, but the common denominator was 🔥. We did not see any of that reported breaking stuff, I assume he still knows how to throw it. 16 pitches all weekend, and the slowest one went 97 miles per hour.

Duran is here to get outs in October, but like Cliff Lee and other major trade deadline acquisitions before him, the man has injected some fresh energy into this ball club in August. The man has juice. And largely because of Duran, The Bank was absolutely rocking this weekend, the type of weekend that made you wonder what October might be like.

The revolving door of receivers: We got some fake football this week! With that in mind, now let’s talk about two guys who never are gonna see the field on Thursday against Cincy, not in a million years.

DeVonta Smith has missed the better part of the past week, but he was back at practice on Sunday. But A.J. Brown missed Sunday’s practice with a hamstring injury. On a positive note, Drew Mukuba was back at practice on Sunday and getting those critical on-field reps.

The passing game was much improved on Sunday, after a defense-dominated camp. From Zach’s practice notes:

I was pretty pumped to hear Fran say that Jalyx Hunt looks more “heavy-handed.” Gonna be important for the former safety to develop some power-rush moves to complement his athleticism.

Micah Parsons’ trade request: When it comes to the best players in the NFC East, that is two thus far, shooter. If you want to listen to the DLLS Cowboys Show for some schadenfreude, it is here.

I have written a bunch about how the Eagles do business (proactive with star players, pay cash up front, maintain good relationships with star players, get ahead of the market) and how the Cowboys do literally the exact opposite (wait until the last possible minute, pay as they go, alienate their star players, get no discount at all).

Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!

The Cowboys seemed to be under the impression that they had struck a deal talking with Parsons alone, but he wanted to run it by his agent. And they are mad… because he wanted to run it by his agent? Of course he wants to run it by his agent, that is why he has one! Mickey Mouse stuff.

Think about this: Dallas absolutely nailed two first-round picks in a row, with CeeDee Lamb (2020) and then Parsons (2021). And yet, the Cowboys have failed to build a consistent winner around those picks and also alienated them during contract negotiations. My question is, what happens when they stop drafting well?

And if this is actually how Jerry Jones thinks, man, Eagles fans are so fortunate.

Eric Allen: The former Eagles cornerback, who has some super fun highlights, got himself a bust in Canton this weekend. Love to see that the fellow members of Gang Green were there to support him.

Jhoan Duran, grand opening: I know I already talked about Sunday, but how about we talk some about Friday?

Best moment of the season? Best moment of the season.

It feels like baseball has done a nice job of modernizing itself in a bunch of ways over the past decade. The elaborate closer entrances are a great example. That is a lot of fun! Credit to the Phillies for being ready to go immediately on Friday night, which involved a ton of teamwork with the Twins and a high level of commitment by the NBC Sports Philadelphia broadcast crew. All class from Minnesota’s side.

So, when the Phils battled back against the Tigers to take a one-run lead in the bottom of the eighth inning, the camera was right there on the bullpen to capture the moment. Dan Baker announced Duran, who took over Rob Thomson’s number (I did not know Topper had a number?), and the crowd went nuts.

Phenomenal moment.

J-Roll and Ed Wade: Star-studded night at the ballpark on Friday. Jhoan Duran made his debut, Superman (a local guy!) was in the house, and Jimmy Rollins and Ed Wade were inducted to the Phillies Wall of Fame.

I do not think we need to go too deep on J-Roll, whose place in Phillies history is more than secure. We do not need the Wall of Fame to remind us of all the great things that Jimmy Rollins did as a Philadelphia Phillie. Legend.

Ed Wade is kinda interesting, though. I remember how much people wanted him gone in 2004 and 2005, and I remember Fire Ed Wade dot com. It was A Thing. And look, the Phillies clearly did something right by bringing in Pat Gillick. That was the guy you were supposed to bring in to get your team over the top, the previous generation’s Dave Dombrowski. Gillick did just that, no argument there.

But a lot of the Phillies’ success from 2007 to 2011 was simply due to the core group of players that Ed Wade drafted/acquired maturing and finally being ready to win big…

Among those players, only Pat the Bat was a super-high draft pick. Chase and Cole were both selected in the middle of the first round, plenty of other teams had shots at picking them. Wade and Mike Arbuckle did some serious work during those years, and then Gillick put the finishing touches on it (Jayson Werth, Brad Lidge, Pedro Feliz, Joe Blanton, etc.). Congrats to Wade for being recognized. Well-deserved.

Important week in Lehigh Valley: Three guys there worth checking out…

Mets fan: So, I was watching SportsCenter last night after the Phils won on Sunday Night Baseball. They showed the Mets getting throttled by San Francisco, which was cool. It feels like the Mets and Phils are gonna be on the see-saw a bunch these next two months.

That is not why I am mentioning the Mets here. I am mentioning the Mets here because I am obsessed with this Mets fan going nuts after catching a three-run homer from Raffy Devers. Whooping it up like I have never seen before. Pumping his fist, leaving his feet to jump up in the air, etc. After his team gave up a three-run bomb.

It was a nice catch, and getting a home-run ball must be really cool. But this guy reacted like I did after Bryce Harper homered off Robert Suarez… as his team just went down by three runs. It is such a wild move that I respect the hell out of it.

Joel Embiid, seamhead: At the game, Phillies hat on, talking shop with the players.

I wrote about this a few weeks ago, but I truly think JoJo might be able to define what a “splinker” is. My guess is that he will be participating in an NL-only keeper league within the next year, if he is not already. The man turned 30 years old and he found baseball.

On the court, it is cool to see that a lot of the young guys (who might get the bulk of the minutes this season, for all we know) are already working out together in Camden. Maxey held his basketball camp in the area over the weekend. I think that is a nice thing that a lot of professional athletes do, holding camps and clinics for kids. Saquon Barkley and A.J. Brown did the same over the past month.

VJ, faring well: Over at ESPN, Jeremy Woo polled a bunch of scouts and execs about the 2025 draft class. To the following question — Which rookie, other than Flagg, will prove to be the draft's best pick? — the No. 1 answer was none other than VJ Edgecombe with ten votes.

I am a little bit surprised by VJ edging out Dylan Harper, especially since Harper was the consensus second-best player in the NBA Draft. Perhaps this small group of basketball people just liked what VJ was able to do in summer league? Anyway, not a bad place to be if you are the Sixers.

Union 2, Eintracht Frankfurt 2: So, why were the Union playing a friendly against a Bundesliga team? A few reasons…

Frankfurt joined the likes of Florence, Tel-Aviv, Incheon and Douala (Cameroon, but not where Joel is from) as a sister city. And the game ended up as a draw, with another local kid (Chris Donovan) notching a late equalizer.

The Phillies are taking on Baltimore, a team that is having one of the most disappointing seasons I can remember in recent years in any sport. Two years ago, the Orioles won 101 games with a young roster and had what was unanimously considered the best farm system in baseball. Now? They are ten games under .500, dead last in the AL East and have an average farm system. Man, life comes at you fast. Seriously, at least the Sixers had real injuries this past year.

The O’s have a bunch of problems, but none more than their starting pitching. Cade Povich takes the ball against Jesús Luzardo tonight (6:45 p.m., NBC Sports Philly). Wonder if he is related to Maury and Shirley?

Big, big week of Eagles shows ahead. Your tentative Monday schedule at ​PHLY​:

Let's make it a good one.

Rich Hofmann
Daily Newsletter Editor
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