👋 Good morning! CeeDee Lamb, you just got JACKED UP!

To add insult to injury, Lamb was called for a penalty on the play. Good call, that white paint belongs to the official. Major fail by the Cowboys’ get-back coach.

One other crazy thing from the weekend’s preseason games: Jags kicker Cam Little booted a 70-yard field goal that looked like it had a few more yards to spare. Remember when Lane Kiffin sent out Sebastian Janikowski for a 76-yarder and the ball was caught at the 4-yard line? This dude would have been pretty darn close from that distance! Modern kickers are so good.

Today’s newsletter is brought to you by Righteous Felon Craft Jerky.

This Chester County based company has the perfect snack that satisfies your hunger and provides the right amount of protein to fulfill your body’s daily needs, and they have been doing it for over a decade. if you are the kind of person who wants a deal and snacks delivered right to your doorstep, you can order online using discount code PHLY20 for 20% off. Righteous Felon has all kinds of cool variety packs and bundles on the site.

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

Remember when I called Globe Life Field a house of horrors?

Well, after three straight days of BTA from the visitors, The Official New Narrative is that the Philadelphia Phillies have won six consecutive games against the Texas Rangers. Those guys can’t beat us! Not the first time I am gonna eat my words in this section.

All kidding aside, this is probably the best I have felt about the Phillies all season. That is good, because the best I felt about the Phils last season was also when they swept the Rangers… in late May, and then it was mostly downhill from there. They just feel like a more well-rounded baseball team right now, for a few reasons we will get into. And after every one of the Phillies’ five wins this week (plus their one loss, for the sake of completeness), I glanced at the out-of-town scoreboard and saw what, Max?

For most of this season, the Phillies have rode their one massive strength to a competitive record: Their starting rotation has been the best in baseball. Forget ERA for a minute. As Tyler mentioned on Friday’s Phillies pod, the Phils’ starters lead all of baseball in innings pitched and strikeouts by a mile.

That elite starting rotation is a great foundation, although after this weekend, that foundation appears a bit more wobbly. But to compete for a World Series, you also gotta be good at other stuff. You gotta be able to win in other ways. The good news? The other three phases are all improving over the past few weeks.

Offense: Two things in particular we are loving that we are seeing…

In the 21 games since the All-Star break, the Phillies have the second-most homers (39) and third-highest slugging percentage (.482) in MLB. Kyle Schwarber gets the lion’s share of the credit, but he has been destroying baseballs all season. But how about Brandon Marsh going 4-5 on Friday with three extra-base hits and a homer? Whatever Marsh did from April 16th to May 3rd was the greatest rehab in the history of rehabs.

But it is not just Marsh. Bryson Stott, a wildly disappointing hitter for most of this season, has an .883 OPS post-ASB. Stotty — FYI: You get to be called “Stotty” when you are swinging the bat well — had five hits and a couple of doubles this weekend. Max Kepler, who I absolutely, positively never doubted, has four hits (two doubles, one homer) in his last three games. Add in J.T. Realmuto (excellent July), Edmundo Sosa (homer off Patrick Corbin) and Harrison Bader (trade deadline acquisition) and Rob Thomson is finally getting some real production from the bottom of the lineup. 7 through 9 is not a wasteland right now. Feels good.

Realistically, the Phillies are gonna need the Schwarbers and Harpers to carry them for stretches to make a deep playoff run. But if the bottom of the order at least proves capable, if it does not stink, it makes them that much more dangerous.

Defense: At the trade deadline, I was worried about the offense. I wanted Eugenio Suárez, whose presence would have forced the Phils to rearrange the puzzle pieces on defense. That part would not have been pretty.

The Phillies instead went with Harrison Bader, who is not nearly the hitter that Suárez is. But he is a much better defensive player, at a premium position and a position of need to boot. Ask poor Corey Seager.

Let’s say the Phillies try Bader and Marsh as everyday players. In that set-up, they are above-average defensively in both center and left field. They have The World’s Slowest Man in right, but whatever. Alec Bohm has turned himself into at least an average third baseman, someone who does not take anything off the table. Trea Turner has been a well above-average shortstop by the numbers this year, even if I always have my guard up with him. He made a great play in the ninth inning yesterday. Stotty has been borderline elite at second all season, while Bryce is at least an adequate first baseman. Behind the plate, J.T. is not very good at pitch framing but he is very good at managing a pitching staff and throwing runners out. We saw that on Saturday night, as he helped Jesús Luzardo navigate some traffic on the bases.

Did somebody say “Luzardo?”

My long-winded point: Outside of Nick Castellanos, this has the makings of a pretty good defensive team! Stotty, in particular, made some incredible plays (one, two, three) over the last eight days.

Bullpen: The Phillies will have to make some tougher decisions soon. David Robertson joined the big club on Sunday, which means that Alan Rangel was sent down. That one was easy, but Aaron Nola and Jose Alvarado are both about a week away from returning. Assuming Taijuan Walker sticks around, that means two of these three gotta go: Max Lazar, Jordan Romano, Joe Ross.

Maybe just one, actually. Lazar is the best pitcher of the three, but he has minor-league options available. The Phillies could send him down for Alvarado on August 19th and bring him back when they are allowed to roster an additional pitcher on September 1st. But one of Romano or Ross is probably gone.

The bullpen feels much better than it did a month ago, and that is mainly because of Jhoan Duran. Over the weekend, Duran picked up back-to-back saves. Despite no music and light show, he yet again looked impressive doing it. When Duran finally gave up a single hit, it was a jam shot blooped over Bryce’s head.

We finally got to see Duran’s off-speed arsenal this weekend. I was cackling at the put-away pitch against Former Phillie Joc Pederson. Here was the sequence: 101, 98 mph splinker, 101, 101… and then a wicked knuckle curveball at the bottom of the zone. All you could do was laugh like a maniac at how unfair that felt.

And speaking of Duran, you might want to check out the store today.

Yep, the Phils are playing good baseball. And man, breaking the curse at Jerry World and Globe Life in about a 10-month span?

EJ! EJ! EJ! I would normally give the bad news first, but since the good news is reporting on the bad news in this case, you gotta flip it around.

EJ Smith, formerly of the Inquirer, is PHLY’s newest Eagles reporter and co-host of the PHLY Eagles Podcast. Fantastic get by us (pats self on back). EJ is a dual threat, an excellent writer who has been on the Eagles beat for a while now. And he is also very adept at podcasting both about football and handing out some occasional life advice. Like his predecessor, EJ is an A+ person. And as a bonus, from what we saw at the Osprey’s, he is also a heckuva guitar player.

EJ will do great here, and he is already doing great. Speaking of that, sigh…

Landon Dickerson’s injury: The turnout for the open practice on Sunday night looked amazing. Everything was good vibes, well, until Landon Dickerson got hurt.

Here is the play, coming at you in -1080p.

At the time of this writing, there has been no word on Dickerson’s injury. At the time you might be reading this, you very well may know the full diagnosis. Let’s hope it is not a season-ender. But man, this is the worst.

I am reading C-list Twitter doctors (David Chao will not even chime in on that Zapruder-ass video), looking for hope in any little detail (“He walked off the field!” He was sitting in the front of the cart!”), but ultimately am waiting like everyone else for something more official. But this is a nightmare, because for the first time in a long time, the Eagles’ offensive line depth kinda stinks.

The starting five? Excellent. The guys behind them? Ehhhhhhhh. Our newest teammate pointed that out in his practice notes:

Remember when the Eagles lost Jason Peters and still won the Super Bowl? That was awesome! Remember last year when Jordan Mailata had to go on IR and Fred Johnson shut down Trey Hendrickson? Wonderful! Remember when the Eagles scored 55 points with Tyler Steen at left guard in the NFC Championship Game? Phenomenal!

Right now, I do not know who would step in for Dickerson. Kenyon Green has apparently been a non-factor at camp. Howie Roseman went off script the last few drafts, not selecting an offensive lineman in the first four rounds each time. The result was incredible, an all-time defense and a Super Bowl champion. Nobody is wishing Howie did anything different. But this is something the Eagles will have to work around, after not investing in the trenches like they usually have. As EJ pointed out, the lack of any competition for Steen was a red flag.

Dickerson has been a remarkably durable professional, after some serious injury issues in college that turned him from a first-round to second-round pick. But as much as you want to blame this development on a player’s injury history reverting to the mean, that video mostly looks like bad luck. A player stepping on his foot, which is how a lot of offensive line injuries happen. Sometimes a lineman is pass blocking and gets rolled up on from behind. It is very much the luck of the draw.

Let’s hope that Landon and the Eagles get some luck here. He is one of the best guards in the sport.

The only negative: The Phillies had a great weekend overall, no question about that. But that vaunted starting pitching did reveal a few concerns.

Zack Wheeler gutted through his Sunday start after giving up an early two-run homer, but he was not throwing all that hard (for him, anyway). Rob Thomson shut him down after just 83 pitches, which would normally be fighting words for Wheeler. Like, he would literally try to fight Topper. Not this time, though. Good to see.

But Wheeler told reporters that he felt good and was confident that his fastball velocity and command would return. Feels like the Phillies could pretty easily IL Wheeler and give that sore shoulder a break, inserting Aaron Nola into his spot for a few weeks. It sounds like that is not gonna happen, and who knows, maybe that is the right call.

I just wanted to feel reassured by Wheeler’s start. I am not reassured. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Down on the farm, Andrew Painter got absolutely shelled by the Yankees’ Triple-A team. Nine hits, two walks, two homers and seven earned runs. Yuck. His ERA is 5.42 on the season. I am probably too late to this, but Painter is likely not gonna factor into the Phillies’ plans this year. That is disappointing, and it clearly caught the organization off-guard. After all, Dave Dombrowski initially said “July-ish.”

You never know what someone will look like post-Tommy John, and at the very least, it is taking Painter a while to become an elite pitcher again. The Phillies need to get him doing whatever Mick Abel did last offseason.

Union 1, Toronto FC 1: Super nice build-up play here, but not great to only get a point against this team at home.

The good news? Nashville and CIncy, the two teams chasing the Union at the top of the Eastern Conference, both lost. So, the Union actually gained a little bit of ground. Missed opportunity to separate, though.

The Phils are in Cincy to take on the Reds (6:10 p.m., NBC Sports Philly), a team fighting for an NL wild-card spot. Primetime Tai against tough lefty Andrew Abbott.

Your tentative Monday schedule at ​PHLY​:

Let's make it a good one.

Rich Hofmann
Daily Newsletter Editor
PHLY SPORTS