The Phillies offense jumped all over Manny Parra and the Brewers tonight, coming away with a 7-3 victory and moving up to 2 games back in both the Wild Card standings and the NL East. The Mets lost to the Braves tonight to help them out. As for the Phillies, poor Parra lasted only 1 1/3 innings after the offense jumped to a 3 run lead in the first inning. 
Jimmy Rollins led the charge with 3 hits and 3 RBI in the game, coming a triple short of the cycle. Chase Utley did his part with 2 hits and one RBI and Jayson Werth was on base 3 times with 1 hit and 2 walks. With the top three in the line-up performing like this, it becomes much easier to win games.
Cole Hamels collected win #13, pitching 6 1/3 innings and giving up 2 earned runs on 6 hits and 3 walks. Chad Durbin ran into trouble again in the 8th inning as he gave up a home run to Ryan Braun. After that though, he managed to get through most of the inning until JC Romero could come in to close it out. Brad Lidge came in for the 9th in a non-save situation and everyone watching took a deep breath and held it… He has generally not been great in those situations, but to our collective relief, he got through the inning without incident.
The only concern after tonight is that Pat Burrell has still not snapped out of this funk he is in. The Phillies are going to need him if they are to make a run for the playoffs so I sure hope he finds his swing VERY soon…
Tomorrow is a day / night doubleheader, as yesterdays’ game was cancelled due to rain. Joe Blanton will pitch the first game and I really hope he is able to channel the spirit of Cy Young. Maybe someone ought to run out and buy an Ouija board…have a séance before the game or something. Blanton just cannot afford another bad outing. Brett Myers gets the 2nd game at 7:35pm…the rain delay may have been a good thing for Myers, who was going to pitch yesterday on only 3 days rest. Now he should be at full speed with the extra day. 2 games back, 2 games tomorrow…opportunity knocks. Hopefully, the Phillies are listening.
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