The Phightin Phils

We’re all basking in the Phillies three game sweep of the Braves and the Mets’ 3 losses to the Padres.

My friend PK takes stock of the Phightin’s:

The bullpen is the story of the year, I think. The offense is beginning to get where it was last year, now that J-Roll is back and Howard is heating up.

But the bullpen is unreal. Flash has actually settled down, Romero is just ridiculous against lefties and Madsen and the others have been great at keeping the team in the game if the starter only goes 4, 5 or 6 innings, which is all you can ask of the guys in the lower end of the 'pen. Throw in Lidge's absolute dominance, and it's scary.

Remember, from '96 threw '00, when they won 4 rings, the key to the Yanks was their absolute shutdown bullpen combined with clutch hitting. Their lineup then -- the one that won those World Series rings -- wasn't that brutal. It was just a very solid lineup that knew how to get the clutch hit, not just Jeter, but also O'Neil, Brosius, Leyard, Posada. (Remember, the '98 Yanks, which won 125 games, didn't have a single starter in the All Star game.)

But they had a shut-down 'pen, which meant that as long as the starter gave them 6 innings in the playoffs, then Lloyd, Nelson, Rivera were gonna kill the other team's hitters, and gave their bats the chance to win it.

That's what the Phillies 'pen is doing right now. Bad sports analogy coming here, but great middle relievers are like great shutdown corners. When they really do their jobs well, you don't even notice them in the game. Oh well, la di da, it's the 6th and 7th inning and the opponents just went down in order, 1-2-3, 1-2-3, that's nice, ho hum. Or, when a corner is really on, you don't even notice it because the opposing offense doesn't even try to throw to that guy's cover.

Yet they're invaluable come playoff crunch time. God, I hope these guys can stay healthy.

BTW, I feel an Utley SI cover coming very soon, once the NBA championships are over.