Marlins Idle Their Way Back To Wildcard Tie

Thank those Phillies, you last half-dozen Marlin fans with hopes of postseason prayers being answered. Of course, it took the Marlins having the night off and not having the chance to lose another game themselves to make it happen, but since the Phillies and my least favorite pitcher got hammered in Montreal last night by a 12-1 margin, the Marlins are tied for the NL Wildcard once again. New life. Fresh start. Even the Expos have pulled to within three games of the NL Wildcard lead. Can the Mets be far behind?

The Phillies meanwhile, not only dropped to 1-6 on this four-city, 13-game road trip and have lost 12 in their previous 15 road games, but are now a sizzling 10-12 for the month of August. Since the All-Star break, they are 18-20 and if you subtract that aberration of a five game winning streak which concluded a week ago, you have to scratch your head and wonder how the Phillies have managed to stay in the wild card hunt at all. Sure, other than Pat Burrell, they can hit. But they led the league in runners left on base with 998. Their pitching is ranked 11th in the NL since the All-Star break. Here's what ugly looks like:

Kevin Millwood 2-3 4.32 ERA
Randy Wolf 2-5 6.60 ERA
Vincent Padilla 3-1 4.12 ERA
Brett Meyers 3-1 4.57 ERA
B. Duckworth 1-4 5.68 ERA

That's the starting rotation's numbers since the All-Star break.

Unfortunately, these stats do not incorporate a very significant factor in analyzing umpire Jim Wolf's games and that is, How Does The Game Effect The Phillies Phactor" His brother Randy could have used the help last night. Wolf suffered the worst start of his major-league career. In just 1 2/3 innings, he allowed nine runs, six hits and four walks and also hit a batter. It supports a growing trend: In his last six starts, he is 1-4 with a 9.30 ERA. In 30 innings, he has allowed 37 hits, 33 runs, 31 earned runs and 18 walks, with 25 strikeouts.

The already-apocryphal future of the Phillies rotation took a blow when the Atlanta Journal-Constitution wrote Sunday that Millwood "has reportedly confided to friends he does not wish to return to the Phillies." That would be consistent with some recent clubhouse rumblings that have indicated Millwood will be tough for the Phillies to re-sign. Maybe not having Larry Bowa yank him out of the middle of a 3-2 game, like he did the other night in Milwaukee, would have helped. Too late now. Mets fans can continue the silly dream that they will outbid George Steinbrenner for Millwood's services next season.

As for the Marlins, they will start another push, this time through Pittsburgh which should be infinitely easier than pushing through Colorado and San Francisco. Through Saturday, the Marlins were 4-20 in their past four trips to Colorado and San Francisco. Mike Lowell is 1-for-20 with two RBIs on the road trip, while Ivan Rodriguez is 5-for-18 (.278) with no runs batted in.

Here's my favorite quote from the weekend: "I'm here now to provide depth to the pitching staff," said pitcher Rick Helling, signed this weekend by the Marlins, who was 7-8 (5.71 ERA) with the Orioles before being released. "Depth to the pitching staff" is code for I suck but instead of wasting a good arm on a few innings of work in meaningless games, there's always me.

Who's Your Bitch Now?

A little over a year after coughing up a huge first place lead to the Oakland A's, the Seattle Mariners are at it again. Last night's 8-6 victory over the Toronto Blue Jays combined with a despondant 8-1 loss of Seattle to Boston as Pedro the Lion won his 12th consecutive victory over Seattle, has evened an AL West race that once seemed just about over. Hey, we all thought after Mulder went down that the A's were toast for the season but all of the sudden, they've learned how to hit. The A's have scored 36 runs in the last three games. Miquel Tejada went 15-for-31 as Oakland went 5-2 on a trip to Boston and Toronto.

The biggest disappointment regarding the Mariners getting swept by the Red Sox is that they were never really in any of the games enough to allow us to see another big Meltdown by Armandogeddon. Sure, there were a few nailbiters, but Armando has been kept from any meaningful outings since manager Bob Melvin pulled him out of the fire in a game against the Red Sox last week when he almost blew a 9-4 lead on his own. Perhaps now we can say it is perhaps poetic justice that a choke-artist closer has been remanded to a choke-artist team and let it stew there for awhile.

The Mariners rotation is 3-9, with a 6.40 earned-run average in their last 15 games. They've got plenty of closers but no starters who can keep them in the game long enough to matter.

Here's another nugget for those Seattle Mariners who demanded a king's ransom from the Mets to get their man as manager, Lou Piniella. Since July 3rd, Piniella's Devil Rays, whom the Mariners face next, have gone 24-23 while the Mariners have gone 22-25. Even the Mets are 13-6 over the last three weeks.

But it's important to remember that these are pennant races and pennant races, like wildcard races, are going to have still more ups and downs, lowest of lows and highest of highs. Just a week ago, Red Sox fans were suicidal and now the Mariners have a turn at trying not to panic. The only thing predictable, as they say, is that things will be unpredictable. Who would have thought last week that there would be a three-way tie for the AL Wildcard? So take heart Mariners fans. After all, you could have the burden of being a Cub or a White Sox fan.

Matchups I Don't Want To Miss

Esteban Loiaza takes his career-high 16 victories and his career-high 149 strikeouts to face the old master Roger Clemens. Over the last three years, Loiaza is 5-3 with a 3.96 ERA in eight starts against the Yankees tonight. Clemens, on the other hand, is pitching against the White Sox for the 39th time in his career and is 20-10 with a 2.83 ERA in his career against the White Sox.

Can Brian Anderson jump right in an replace Kevin Appier for the Royals? After being acquired in a trade with Cleveland Monday, Anderson will go right to work for the Royals. He is 1-1 with an 0.81 earned run average in his last three starts for the Indians. He has a 2.87 ERA over his last 15 starts.

Mark Prior is 4-0 with a 0.58 ERA in four starts since coming off the disabled list. His next victims are the St. Louis Cardinals in a see-saw, three-way battle for first place in the NL Central while Houston will face the Dodgers.