Rest In Peace, Buck O'Neil

*****Buck O'Neil, 1911-2006*****

"This is not a sad story. It's a celebration!"

That is what Buck O'Neil would often say to people who would lament the fact that he and countless other baseball players, managers and officials were relegated to the Negro leagues in the segregated America of yore.

The same sentiment how should hold true as we say good-bye to Buck O'Neil, who died at age 94 Friday night.
Major league baseball and the world at large will say one last, loving farewell to Mr. O'Neil, the man who put the human face on an era and the leagues in which he played and managed.

Remembering O'Neil should be done in a way he would appreciate.

Honor the man who used an unending supply of grace to help a game and a nation come to terms with its disgrace of a past.

Emulate the man who never knew bitterness, self-pity or hate, but rather embraced this nation and its national pastime with all his heart and soul.

Allow the positive lesson to sink in that it is possible to find humanity in an institution, in a society despite both having kept countless Americans disenfranchised simply because of the color of their skin.

O'Neil, of a generation that saw the worse side of modern America's intolerance, found that humanity, and more. For that reason, alone, Buck O'Neil was right when he said he wasn't born too soon, but right on time.

Because while he was surely valued as a player, then longtime manager of the Kansas City Monarchs, O'Neil's greatest legacy will be how he proved to be the perfect interpreter of America's imperfect, painful past.

A walking, talking font of history, O'Neil put dimension, humanity and perspective into countless stories populated by the likes of Jackie Robinson, Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Bob Feller.

The pictures he painted of the players of the 20s, 30s, 40s and beyond, be they white or black, big or small, were vivid. And the recounting of their trials and tribulations were touching, funny, revealing.

Most important, Buck O'Neil's recounting of the era in which all the greats lived, on one side or the other of the color line, did more than illuminate. It showed how to come to terms with what had been.

For who could fume about such history in front of a man who lived it yet still projected nothing other than goodness and compassion, patience, faith and, above all, forgiveness?

Just this summer, O'Neil showed, again, the amazingly forgivng heart held in his then-frail frame.
For he watched as baseball welcomed its largest - and likely last - class of Negro League luminaries into the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown. While many in the baseball world were outraged and embarrassed that O'Neil was not allowed to join those 17 selected by a specially-appointed screening committee, O'Neil refused to fuel the fury.

Instead, he came to Cooperstown to welcome those bygone greats into a fraternity that never found a way to include him - much the way the game, itself, did not invite him in to play on the major-league stage.
By doing so, O'Neil showed once more a love of the game. And he used that love to coax an arguably unworthy sport through yet another pitifully awkward chapter.

No one who was there will ever forget that bright, sunny day in rustic New York when O'Neil showed us all how beautiful magnanimity can be.

"I want you to light this valley up today," said O'Neil told an enthralled audience of Hall of Famers, baseball execs, media and fans.

The audience did, especially when Buck O'Neil, part Southern black preacher, part performing artist, asked the audience to join hands and sing with him a repeated refrain:

"The greatest thing in the world is loving you."

Again and again, we all did sing. And how we loved the moment, and how we loved Buck O'Neil.
Hall of Famer? You'd better believe it, a million times over, forever and always, in heaven as he was on earth.

Repeat After A-Rod: "I sucked!"

"You kind of get tired of giving the other team credit. At some point you've got to look in the mirror and say, 'I sucked."

- Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez told the media after another terrible October ended with New York's elimination at the hands of the Detroit Tigers Saturday.

One week into the post-season, A-Rod can be comforted by not being at all alone in his disappointment.

Consider the following:

• The Los Angeles Dodgers, swept from the playoffs in three games by the New York Mets, extended their dry spell another year, having not won a postseason series since 1988.

• Dodgers manager Grady Little incredibly put himself in the middle of yet another postseason second-guess feeding frenzy with a handful of questionable moves, including using starting pitching as middle relievers and letting starter Greg Maddux bat in a game L.A. trailed, 3-0, in win-or-go-home Game 3.

• Joe Beimel, the Dodgers' indispensible lefthanded setup man, committed the inexcusable mistake of stepping out on the eve of the series against the Mets after curfew, then ending his season by slashing his pitching hand on a broken glass in a bar room. Beimel then lied to the team about where the injury occurred, angering teammates and Little once the deception was revealed. Undoubtedly that anger will fester long after the Dodgers pack up and head into the postseason, because Beimel's absence forced many of the awkward - and ultimately fruitless - moves made by the hamstrung Little.

• Good guy Torii Hunter made some critical flubs in the Minnesota Twins' shortlived ALDS series against the Oakland A's, most notably the ill-conceived decision to dive for a Mark Kotsay liner to center in Game 2. The Gold Glove centerfielder missed the ball and the resulting inside-the-park home run broke a tie that led to a backbreaker of a defeat for the Twins.

• Then there was A-Rod - 1-for-14 (.071) with no RBI in four games for the Yankees. The player who's opening foray into New York was to draw a distinction between himself and Derek Jeter - a "No. 2 hitter" - started the series batting sixth in the order and finished it batting eighth. None of Yankees manager Joe Torre's early attempts to ease the pressure from the high-priced Rodriguez and late attempts to hide a troubled bat worked. Tigers pitchers found the slumping A-Rod time and again. So, too, will the Bronx cheers, guaranteed to follow A-Rod into a long, restless off-season.

Paper Tigers No More

Jim Leyland hoisted from the ground by by his joyous Detroit Tigers team. MLB Photos

Start spreading the news. Motown mowed down Millionaire's Row, without mercy or apology.

That they did it without sneers or cockiness or disrespect should make it hard for the most disappointed New York Yankees fans to begrudge Jimmy Leyland or the young Tigers anything.

How could you not feel a tug for the grizzled manager who pulled himself off the slag heap to come back to the game and show a young team how to win? Or the impressionable youths who listened when he told them 100-loss seasons didn't have to be the norm?

Winning 95 regular-season games would have satisfied Motown. And settling for that would have fulfilled their part of what was scripted in a postseason test against the league's winningest team.

But the Tigers did not settle. Because they did not, the Tigers showed you just how much fun watching an underdog overcome can be, wearing the self-appointed label of "freshman team" but refusing to buy into the cynicism that they somehow did not belong on the same field as the mighty Bronx Bombers.

The Tigers culled a lot of karma from perceived slights.

Forced to explain their miserable crawl through a last two weeks of September time and again.

Forced to justify why they even bothered to show up to play the best team money can buy.

Forced to hotel hop in midtown Manhattan Wednesday night after a rainout delayed their getaway game.

In the end, though, there was nothing forced about the celebrating the Tigers did when they swept away the Yankees in the American League Division Series, 3 games to 1. Detroit reeled off three wins to seal the deal.

Three wins that came after the rainout and the communications snafu that went with it.

Three wins that came despite the fact that no one gave one-time Yankees washout Kenny Rogers an iota of a chance in Game 3, either against Hall of Fame certainty Randy Johnson or the Yankees' latest Murderers' Row lineup.

But Rogers and a host of young pitchers nearly young enough to be his sons stymied the vaunted Yankees' offense. They even made Derek Jeter look human after his five hits in the Yankees' Game 1 win. And they certainly made Alex Rodriguez and Gary Sheffield, among others, look nothing short of pathetic as the Detroit staff limited New York to six runs in the final three games.

Once the clinching was done, there came the final touches, vingettes that had to warm the most jaded down-on-pro sports Grinch.

Youngsters wearing the uniforms of Kaline and Greenberg, Trammell and Whitaker, Horton and McLain, carrying Leyland off the field on their sturdy shoulders.

Those same youngsters circling the field spritzing delirious fans with champagne.

Rogers hoisting his old bones up on the dugout at Tiger Stadium to do the same champagne celebration with fans.

Baseball purists couldn't have asked for a better ending to this big-market, small-market dance. And Hollywood couldn't have topped the ending. It was downright Capra-esque.

Next Blue Light Special: A-Rod?

With every hitless post-season at-bat, Alex Rodriguez comes closer to having a million dollar question answered.

Well, actually a $16 million-dollar question, as in how much of A-Rod's $16 million-a-year salary will Yankees owner George Steinbrenner be willing to eat in order to make the third baseman go away?

Now, most fans believe A-Rod could and would shore up most any lineup with sheer namepower alone. Bet Phillies fans would sell their souls to see the bat that produced 35 home runs and 121 RBIs this season nestled in behind Ryan Howard in batting order.

The perception sometimes kicks reality's butt. And the perception of A-Rod in the five boroughs of New York is that this player cannot protect a teammate in a lineup when he can't protect his own psyche from the yips. New York City is rough, but not that rough. Yet A-Rod's torment often has reduced him to a figure whose contitution seems no more sturdy than a wet noodle.

Steinbrenner could gag , eating all that crow and cash, but, really, will the Yankees have any choice but to move the game's version of Captain Queeg? The drumbeat among Yankees fans has already begun. A 1-for-11 start with four strikeouts assured that in the Yankees' first three games against the Detroit Tigers in the shock of an American League Division Series. So, too, did two Yankees' losses in the series' three games.

One more loss, one more early exit from a postseason they were supposed to dominate and the Yankees will likely not be merciful, expecially to the player fans in the Bronx never shy away from vilifying, anyway. So don't be surprised to see the Yankees concede the day and see if there is another easy touch, I mean team, willing to take on a Psychology 101 project.

Then the only question will be, how much will Steinbrenner pay to get A-Rod out of town? The bet here says that the amount the Boss will agree to swallow goes up exponentially with each failed October at-bat by A-Rod.

The Boss, of course, bit off a big chunk of lettuce when the Yankees acquired Rodriguez from the Texas Rangers in February 2002 return for Alfonso Soriano and a promise to absorb $112 million of the $179 million still owed on what was originally a 10-year, $252 million pact A-Rod signed with Texas in 2000.

That's an average of $16 million a year - $1 million more than the entire Florida Marlins team earned this season. And the Yankees will be funneling money A-Rod's way until 2025 - an IOU that likely won't go away easy, even should A-Rod wind up playing for another team.

Koufax to Cueller to ...Kuo? Oh, My!

Mets manager Willie Randolph was asked yesterday if he had yet announced his Games 3 and 4 starters for the National League Division Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

"No, not yet. Not yet."

Once upon a time such questions didn't even need to be asked. Then, again, once upon a time, teams in the postseason probably had starting rotations that went deeper than the obvious candidates for, well, Game 1.

That is no longer the case. Not when manager after manager got into the postseason only to find themselves with starting staffs still works in progress.

At least that's what you have to assume the playoff rotations were, looking at some of the pitchers toe-ing the mound during this, the most important games to date in their team's 2006 campaigns.

Blame it on injuries, youth movements or a general lack of depth throughout major-league pitching, but not one of the eight rotations toiling in the postseason will be confused with the Baltimore Orioles 1971 rotation members (pictured above) who entered the postseason with 20 or more victories each.

Jim Palmer-Dave McNally-Mike Cuellar-Pat Dobson?

Sandy Koufax-Don Drysdale-Claude Osteen-Don Sutton?

Greg Maddux-Tom Glavine-John Smoltz-Steve Avery?

Try these guys on for size: Tuesday, Boof Bonser, a rookie who spent part of the season in the minors and was 7-6 with a 4.22 ERA in the bigs this season, was sent to the mound by a Minnesota Twins team needing a victory to even their ALDS series against the Oakland A's.

Later that day, another rookie John Maine (6-5, 3.60), was the Mets' Game 1 starter, against L.A.

Today, St. Louis' starter in Game 2 of its NLDS clash with San Diego was Jeff Weaver - 3-10 (6.29) with the Angels, 5-4 (5.19) with the Cards (Weaver and four relievers, including three rookies, shut out the punchless Padres, 2-0).

And finally, last night the Dodgers, down 0-1 in the best of five series against New York, sent Hong-Chih Kuo - 1-5, 4.22 - to the mound. Kuo has one big-league victory to his name, it coming on Sept. 8 at Shea against the Mets in his first major-league start.

Kuo's mound opponent? Glavine, who's started almost as many postseason games (33) as Kuo has major-league appearances (38, counting the Game 2 start).

Minorities Top Endangered List. Again

What do these three men have in common?

Well, here goes:

Cito Gaston, Dusty Baker and Don Baylor (left to right) all took teams into the postseason.

Gaston managed two World Series teams in Toronto - and won both times. For those counting, that's one more world championship than won by Tony La Russa. One more than won by Hall of Famer Earl Weaver, as well. And it is the same number won by Tommy Lasorda, yet another Hall of Fame manager.

Baker - a three-time manager of the year, led the San Francisco Giants to the seventh and final game of the 2002 World Series before losing to the California Angels.

Baylor, in perhaps the greatest of these feats, took the expansion Colorado Rockies to the playoffs via a wild-card berth in the team's third year of existance - a major-league record for fastest advancement to postseason play by a new franchise. That garnered him manager of the year honors.

What these three men also have in common are these two things: Not one is currently is managing in the major leagues. And, as such, each is a member of baseball's most endangered species: minorities in managerial positions.

This wouldn't be such a sensitive subject were it not for the Black Monday witnessed in baseball this week. For Monday - the day following the end of the regular-season - saw all but two of the black or Hispanic managers who began the 2006 season ousted.

Frank Robinson, fired by the Washington Nationals.

Baker, fired by the Cubs.

Felipe Alou, fired by the San Francisco Giants.

Willie Randolph? The New York Mets skipper is baseball's last man - of color - standing.

Ozzie Guillen held on to his perch with the Chicago White Sox.

The ranks of Hispanic managers did grow when the Marlins replaced Joe Girardi with Fredi Gonzalez Monday.

Robinson and Alou, both 71, realistically won't put uniforms on, again. Both want to remain in baseball, however, and deserve opportunities to move into front office positions somewhere.

Baker, like Baylor, very much wants to manage again. Immediately.

Still, if baseball trends hold to form, Baker, like most minorities, will go to the "back of the bus," figuratively speaking, despite being a three-time manager of the year. After all, who would are deny that the revolving door through which displaced managers return to the ranks of the employed just flatout spins more slowly men of color than it does others?

Slower, as in galacial. Or, in the case of, say, Gaston, Baylor and Jerry Manuel - another one-time manager of the year who never got another shot - not at all.

Gaston, unlike many a manager with not one World Series ring, was never invited to skipper manage another team after being fired by the Blue Jays in 1997.

Jimy Williams, the man Gaston replaced in Toronto in the 1989 season, has been hired twice by teams since Gaston was fired. Williams has yet to reach the World Series.

Meanwhile, names of former managers like Lou Piniella, Bob Brenly and, alas, Girardi are already said to be hot candidates in places like San Francisco, Chicago, Washington and Texas. For those keeping score, only Piniella has won a Series ring as manager.

Where's the justice? Where's the outrage? Commissioner Selig? Anyone in authority?

At least, where's the buzz? Something to suggest that some or all of these very qualified veteran managers are being considered anywhere that currently has bench jobs to fill? For if they have no hope of breaking back into this exclusive club, what will the game tell the hopefuls named Cecil Cooper, Terry Pendleton, etc.? Wait your turn, because there's room for only one at at time in the pipeline, again?

Time to step up, baseball. Make sure the hiring processes in Washington, Texas, Chicago, San Francisco and anywhere else a position may open up are truly fair. These men don't want guarantees, just opportunities to compete. Then they'll be happy to let their records, accomplishments and talents speak for themselves.

Glavine, Aging Like a Fine Wine

.Apparently it can be as easy as rolling out of bed.

At least for Tom Glavine.

The two-time Cy Young award winner the Phillies could have had four years ago if not out-bid by the New York Mets made his first post-season appearance since 2002 a thing of beauty tonight.

Glavine, starting Game 2 of the National League Division Series against Los Angeles, threw six innings of shutout ball at the baffled Dodgers.

Glavine, killing them softly with smarts and stealth, allowed only four hits - all but one of those singles. he walked two, and struck out two, a performance precise enough to hold off L.A. And when Mets closer Billy Wagner sealed the deal with a scoreless ninth, Glavine and the Mets had a 4-1 victory and a 2-0 lead in the best-of-five series.

"He's been doing that to hitters for a long time," Grady Little, the Dodgers manager, said of Glavine, owner of 290 regular-season victories. "This guy's an outstanding pitcher and a lof of hitters talk to themselves after they face him three or four times."

"He was superb, as usual," said Mets manager Willie Randolph. "He's a big-money pitcher, a big-game pitcher."

The Mets certainly welcomed the uneventful save by Wagner - his second. Wagner? He welcomed lessons taught by his friend. "It's frustrating," Wagner laughed, "because he does make it look that easy. I've never seen him when he's not poised."

Wagner, an admittedly an excitable type, marveled at Glavine, who showed a fellow vet something invaluable even on a shared ride into the stadium before the game. For it was Glavine who was both talkative and exciting, wild, said Wagner, "because I'm usually the blabbermouth.

"It was calming to see a vet really excited coming in," added Wagner. "And it makes me feel good because I don't feel like I'm the only person sitting there ready to puke. It to see him calm himself down and go out and pitch a great baseball game.

"It takes me back to when I watched him when I was growing up," Wagner added with a laugh.

For Glavine, his 33rd playoff start - and first as something other than an Atlanta Brave - produced a 13th win.

The 40-year-old lefthander who signed a free-agent contract with the Mets before the 2003 season, is now 4-3 in division series games, 5-9 in league championship series and 4-3 in World Series contests.

Glavine's post-season victory answered many questions. Yes, he could pick up his team with a healthy dose of veteran presence after the Mets had lost Pedro Martinez and Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez to injuries on the eve of the postseason.

And yes, Glavine showed, he could continue a strong kick in which he'd won five of six September decisions to complete a 15-7 regular-season. That campaign proved to be Glavine's best since 2002, when he was 18-11 in his final season in Atlanta. It was quite an accomplishment considering that just before Glavine's impressive stretch run, the pitcher received the scare of his career when coldness in his left finger led to the discovery of blood clots.

Medicine rather than surgery took care of the ailment, then Glavine - "the lefthanded Greg Maddux," teammate David Wright declared - took care of business from September on.

As special as the season was, the playoff victory was all that and more, said Glavine, becaue "I've waited a while to do it, gone through some tough times here in New York, personally. It's the kind of thing you try and persevere and find yourself in position which I obviously wanted to be in when I came to New York."

So all things, big and small, will be savored, Glavine promised, including Randolph's "Big game, Tommy salute" before a national media contingent in the post-game news conference (That means a lot to me.")

But, Glavine, as business-like as a Wall Street exec, reminded, "it's a lot less about what I have or haven't done in my career in the postseason and much more about now."

Because he did in the here-and-now everything his resume suggested he could, Glavine and the Mets are one win away from the League Championship Series. And Glavine is one argument closer to sealing his all-but airtight case for a plaque in Cooperstown.

Redemption, Detroit Tigers-style

Yes, the Detroit Tigers are young, almost devoid of postseason experience and certainly never to be confused with the Forbes 500-caliber millionaires employed by George Steinbrenner.

But, the freshman team vs. the varsity?

That certainly was the perception on the eve of the American League Division Series between the wild-card winning Tigers and the league's winningest team in the AL East champion Yankees.

Tigers manager Jim Leyland even joked about it - often enough to suggest that the constant references to a mismatch had become an issue, and a cause, among the Detroit contingent at Yankee Stadium the last few days.

Well, Detroit stunned one-half of baseball-mad New York into silence today when it evened the series at 1 game apiece. The Tigers did so, thanks to superb pitching by some of those inexperienced kids, most notably starter and rookie of the year candidate Justin Verlander (5 2/3 innings, three runs) and 100-mph, flamethrowing reliever Joel "Zoom-by-ya" Zumaya (1 1/2 innings, three strikeouts).

With the win in his pocket and egg on the face of some of the Tigers' harsher New York critics, Leyland started to show how much the chiding had registered.

"I'm sure we haven't convinced everybody, but I hope in my heart that everybody realizes that we are a playoff team. I hope that we at least proved that today. To do what we did with those kids pitching and the way we played the game, I hope at least everybody believes that we're worthy of being in the playoffs."

Wagner On the High Wire. Again.

It wasn't pretty but Billy Wagner put the first save of his postseason career in the books.

Brought in to a game led, 6-4 by the Mets in the ninth inning today at Shea Stadium, Wagner immediately gave up a leadoff double to the Dodgers' Wilson Betimit. The ex-Philles fireman then got pinchhitter Olmedo Saenz on a fly ball and Rafael Furcal on a swinging third strike.

The angst in Flushing jumped a notch moments later, though, when Wagner allowed an RBI double to another pinchhitter, Ramon Martinez.

Wagner ended the drama one batter later, however, when he struck out the dangerous Nomar Garciaparra, swinging, to end the game.

"You know, that's the life of a closer," Mets manager Willie Randolph said. "He's gone live on the edge a lot of times, but he's had a phenomenal year for us. It's nice to see him get the save for us."

Randolph also put credit where it was due. The Dodgers know that Wagner will always come at you, the manager said, "and they put some good swings on him."

Then there was the backdrop, with the always noisy she really rocking with anticipation of the Mets' first postseason victory since 2000.

"The music was [so] loud, almost deafening," Randolph said. "He gets into it. He feeds off his adrenalin. He's always that kind of guy who gets pumped in those situations. The key for him I to just kind of channel it."

Wagner eventually did just that, then, in a calm afterglow of the game, dissected his interesting trip to the save.

"You want to go out there, want to throw strikes and make them beat you," Wagner said, "but I threw a few festival's to bedmate that got away and he hit it a ton. At first I thought it was a popup, but the ball was carrying out to right ..."

Wagner then settled down, he said, "kind of collected himself. You just have to go out and make pitches. you can't worry about one run scoring, you can't worry about any of those little things. You have to go out there and get three outs before they get two runs."

He achieved that goal by setting up Garciaparra with a fastball, away - "the best pitch that inning," said Wagner. "Somehow he fouled it off, but it set him up for a slider, and the slider had tonight was the best I've had in a while."

"I thought he threw the ball really well," said Randolph. "Just made a couple pitches up in the zone where they drove the ball to right-center field. But he was able to get through it."

Major League, Take One

With apologies to Ron Howard and Tim Robbins, the two big-time movie directors who were in the house at Shea Stadium today, Hollywood had nothing on the Mets.

Not when a Shawn Green-to-Jose Valentin-to-Paul Lo Duca relay resulted in two Dodgers - two - being thrown out at home plate on the same play!

"I have never seen that before, other than Major League, The Movie," said Lo Duca, the former Dodgers catcher.

The Mets' 6-5 victory over L.A. in Game 1 of their National League Division Series was the final result of a long day's play. But the double play at the plate in a wacky postseason first was what brought the house down.

Lo Duca was the prime hero on the play, because of his double duty. After Russell Martin's single was brought back into the catcher on throws by Green and Valentin, Lo Duca tagged the lead runner, Jeff Kent, as he tried to score from second by sliding through the back-door.

Lo Duca then pirouetted in time to tag J.D. Drew - no Willie Mays Hayes, he - trying to slide in through the front door.

"That was crazy," said Green, who started a great play by adroitly fielding the ball hit off the wall in right, then making a pinpoint throw to Valentin. "I was kind of shocked when I threw the ball in. Valentin made a great relay. And I all of a sudden I saw the two guys going. I was just hoping Dukey saw them."

Lo Duca more felt the presence of Drew than saw him. After he tagged Kent, he was out of position, what with his back to the field. The catcher then said it was something in the way home plate umpire John Hirschbeck was looking past him that made him spin around just in time to get the diving Drew.

Lo Duca later realized his teammates had tried to warn him. "[John] Maine and David Wright were screaming at the top of their lungs, but I didn't hear either one of them," Lo Duca said.

"I was backing up," Maine, the pitcher, said. "I saw the relay coming in. I was like, OK, they got this guy. Then I was yelling at Lo Duca, 'Turn around! There's a guy right behind you!"

The play was so bizarre, it actually left ex-Phillies closer Billy Wagner speechless.

"It was really one of those unbelievable things," he said. "You really don't know what to think because you've never seen that happen. I haven't."

The Dodgers' reaction?

"We've been in L.A. all season; we certainly know about traffic jams. We had one there," Dodgers manager Grady Little said.

No Time to Lead With Your Heart

Mets manager Willie Randolph dearly wanted to get a victory for John Maine.

After all, the starter had done what had become routine all season - step into the breach for an injured front-line pitcher, this time fallen ace Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez (calf injury).

And Maine acquitted himself well enough early on in Game 1 of the NLDS against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Yet Randolph pulled Maine out of a 2-1 game the Mets led with two on and one out in the top of the fifth.

"I wanted to get six out of him, and definitely more than four. ... I wanted to hang in there a little bit with him," said Randolph. "But I always manage with my gut, and do what is right for the team.

"So when this guy over here [on his left shoulder] says, 'hey, it's good for his morale to get a win and he's really stepped up for you a lot,' then this other little knucklehead over here [pointing to his right shoulder] says 'hey, man, go by what you see and what you feel."

And what he felt was, Maine was done, having hit a familiar wall about the third time through the Dodgers' lineup.

So began the march of the relievers out of a well-rested bullpen. Pedro Feliciano (strikeout of Kenny Lofton) and Chad Bradford (Nomar Garciaparra groundout) ended the fifth.

L.A. would get three back in the seventh off of Guillermo Mota, tying it at 4. One more would come in against closer Billy Wagner in the ninth, but it was never enough to steal the lead, or the game eventually won by Mets' bullpen committee, 6-5.

Gold Standard, and Still Going Strong

Vin Scully, in his 57th season as an announcer for the Los Angeles Dodgers, returned to New York yesterday. And once, again, all the Hall of Famer needed do was speak to remind what national treasures both he and his golden pipes are.

Scully's presence makes the postseason complete. What better forum for one who's graced the booth not only during 18 no-hitters, but seven Dodger World Series?

Scully transcends time. He can paint the present-day game as eloquently as any voice on the air. And he can take you back, as he did yesterday when discussing the legendary 1951 playoff game between Brooklyn Dodgers' Ralph Branca and the New York Giants' Bobby Thomson.

Bedside reading prompted Scully's memories. He's currently devouring Echoing Green: The Untold Story of Bobby Thompson, Ralph Branca, and the Shot Heard Round the World, a new book by Joshua Prager.

"I knew those guys," said Scully of all the writers whose works Prager quoted.

Scully knows the story, too. He lived it that day Thomson's walkoff home run gave the game the moment forever known as The Shot Heard Round the World.

Yesterday he relived it as if it were, well, yesterday. And he described the outfield fence peephole where the Giants allegedly inserted a telescope to read opposition catchers' signals, the supporting players, from the electrician allegedly who rigged the crude, battery-operated relay signal system, you were there.

That's magic. That's Vin Scully.

A-Plus for Abreu In Game 1

They were but two of the Yankees' 14 hits, but few were bigger. So it was no wonder that Bobby Abreu could rightfully consider his first postseason game since 1997 nothing short of perfect.

The former Phillies all-star rightfielder showed a national TV audience why he's earned nothing but admiration from the Yankees since he arrived in a July 30.

Abreu went 2-for-5 and ignited a 5-run third inning with a two-run double, breaking up what had been a scoreless duel between Detroit's Nate Robertson and the Yankees' Chien-Ming Wang.

Abreu then used a two-run single in the sixth to add breathing room to what had become a 5-3 game. The Yankees never looked back, winning, 8-4.

"The last two [were] great because any time the other team starts scoring runs, the momentum slips over there," Yankees manager Joe Torre said. "He got it back to where it was comfortable for us."

Speaking of comfortable ...

"The team made me feel good over here," Abreu said. "After we clinched, I was so happy, going to October. just going to play in October. I came herr to New York and played my first game in the postseason - it's amazing.

"The New York Yankees - it's a very powerful name and you have to do whatever you have to do to represent that."

Jeter: One for the Ages

You cannot quantify the immense value, just appreciate it.

A decade after Derek Jeter began his historic postseason run with four hits in the 1996 American League division opener against Baltimore, he threw a 5-for-5 performance at the Detroit Tigers in Game 1 of the ALDS.

That performance, the lynchpin of an 8-4 Yankees' victory, tied a big-league record for hits in a postseason game, held by six. It also added to an undeniable legend, this quintessential performance by the quintessential clutch player.

For Jeter used two doubles, a home run and two singles to extend his own major-league records of most career postseason hits (147) and most DLS hits (64).

Jeter's big night came on the heels of a regular-season in which Jeter hit .345 during what was his fifth 200-hit season (another major-league record, for shortstops). It established once more that who the most valuable Yankee of 2006 is, and underscored the strong argument Jeter made for AL Mvp.

What pushes this special player to such a zone once October arrives?

"I think somewhat personality and his competitive drive," said Joe Torre, who, in 11 years, has reached the postseason every single season in large part because of the guy at shortstop. "You know, it's like this time of year, big games, whether we play Boston or games that are significant; not that he slacks off the other times. Look, he hit .340 this year.

"I guess the only way you characterize it for me, he doesn't go up there thinking negatively. He just doesn't. Failing doesn't scare him."

"You know, you're not always going to come through," said Jeter. "There's been plenty of times that I haven't. But when I'm in that situation, I feel as though I'm going to produce, or come up with a hit, or make a play."

He did tonight, turing a crucial doubleplay before the scoring started, then topping his offensive run with a crowd-pleasing eighth-inning homer.

It is these kinds of performances, and that special makeup that allows Jeter to continually put a damper on any contention that Alex Rodriguez is the best shortstop not playing the position for the Yankees. ARod might have the most talent stuffed in his body. All Derek Jeter does is win.

So, like the Ted Williams-Joe DiMaggio "who's best" debates of old, do you take the best athlete or the guy who just flatout finds a way to win? In the Jeter-ARod tug-of-war, there's no question which player wins.

Another thing: ESPN The Magazine was pretty provocative this week when its cover featured the Mets' Jose Reyes with a headline declaring the dazzling performer the best shortstop in New York.

Well, Reyes has got Jeter in terms of age. Jeter, though, long ago established himself as one for the ages. Reyes will have to wait for such accolades, at least until he can compare one World Series ring to Jeter's four.

Hurt's So Good

The Chicago White Sox threw Frank Thomas away like so much dirty laundry, much the way baseball threw away The Big Hurt's era when it ratcheted up its home-run love affair and turned its fancy to the chemically-induced.

Well, the two-time American League Mvp who was cast aside and demonized in his final days in Chicago, is finally is enjoying the last laugh, and new life with the Oakland A's.

The big man - and he's always been that, even before doctors and juicers pumped the biceps full of steroids - started his first playoff series in xx years by hitting two home runs off Minnesota Twins ace Johan Santana yesterday.

Because he did, the Oakland A's won the first game of an American League Division Series, on the road, 3-2.

Talk about dividends.

All the A's had guaranteed Thomas only $500,000 and a chance. He cashed in on both, using 39 home runs, 144 RBI and a bucketful of incentive clauses to gather in $3.1 million this season.

The man who once vied with Ken Griffey Jr. for title of most feared slugger in baseball - before Barry Bonds and Big Mac - healthy and happy, again, had restored his self-worth, and place in the game.

Now comes the gravy.

So, for those keeping score at home, it's Thomas 1, bloated home run kings 0.

And the White Sox? Not even in the game. Alas, they're home, watching the postseason on TV.

Now that hurts.

John Maine - and Pray for Rain?

Games were played, but the biggest news of the day had to be what happened in the Mets' off-day workout.

Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez - the would-be Game 1 starter today against the Dodgers - strained his right calf. The injury further muddied the pitching outlook for the National League's winningest team, which already must forge ahead after having lost Pedro Martinez.

That pitcher had shoulder surgery and is gone for eight months.

Already there has been speculation about whether Martinez's shoulder trouble resulted from his overcompensating for leg injuries in the second half of the season.

That will make the Mets' handling of El Duque (11-11, 4.66) all the more scrutinized, considering cautionary tales about pitchers hurting themselves all the more by allowing leg injuries to mess with arm delivery dates back to Dizzy Dean.

Before the Mets determine Hernandez's immediate future, they must concern themselves with their own. Should Hernandez miss his start against the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers, his replacement likely won't be Steve Trachsel (15-8, 4.97), who had to leave the team over the weekend for personal reasons.

So that future could now rest with John Maine (6-5, 3.60) - not exactly the hand the Mets envisioned holding the Game 1 mound against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Or their playoff aspirations, for that matter.

But Seriously, The Tigers Will Show Up

The American League Division Series between the Detroit Tigers and New York Yankees hadn't even started and already the guys not called baseball's greatest team had to answer the question:

Why even bother to show up?

Well, Jim Leyland?

Well, I told everybody, they have got Murderers' Row and then Cano. That's not a good feeling," the Tigers manager said, tongue-in-cheek, hours before Game 1 at Yankee Stadium.

But seriously, folks. ...

"I think a lot of people, for whatever reason, they have this as the Yankee varsity versus the scrimmage and freshman team. I don't feel that way.

"I always let my feelings be known, so I'm going to tell all of you: Those that said we lucked out and snuck in, I totally disagree with that. We won more games than only three teams in baseball. That's pretty good."

Piazza Thriving Under The Radar

Shhh!
Mike Piazza, Hall of Fame shoo-in, all-time catching great, has a little secret.
For the first time in his storied major-league career, the onetime marquee player of the mega-market Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Mets spent a season practically off the grid.
Moved to San Diego. Mellowed out. Went all Left Coast and low-key - and absolutely loved it.
"My whole career, I've had a big job and never shied away from it," said Phoenixville High's most celebrated baseball product. "I always enjoyed being the go-to guy. But this year it's been about being a pseudo-everyday player, and also a role player, and a mentor, working with young kids.
"And, you know what? It's been fun to play this way, to play under the radar."
As he spoke, a grin creased the face of baseball's all-time leader in home runs among catchers (398). And it illustrated just how happy the 38-year-old is to be where he is and who he is.
Who he is: a vital part of a Padres team that won the National League West. Where he is: in the NL division series opener today at home against the NL Central champion St. Louis Cardinals.
As Piazza spoke, he did so with the precocious air of a schoolboy, which is understandable since no matter where this postseason takes him, the 14-year vet will go not as an afterthought.
"He's done a great job with the staff and helped stabilize it," said Padres manager Bruce Bochy. "He gives us a veteran presence back there. Our pitchers have confidence throwing to him."
Value has come at the plate as well as behind it. Though 28-year-old Josh Bard (50 starts) and 25-year-old Rob Bowen (eight) were key backups, it was the old man who started 99 games and hit 22 of the troika's 34 home runs and accounted for 68 of its 121 RBIs. Piazza had not achieved such totals since 2002, when he hit 33 homers and drove in 98 runs for the Mets.
Piazza's home runs this season ranked second among National League catchers, after Atlanta's Brian McCann (24). On the Padres, he trailed only Adrian Gonzalez's 24, a number compiled in 156 games compared to Piazza's 126.
"Twenty-some home runs?" said pitcher David Wells. "His bat is huge."
What a difference a year makes. Last season, back East, questions about whether Piazza could still be the go-to guy became irrelevant. How to get him to just go away became more pertinent as baseball-crazed New York increasingly fixated on Piazza's age, injuries and eroding defensive and offensive capabilities.
The end of what had been a long love affair with a legend was poignant and, at times, painful. Remember the mercifully short-lived attempt to convert Piazza into a first baseman?
Piazza, bright, sensitive, accepted the inevitable. "I wanted to finish my career in New York; I loved the tradition, I loved the fans," Piazza said. "But it just didn't seem like it was going to work out. And I didn't want to be a burden."
Thrown onto the free-agent market, Piazza had his suitors, including the team he grew up watching from his father's field box at Veterans Stadium.
"The Phillies definitely showed interest, and it was definitely an option," Piazza said, "but at the end of the day, with [Mike] Lieberthal there, well, an $8 million catcher is not going to sit.
"I wasn't looking to be a starter, or a guarantee of games, but at that time there was just so much more flexibility in San Diego. Even Pat [Gillick, the Phillies' general manager] said maybe that would be the best option."
San Diego did have its selling points. Weather - 72 and sunny every day - the slew of quality pitchers, a talented roster. Then there was a sincerity as the Padres convinced Piazza they would treat him as a valued commodity.
"You don't want guarantees, but you do want a little bit of a blueprint of how you would fit in," the catcher said. "And it just felt right. There was just an energy there. It became more of a spiritual decision than a mechanical one."
The job was not full-time, but that comes with age, Wells said.
"As a veteran, you know when you are winding down, when you're going to face limited playing time," the pitcher said. "So when people ask: Is his arm as strong? The answer is simple. No one's is when you get older.
"So, you come out for defensive purposes. Your backups take some of the pressure off."
Still, make no mistake, said Wells. "Mike's definitely an impact player. It's all about winning and compiling knowledge, and he's done that. So we need him back there, because he's still that strong a presence."

Abreu Advances Where Phillies Cannot

NEW YORK - Bobby Abreu, gone but never to be forgotten, will forever be the itch Phillies fans cannot scratch.

The former Phillies rightfielder is headed for his first fully realized postseason, but not with the organization that groomed him into being an all-star.

Abreu may finally get his first sip of championship bubbly. But not with the franchise for which he wound up ranked in the top 10 in, among many categories, career extra-base hits, stolen bases, RBIs, runs scored and slugging percentage.

The team that traded him to the New York Yankees on July 30 fell just short of winning the National League wild-card berth.

"That's a tough one," Abreu said Saturday after learning that the Phillies had been eliminated on the next-to-last day of the regular season.

"I know those guys; they play hard. They go for it every day. And for this to be the second time it happened in a row, to get this close, then get eliminated, it's tough."

In a perfect world, Abreu believed, both he and the Phillies would have advanced and - who knows? - restaged the 1950 World Series.

Since that won't happen, he gladly will live with the alternative - returning to the playoffs for the first time since his rookie season in 1997, when he went 0 for 3 for Houston in the National League division series.

"Yeah," he said with a smile, "when they made the trade, they told me it was an opportunity for me to be in the playoffs. So I will take it."

And Phillies fans? Learning that the player they couldn't win with proved to be the player they also could not win without just provided another slice of unappetizing reality to chew on.

Especially since the 32-year-old Abreu turned out to be the last multimillion-dollar piece of the puzzle for the Yankees. Call it overkill, but he was the addition the well-heeled American League team apparently thought it needed to secure a tie for the majors' best regular-season record. And it worked.

Yet from the day Abreu was swapped along with pitcher Cory Lidle for four minor-leaguers, the Phillies appeared more than capable of living with the consequences. After all, they too enjoyed a rebirth after general manager Pat Gillick's series of trade-deadline moves transformed the team into a younger, swifter, more defensively sound version of its former self.

But the Phillies turned out to be wanting at the plate and on the mound just often enough to miss the postseason by a hair. Again.

For some, the reasons for failure 80 miles south of New York likely will include the player who so pleased yet puzzled fans before leaving Philadelphia.

"But," cautioned Larry Bowa, ex-Phillies manager-turned-Yankees third-base coach, "Bobby is not the reason the Phillies don't win.

"I was there with him for four years, and we came in second place three of the four - and it sure wasn't Bobby Abreu's fault."

Where does the fault fall on Pattison Avenue?

You know Bowa has his theories.

"The season is 162 games, and you have to have an attitude - from day one of spring training till the end - an attitude that never goes away," he said. "You don't just wait until August and say it's time to click it in. And it happened to me, too, but there's no way that team should have been under .500 earlier in the year."

Phillies obituaries aside, Abreu obviously changed the Yankees for the better. The question is, did the Phillies' only 30-30 man and one of its most prolific home-run hitters (197) change, too?

"Not at all," Bowa contended. "And his making the postseason is great because of the perception of him that he doesn't care. He does care."

Without a doubt, Abreu excelled, hitting .330 in 209 at-bats in 58 games with the Bombers, with seven home runs, 37 runs scored and 42 RBIs.

"He's done everything; I mean he's fit in perfectly," Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter said. "He flat-out plays - can hit, can steal bases, has been playing good defense, has a strong arm that has been shutting down a lot of teams."

Pretty much like the blueprint Philadelphia originally saw in the veteran who wound up batting .277 with eight homers, 61 runs scored and 65 RBIs in his final 98 Phillies games. The player who left behind vocal fans among his former teammates.

"I wish him the best," said pitcher and longtime Abreu teammate Randy Wolf. "I am excited for him. I am happy about what he brought to that team. I like the way he's been taken in by the Yankees fans. He's done a great job. I hope he gets himself a ring."

Said Pat Burrell: "Good for him, man. Good for him. Ultimately, [the postseason] is what you play for. I know it was hard for him to leave here, but he got the opportunity to move on and he got into a situation where he had a chance to help that team."

Abreu perennially was asked to carry Phillies teams off the field as well as on; he just didn't have the kind of personality to convince people that he could. Again, Bowa said, that should not be an indictable offense.

"He just doesn't wear his emotions on his sleeve," Bowa said. "That doesn't mean he don't care. Mike Schmidt didn't wear his emotions on his sleeve, either. He cared."

Now it doesn't matter whether Philadelphia believes that or not. The languid Venezuelan with the ever-present, often-inscrutable Mona Lisa smile is about to enjoy the last laugh.

"I am right where I want to be, in the playoffs, and happy about it," said Abreu, his smile devoid of mystery at last.

Frank Robby: A Class Act Closes

Frank Robinson with former National League president Len Coleman

WASHINGTON - After 51 years in the game, Frank Robinson likely spent his last day in a major-league uniform yesterday.

But before the Hall of Fame player and owner of 1,065 managerial victories oversaw his final Washington Nationals game as skipper, Robinson had some news for the game he loves:

"I am not retiring," the 71-year-old said as the hearty Fan Appreciation Day crowd at antiquated RFK Stadium roared. "There are a lot of things I'd still like to accomplish, for others who come after me."

Robinson - unstoppable offensive force as a player, social pioneer and advocate for equal opportunity at the management level - had done what he promised.

He refused to take his cue from the Montreal Expos-turned-Nationals organization that decided not to bring him back for a sixth season as manager. Instead, he continued to look ahead, even after a 6-2 loss to the visiting New York Mets brought his Nationals tenure to a close.

"I still feel I have something to offer, and to give to baseball," Robinson said. "If that's not the case, then I can very easily fade into the sunset... . But for anyone to understand what I'm saying, you've had to be around the game a long time. It gets in your blood."

Following a game filled with many curtain calls and a postgame victory lap from dugout to dugout, Robinson could only describe himself as "numb." It was a stark contrast to the earlier news conference when one of baseball's most noted competitors dabbed away tears and chastised himself for weeping. ("I said I wasn't going to do this.")

He would choke up again when asked to speak to the crowd after a pregame video salute highlighting his playing and managerial careers.

Once at the mike, though, the silver-haired skipper, clad in Washington Nationals red - his eighth different big-league uniform - enthralled the fans with his humor, poignant reflection, pride and passion.

The crowd of 29,044 showered Robinson, his wife, Barbara, and daughter Nichelle with wave after wave of cheers.

It spoke to the indelible impression made by Robinson in the Delmarva area when he was the heart and soul of the great Baltimore Orioles teams of the late 1960s, following 10 seasons with the Cincinnati Reds.

Baltimore fans were very much in evidence yesterday, cheering every reference to their American League franchise and the man still considered both legend and family.

Only Henry Aaron, Barry Bonds, Babe Ruth, Willie Mays and Sammy Sosa hit more than Robinson's 586 home runs. Only Robinson can claim an MVP award in each league.

Though Robinson yesterday declined to give his opinion on what his legacy is, all he needed do was look across the field to Mets manager Willie Randolph and Mets general manager Omar Minaya to see.

When he played, Robinson started battering away at barriers that once prevented minorities from advancing to coaching staffs, managers' offices and front offices. He finally became the game's first black manager.

His proteges have been many, including Don Baylor and Dusty Baker, who followed his path to winning manager of the year awares.

Now, Randolph is a viable candidate for that same honor after leading his Mets to the National League East crown and the league's best record. And Minaya, a native of the Dominican Republic, is a strong candidate for executive of the year.

Minaya aptly called Frank Robinson the "Jackie Robinson of managers."

"Sitting in his office the other day, Frank told me, 'Here, I'm handing you the baton.' It blew me away," Randolph said.

Randolph wasn't the only one blown away.

After Robinson addressed the crowd, the visiting Mets, led by veterans Julio Franco and Carlos Delgado, Randolph and his coaches, beat the Nationals to the punch by streaming to home plate to hug the Hall of Famer, one by one.

"I've never seen that, not to that extent," Robinson said. "And I've been in baseball 51 years. That was a very nice gesture on their part. It truly was."

Tomorrow, Robinson will return to his California home. The man who wound up with over 1,000 managerial victories has said "goodbye."

But remember his words, and his worth.

The game can top today's tribute by assuring Robinson is right. Find a place somewhere in the game for a man who very much wants to contribute more. History says he's pretty good at following through and baseball would be foolish to turn away from this valued, honorable man for good.

Bowa: Now Here's How You Win

In Larry Bowa's mind, the Phillies and most other teams will never be confused with the Yankees, and not just because of the billion-dollar payroll wielded without apology by the Bronx Bombers.

That attitude Bowa says the Phillies lack permeated the winningest team in baseball, by design, Bowa learned in this, his first season in New York.

"It's not an issue of if you get to the playoffs, but it's 'you'd better get to the playoffs" around here," Bowa, the Yankees' third base coach, said. "That's the goal, and it's non-stop here. Anything can happen once you get to the postseason, but in the speeches from Joe Torre and the front office in spring training were, 'we expect to play when it's cold out.'

"In my situation, a lot of times I was told, you can't be that competitive. You put too much pressure on people, which I think is hogwash."

Bowa believes true leaders can take the cues to win, no matter how aggressive and relentless the message.

Again, he points to the Yankees clubhouse, where Pressure is always spelled with a capital P.

It's amazing, the leaders here. When [Gary] Sheffield puts on the uniform, the way he plays, ARod, Moose Mussina, [Johnny] Damon. I mean, I could go all up and down the lineup. I don't want to leave anybody out. But when your leaders do it, obviously it makes everything easier for the staff and the front office, for everyone."

Money doesn't assure that, Bowa knows. Lots of bloated payrolls fell way short of the promised land this final week of the regular season. Not the Yankees, some of whom wouldn't recognize October if it didn't contain a playoff series or two.

"Look, a season is a grind. It takes a special person to grind it out, from the first day of spring training until the end," said Bowa. Look, a season is a grind. It takes a special person to grind it out, from the first day of spring training until the end.

"We had two guys go down in Gary Sheffield and Hideki Matsui - and you're talking 50, 60 home runs and 250 RBIs between them. And the kids filled in.
we had two guys go down in Sheffield and Hideki Matsui - and you're talking 50, 60 home runs and 250 RBIs between them. And the kids filled in."

Kids like Melky Cabrera and Robinson Canoe, the No. 9 hitter who threatened to win a batting title going into the last day of the season.

"When you get players who grind it out and never let up, it makes a difference. When you get a group of them it's something special," said Bowa. "Most teams don't have groups of them."

The Yankees seldom don't, a case of the rich not only getting richer, but picking right when it comes time to choose the pick of the big-league all-star litters.

Phils: 20-20 Won't Be Kind

It won't take long for the good feelings about the Phillies' season to give way to a harsher reality.

Forget late-night rain delays and the residual fatigue. Forget questionable calls by umpires. The bottom line is that, in a weakened National League, the Phillies could have, should have won the wild-card berth. In their hearts they have to know that. They had everything, including an easier schedule in terms of opponents' winning percentage, the final two weeks of the season, compared to the San Diego Padres and Los Angeles Dodgers.

Thing is, Ryan Howard could not pull the train alone in the end. Nor could Jimmy Rollins, nor Chase Utley, who revived his bat in the final week, but will be left to wonder what if after a slump ruined most of his September stretch drive.

In the end, the Phillies won't escape their own self-examination or those always willing to critique. Like former Phils manager Larry Bowa.

"The season is 162 games and you have to have an attitude - from Day 1 of spring training 'til the end - an attitude that never goes away," Bowa said in dissecting the Phillies on Saturday, the day the team was elminated from wild-card contention. "You don't just wait until August and say it's time to click it in. And it happened to me, too, but there's no way that team should have been under .500 earlier in the year."

Multitasking in the Midwest

Tonight, the confluence of baseball pennant races, the Internet, the ethernet and the television networks made for a perfect multitasking scene for baseball fans in St. Louis.

As the Cardinals were finishing off the Padres in the top of the ninth inning last night to snap a seven-game losing streak, their celebratory but still-anxious fans sitting in front of the press box at Busch Stadium kept alternating their cheers with quick peeks over their shoulders.

What were they watching to the rear? The press-box TV monitors, half of which were tuned into the Astros-Pirates game being beamed by ESPN from Pittsburgh, where the 'Stros were trying to win an eighth straight game. Do that and the heat would remain on St. Louis, who'd seen Houston pull to within 1 1/2 games of their NL Central lead.

While that drama was unfolding in front and back of the Cards fans, another was playing out in the press box. For the visiting writers from San Diego were tracking the Dodgers' game in Colorado with the help of an XM-radio feed and other Internet outlets.

Why? The Padres came into the game in St. Louis needing a combination of four wins/Dodgers losses to clinch the NL West.

Meanwhile this writer, too, was tracking the Dodgers-Rockies via the ESPN Gamecast graphics on the Internet - while listening to the Phillies' game against the Nationals in Washington, D.C., via the MLB.com Gameday online audio feed. Why? Another inextricable link across the miles, as the Dodgers attempted to maintain their one-game lead over the Phightens' in the NL wildcard race.

The final results: the Cards, Dodgers won early, while Houston and the Phillies played late into the night before winning, too, in 15 and 14 innings, respectively.

Winners, all, to be sure. But the ultimate victors, though, had to be any thoroughly wired fan, and 21st century technology.

Talk about a global village, wireless and electrifying all at once.

Cards hard-pressed to fight jitters

ST. LOUIS - You want to know just how surreal what should have been a celebratory September for the St. Louis Cardinals has turned?

Before last night's game, Cards manager Tony La Russa weighed his team's six-game losing streak against the ace he had in one hand in the form of Chris Carpenter and the slowly reviving offense he had in the other and declared:

"I'd like to get five tonight for Carp and take my chances."

The Cards did get five runs. Problem is, the Padres got six off Carpenter.

Before you could say implosion, the Cardinals had lost, again, their 7-5 defeat another lesson in how to lose a grip on what had once seemed a sure National League Central title.

With five games left, the Cardinals, who led the division by as many as seven games as recently as last Wednesday, now hold but a 11/2-game lead over piping-hot Houston.

"We're not OK because we can't make enough happen to win some games," said La Russa, no longer content to sugarcoat things. "But," he added, "we're still alive. Understand that... . You play hard, you turn things around. And we're playing hard."

The Astros, winners of seven straight after a 7-4 victory in Pittsburgh last night, have chopped five games off the Cardinals' lead since Friday. If that weren't alarming enough for the Cards, their miseries have allowed the Cincinnati Reds - winners of six of 10 - to climb to within 21/2 games.

Cardinals losses. Astros wins. A Reds revival. It's the stuff legendary comebacks and collapses are made of. And all are fueling concerns hereabouts the way oxygen feeds fire.

"One of the toughest parts about this game is the harder you try, the less you perform," catcher Gary Bennett said.

"We have one of two choices: Push back harder or give up. I don't think there's any give-up in this clubhouse."

Still, you can't blame Cardinals fans if they want to know: What in the name of Gene Mauch is going on here?

Yes. The 1964 Phillies and their skipper's name are being invoked in the St. Louis media for reasons other than fond memories of the Cardinals team that took advantage of that historic collapse. All because of an 8-15 September free fall.

Carpenter (15-8) was supposed to end all that. And he seemed braced to, carrying a 5-2 lead into the top of the seventh. It was a lead the ace, who had gone 5-0 with an 0.90 ERA in his previous six home starts, could not hold.

When he gave up four in the seventh, the team that was shaken by four straight losses in Houston over the weekend was left even woozier. Comebacks and close games (the Cards have lost eight of their last nine one-run games) are taking a toll.

Witness La Russa after Monday's 6-5 heartbreaker to the Padres: "It's a really rough stretch. We're so close to breaking through."

Or breaking down.

Third baseman Scott Rolen, for instance, continued to struggle, his slump stretching to 2 for his last 28 last night.

"He can't be asked any more often by trainers and coaches if he's OK," La Russa said before Rolen went 1 for 4. "Some people say he's tired. Some people say he's hurt."

"I'm OK," Rolen quietly declared before the game. "We're getting down to the end, but I am going to go out there and keep grinding, and hopefully good things will happen."

Rolen had been charged with protecting Albert Pujols - until last night, when La Russa dropped Rolen from cleanup to fifth behind Pujols and Juan Encarnacion.

"Fourth is an extra responsibility he doesn't need right now," La Russa said.

Just trying to win a game is responsibility enough. Right now, even that seems more than any Cardinal can handle.

RIP, Braves Dynasty

On Sunday, the Atlanta Braves were eliminated from the National League wild-card race. Thus, their dynasty ends. Again, a job well-done. Time will tell if the absence of Ted Turner's money - and Time Warner's interest - will allow this team to rebuild anytime in the near-future.

Wild for the Phils?

By Claire Smith,
For The Inquirer

There's an adage in baseball that while players crave long-term contracts, endorsements, home-run records and the like, what they really want is to still be around when the leaves turn brown.

With 152 games down and only 10 regular-season games to go, the Phillies are very much still around.

Nine wins in 13 games - leaving them a half-game behind the National League wild-card leading Los Angeles Dodgers - ensured that.

Now, the Phillies enter the final weekend of their final regular-season homestand tantalizingly close to their first postseason since 1993.

Four games. And every single one will mean something, beginning with Florida tonight and ending Monday night with a makeup game against Houston.

Florida, desperately clinging to its own wild-card dream, threw crucial defeats at the playoff-hungry 2005 Phillies.

The Astros? They filleted the 2005 Phils, winning six of six, then won the wild card by one game over, yep, Philly.

Fish vs. Phils. Ryan Howard's power vs. an old nemesis.

What Phillies fan, what Phillies player, could have asked for more?

"It's huge, just what you want," Pat Burrell said. "We've had a kind of inconsistent year, but we've somehow managed to stay in this thing, and now is the time when guys have got to get hot and do their thing. And, hopefully, that will happen."

Indeed, when the Phils get to Fan Appreciation Day on Sunday, they pray they will have given away something more precious than prizes by then.

The real prize fans crave is hope.

Hope that the "no game today" postings that follow homestands won't stand until April but rather only until October.

Hope that the baby-faced home-run basher, Howard, gathers enough strength to return to being, as catcher Mike Lieberthal dubbed him, "the X-factor." In the wild-card chase. In the MVP race. Heck, even in the spirited debate about true home-run records (the purists' 61 hit by Roger Maris or Barry Bonds' unbeloved 73).

Finally, the Phillies are holding hope that at long last the fans who cautiously have been driving up the box-office numbers and TV ratings placed their faith in the right pews.

"It definitely feels different. At this time of the year, in the past, we'd draw about 20,000 fans," said Lieberthal, a veteran of 12 Phillies seasons - some of which played out in Septembers so somber and devoid of meaning that barren, old Veterans Stadium resembled Siberia.

"But it just seems like fans are more into it now," Lieberthal said. "Games may not be sold out, and school is back in, but it seems like the fans are more into it now. There's definitely more excitement."

That can be measured among TV viewers, who drove the Phillies' audience share to double digits five times in the last eight broadcasts. That included an 11 share, or 11 percent of those watching television at the time, for Wednesday's game.

The 6-2 victory over the Chicago Cubs drew a 6.7 rating on CSN - the third such 6-plus rating in eight games. (Each ratings point in the region represents about 30,000 homes.)

As for the box office sales, the Phillies have yet to sell out a game during the homestand that began Monday. Attendance did edge up from 31,100 to 31,500 to 35,000 as the now-completed three-game series against the Cubs progressed.

Initially, the team expected similar crowds for the games tonight and tomorrow at Citizens Bank Park, then 40,000-plus for Fan Appreciation Day.

No more.

"We've moved our projections up," John Weber, the Phillies' director of ticket sales, said yesterday. "We're now hoping to get above 40,000 [tonight], in the mid- to high 30s on Saturday. We are expecting to sell out our game Sunday.

"Monday is still up in the air," Weber said. "It is our last home game... and, hopefully, Howard will be going for a little higher of a number. But the low 30s would be our projection right now."

When walk-up ticket sales projections become as riveting as actual wins and losses, you know there's pennant fever in the air.

Home-run fever could be an added lure, thanks to Howard, a likable, larger-than-life figure who has given this city its first truly Ruthian home-run king.

Howard will enter play tonight against Florida righthander Ricky Nolasco (11-9, 4.56 ERA) with 57 homers.

But having gone without one since Sunday, Howard was very much looking ahead - to the needed off-day yesterday.

"I'm trying to be more comfortable at the plate - and trying to go into this day off not thinking about anything," said Howard, who is sitting on major-league-leading totals in home runs and RBIs (140). "I'm just going to try to forget everything. That's definitely, definitely important."

Getting one's mind right and rested is critical, agreed lefthander Jamie Moyer, a veteran brought in late-season to lend the value of stretch-drive experience to a young team. And, said Moyer, "since I've been here, I've seen guys that are hungry and who want to play the game.

"Some are still learning how - and that's a process that can go on for a long time. But it's important to stay in character, to bring [something] every single day to the ballpark that will help you win games."

Veterans Burrell, Randy Wolf and Lieberthal know that these four games might represent the final times they appear in Phillies home uniforms.

"But when we finally leave here [Monday], I don't think anybody's going to be too emotional thinking this could be their last game played here," Lieberthal said, "because I think everybody believes we're going to be in the playoffs, and that we're going to be back."

Dusty Likes Phillies' "Big Boy"

For two days, Dusty Baker - who once managed Barry Bonds - had watched how Ryan Howard, like Bonds, could send a buzz through a crowd just by stepping to the plate.

The Chicago Cubs manager also marveled at how Howard was already seasoned enough to relinquish his slugger's credentials when needed and intelligently chip in a two-out, opposite-field hit.

And when he ran the bases well enough to score from first on a two-out double to left in a 4-1 Phillies victory Tuesday? "Big Boy can roll," marveled Baker.

What Baker didn't see in this three-game Cubs-Phillies series is what pleased him most.Baker did not see Howard's signature play - the howitzer home run - a now-storied shot that has made the Phillies first baseman the most feared long-ball threat in the game.

Fifty-seven times opposition managers have seen the bolts; Baker did once when Howard homered at Wrigley Field last month. But not in this series.

"Hopefully," Baker said before last night's game, "we can get out of here tonight and deal with Howard next year."

In a way, baseball men like Baker are as curious about all of Howard's tomorrows as they are cautious about his todays.

"You'd better hope you have a lefthander ready, and really hope you have two to increase your odds," Baker said. "There's no guarantee either way, but when you're facing this team and you have to face [Chase] Utley and Howard, back to back? You've got to have more than one lefty during the course of the game.

"For two games, Cubs reliever Will Ohman - with two confrontations and two strikeouts of Howard - seemed to be that lefty. "It was very impressive, but you don't want to be in that situation too often," Baker said with a chuckle. "I don't care how good he's done against him. Every time Will gets him out, the law of averages is on Howard's side."

Howard proved Baker right when he faced Ohman in the fifth and raked a double last night.

"He just kind of left the pitch up, and you've just got to jump on it sometimes," said Howard, who went on to score in that inning, paving the way to a 6-2 Phillies victory.

So he is dangerous. But as dangerous as Bonds?

"Not yet," Baker said, "because look how long it took for Barry to get to that point."In the first four or five years, you could pitch to Barry. After that, Barry went to that next level."

Howard's first two-at bats against relative unknown lefty Les Walrond last night (strikeout swinging on a breaking ball, groundout) illustrated how difficult finding that level is in the face of increasingly stealthy pitches."

And that will be tougher this next week, because there's a lot at stake and he's no longer a secret," said Baker, referring to the Phillies' chase for the wild card."

Right now, you can probably pitch to him a little bit and he can get himself out, but after a while, he's going to stop swinging at the balls that he's swinging at. Then you're really going to be in trouble."

Homestretch Triumph

By Claire Smith
In today's Inquirer
Citizens Bank Park - home, sweet home or house of horrors?

The Phillies, running out of time in their quest to close the deal on the National League wild card, entered last night's game against the visiting Chicago Cubs needing to decide which it is.

After struggling initially, the Phillies finally settled on the latter, thanks to the pitching savvy of veteran Jamie Moyer and just enough offense to win, 4-1.

The victory ensured that the Phillies would remain, at worst, 11/2 games behind San Diego in the wild-card chase. The Padres played later against visiting Arizona.

Fortunately for the Phillies, Moyer was obviously as at home as a Phillie could hope to be while making only his second start at Citizens Bank since being acquired Aug. 19 from Seattle.
The 43-year-old lefthander, 3-2 as a Phillie, pitched seven innings of six-hit, one-run ball to improve to 1-0 at the Bank.

The Phillies? They are 37-39 here. But at least the win quieted for a night questions about why the Phillies remain the only big-league club with a winning record on the road and a losing mark at home.

It also allowed the team that entered play three games under .500 at Citizens Bank to reclaim the momentum built on a 7-3 trip.

That trip had made it possible for Phillies fans to care about what happens on this crucial - and final - homestand of the year.

"Three or four more games [won] at home and - who knows? - maybe we'd be leading the wild-card division," reliever Tom Gordon said after pitching a scoreless ninth for his 32d save. "But these games are really, really key games for us, and we've just got to fight.

"And," the veteran of many a pennant-stretch run noted, "the important thing is we've put ourselves in a situation to fight - and a good team will prevail. And the way we've played the last two months, we're that good team."

The Phillies needed to show that very much after the 11-6 debacle of a loss in the series opener Monday, a loss that had brought Charlie Manuel back to his season-long position of having to explain this peculiar home-field "disadvantage."

"I don't even know the answer to that," the manager said before the game. "I have thought about it and thought about it... . We just need to be a little more alert and cool."

Cool? Last night the Phillies needed to act as if they understood that there were only 12 games remaining in their season, and half of those to be played - here - by Monday.
Initially, only Moyer, a St. Joseph's product, seemed a sea of calm as he and the Cubs' Wade Miller, a Reading native, traded scoreless innings through four.

The Phillies' awkwardness at the plate was evident, and the uneasy crowd of 31,892 picked up on that immediately.

Ask Pat Burrell.

Miller, a rebuilt righthander making only his third appearance of the year after off-season shoulder surgery, snaked a slow curve past the hesitant Burrell for a called third strike to end a bases-loaded, first-inning threat. The boos rained on Burrell.

Failure to pounce on Miller (0-2) was a group effort from the start. He struck out eight through the first four innings, and the Phillies stranded seven; shortstop Jimmy Rollins' strikeout in the fourth stranded three alone.

Still, it was Burrell's first-inning strikeout - his sixth in three-plus games - that filled the park with that famed Philly venom.

Increasingly targeted by boo birds waiting to jump on what goes wrong, Burrell could not respond. Fortunately for him, his teammates did.

In the bottom of the fifth, with two outs, Howard singled, then churned home on a double by David Dellucci - the designated Howard protector of the day.

One Cubs error and a two-run bloop single off the bat of Abraham Nunez gave the Phillies a 3-0 edge after five.

A Rollins' home run in the eighth sealed the deal and restored what the Phillies needed most - their taste for home cooking.
See a photo gallery at http://go.philly.com/photos.

A tough loss, but good possibilities remain

No other team gained ground on the Phillies, and the wild card is within reach - especially with Howard's big bat.
By Claire Smith
For the Inquirer
When the Phillies took the field last night, the upper decks in right field and down the left-field line were sparsely populated.

Citizens Bank Park is not yet the place you absolutely have to be. But as fans started to drift in to fill the lower left-field bleachers with their fannies and the air with their cheers, you couldn't help but imagine the possibilities.

Do things right, the Phillies had to know, and the days of ambiguity might end, in the National League wild-card race in which they hovered one game out of first at the start of play last night. And in the hearts and minds of reticent Philadelphia sports fans.

All it would take was... what?

One more gutsy postseason guarantee by Mike Lieberthal?
One more series victory over a team the Phillies not only have to beat, but should beat?
One more gargantuan, game-winning blow by Ryan Howard during his march toward the still-magical 61-homer mark?

Someone to take charge after a tough loss - like last night's 11-6 pasting by the visiting Chicago Cubs?

A rare clunker from a starter (Jon Lieber, 21/3 innings, five earned runs, two incredibly hard-hit homers by Aramis Ramirez) sent most of the starting nine home without comment, including Lieber.

Makes you wonder about pressure, from within and without.

Still, the Phillies had to know, even in defeat that the signs remain good.

No team closed ground on them, nor do many seem to remain serious threats to their second-place wild-card standing.

Second, the Phillies did not go quietly, especially after Howard was plunked by Cubs starter Sean Marshall in the fourth inning.

That ignited the crowd of 31,101, which included about 4,000 walk-ups. For a time it ignited something within the Phillies, too, who closed within two runs after a pinch-hit grand slam by Jose Hernandez topped a six-run fourth.

It proved to be not enough. As Charlie Manuel reminded during batting practice, "We've got to go out there and take care of our business." Last night that did not happen. Not against a team thriving in the role of spoiler.

The Cubs, after all, took four of six from the wild-card-contending Dodgers and Reds last week. "They've been playing good ball, if I am not mistaken," centerfielder Shane Victorino said.

Still, even after rampaging around the bases, Chicago did not trample the Phillies' shot at October. And that goes a long way, even when you lose by five.

Possibilities buy you time.

Howard alone has the potential to form a one-man brass band down the stretch. That much was clear before the game when the Cubs' dugout, filled with players and coaches and the likes of former Phillies outfielders Garry Maddox and Gary Matthews, marveled at the major-league home-run leader during batting practice.

"Fifty-seven home runs - you've got to give him the MVP just because of that," said Matthews, a coach with the Cubs.

"I was getting a haircut today and they were calling Ryan Howard the black Babe Ruth," said Maddox. "And this was over in Camden, where there hasn't been much outreach.

"But when somebody puts up stats like that, everybody's paying attention."

Even after the big guy went 0 for 3 with two strikeouts, the Phillies are still so counting on that. And still expecting more

Integrating past into the present

Tribute to Murtaugh raises money for future.

The Pittsburgh Pirates proved that good things can - and do - happen at a confluence when they brought home a World Series championship to Three Rivers Stadium in 1971.

Yesterday, the Phillies and Delaware County sought to borrow from that trailblazing team's legacy. The Pirates' cross-state rivals joined with the Delaware County Athletes Sports Hall of Fame to bring three good causes together when they gathered at the Renaissance Airport Hotel to honor Danny Murtaugh, the Chester native who managed the '71 Bucs, and raise money to revive baseball in inner cities, in general, and Murtaugh's hometown, in particular.

Murtaugh, who died in 1976, was feted for his vision, as well as a career that was comparable to Hall of Fame managers Tommy Lasorda and Earl Weaver.

"He led the Pirates to two World Series [titles] the Pirates had no business winning," said Bruce Markusen, author of 1971 Pirates, the Team that Changed Baseball.

Aside from the upsets of the Yankees in 1960 and the Orioles in '71, Murtaugh was also remembered for his refusal to bow to the unspoken belief that a preponderance of minorities should not be fielded on any given day.

For those reasons, Markusen declared: "Danny Murtaugh deserves to be in the Hall of Fame."
Murtaugh's son, Tim, recalling Sept. 1, 1971, the historic day when his father fielded an all-minority lineup, against the Phillies, amused the sold-out luncheon when he revealed that his father was color-blind - literally.

"It must have been an omen of things to come," Tim Murtaugh said after telling how his father's medical affliction was discovered when he attempted to become a pilot in the Army Air Corps in World War II.

All who gathered agreed that Murtaugh would have applauded the effort to revitalize youth ball in cities such as Chester. The Phillies were applauded for their work, especially when Rob Holiday, the Phillies' assistant director of scouting, told of the growth of the team's Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities initiative, which is known as RBI.

When the Phillies' RBI branch started in 1989, 200 children participated in what was then a neighborhood Puerto Rican Rookie League.

The Phillies now promote and sponsor RBI teams and leagues in which up to 7,500 children participate throughout the Delaware Valley.

"Baseball is a wonderful game," Dick Allen, the former Phillies slugger who is part of the Phillies' RBI vanguard, told the audience.

"To see kids having fun playing with one little baseball - no guns, no shootings, no knives... . When they're started young, they're on their way," Allen said.

Then, nodding toward a table filled with members of the Chester Red Sox - the only youth team in Chester and the beneficiary of the fund-raiser - Allen said, "When they get to these fellas' age, they're well on their way."

Fifteen-year-old Keyon Staples, an outfielder with the Red Sox, agreed.

"Some people don't understand why we play," he said. "They say baseball is a white person's sport, that blacks should play football and basketball. But they don't know about it. Baseball is fun, too, and I love it."

Treadmill frustrations

When Phillies manager Charlie Manuel complained that his yo-yoing team "can't get something going" shortly after the Phils' 4-1 loss to Atlanta Thursday, six other managers dying to see their teams launch a wholehearted run at the wild-card could relate.

As the seven wild-card contender/pretenders headed into play Friday night, only two - San Diego and San Francisco - could claim to have won more games then they had lost in their previous 10 games. SD and SF won seven of their previous 10. The Phillies, Marlins, Astros and Braves had slogged into action at 5-5 in their previous 10. The Reds had faltered along at 4-6.

Friday, the Reds, Phillies and Fish won while the Astros and Braves lost.

The Los Angeles Dodgers, the team leading the NL West, but definitely feeling the hot breath of the torrid Giants and relentless Padres, had also lost 6 of their previous 10, not great momentum heading into this weekend's showdown with the Pods. Continue playing like that, the Dodgers had to know, would likely dump them from the top of the NL West and into the ranks of the Seven Dwarf minions, suspect company, indeed.

Here is a look at the teams limping into crucial weekend series:

Los Angeles: 77-69, following 6-5 loss at Chicago Thursday.
Games left: 16 - 10 home, six road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Four (vs. San Diego)

San Diego: 76-69, following 4-2 win at Cincinnati Thursday.
Games left: 17 - Six home, 11 road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Seven (Four at L.A., three at St. Louis)

San Francisco: 74-73, following 14-4 loss at St. Louis Friday.
Games left: 15 - Seven home, eight road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Six (two at St. Louis, three vs. L.A.)

Florida: 74-73, following 6-4 victory at Atlanta Friday.
Games left: 15 - Six home, nine road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Four (at Mets)

Philadelphia: 75-72, following a 4-3 victory at Houston Friday.
Games left: 15 - Seven home, eight road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Zero

Cincinnati: 73-74 following 4-0 victory at Chicago Friday.
Games left: 15 - Four home, 11 road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Zero

Houston: 71-75. following a 4-3 loss to Philadelphia Friday.
Games left: 16 - Nine home, seven road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Four (vs. St. Louis)

Atlanta: 70-77, following 6-4 loss to Florida Friday.
Games left: 15 - eight home, seven road
Games remaining against teams at least five games over .500: Three (vs. Mets)