LeeHey Cliff, WHATAREYOUDOING? Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

First he legged out an infield single. A gallant steed, blinders on, galloping down the first base line. Clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop clop. [That’s exactly how many clops it took.] Safe. A free runner. A 1-0 lead, man on, one out, top of the or… wait, what is he doing? That pony darted out of the starting block. Bucking head, kicking hooves. Never made it to the finish line.

Somehow, Lee got a mini ovation leaving the field. His teammates, they greeted him with smiles and fisties (Lee is in front of Brown):

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I’m the biggest Lee apologist there is, but that was dumb. Silly. A free out to the Pirates. Something Chase Utley would ne…. CHASEWHATTHEFACK!?!

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Scene: Bottom 8. Down three runs. Man on second. No out. Best hitter at the plate. Rally time.

Wait.

No.

Bunt.

GAWWWWWWWWW. Why, Chase? WHY?! You’re down three runs. Swwwwwwing away. Bunting with your best hitter in an attempt to set up Howard is the best example of the Phillies foolishly playing for a three-run home run we’ve ever seen. GET HITS. AAAASWWWIINNNNG YOOUUUUUR BAT.

And they were only down three runs because Charlie Manuel is managing with some unhealthy combination of his heart and gut fused together with a pile of stupid.

Scene: Top 7, Holmes. Lee, nearing 120 pitches. Three of the last four batters had reached base. He was clearly done, everyone in the ballpark knew it. Except Charlie… who, just three weeks earlier, pulled Lee with 20 fewer pitches and one out remaining in a complete game bid. He decided to let his pitcher give it the old college try with a tenuous one-run lead. When I saw him stumble off the mound, head bobbing, sans Lee, I thought I had inadvertently cued up the wrong game on my DVR… and I was at the ballpark! He… he couldn’t be leaving him in… could… he?

Three pitches later, the game was tied.

All this comes just a day after the team leader, the leadoff hitter, the great J-Roll™ Jimmy Rollins handed the Pirates two outs, and cost the Phillies two runs. You could say so many things about the stubborn quirks of this team over the past few years, but at least you could always count on them playing relatively sound baseball. Hitting the right cutoff, not running into outs, not being totally aloof and foolish on the field– all things we’ve come to expect from Utley, Rollins et al. But not anymore. Not only are they bad, and not only do they produce lousy and embarrassing at-bats, but now the Phillies do really stupid things, play really fundamentally unsound baseball. And their manager no longer has the players to make up for his dumb decisions. Wake up, Phillies. WAKE UP.