Good morning.

The Phillies are losers of seven straight and just got swept by the Marlins.

The Mets are 37-41 and mired in mediocrity.

Tonight kicks off a four-game Phils/Mets series at CBP, which should be a doozy. We shall witness what happens when the stoppable force collides with the movable object.

Philly is really down on its baseball team, some people think Gabe Kapler lost the locker room, and others don’t think the roster was even that good to begin with. But at least our team isn’t threatening reporters with physical violence:

The reporter in question was Tim Healey of Newsday. Healey refused to leave the clubhouse, resulting in this, after the jump:

Thosar, who writes for the New York Daily News, explained what led to the altercation in a story published last night:

Four words sparked Callaway to let out a string of aggravated curse words directed at Healey.

“See you tomorrow, Mickey,” Healey said to Callaway as the manager walked by the reporter in the clubhouse following the postgame presser.

“Don’t be a smartass,” Callaway said to Healey as the manager kept walking. Under his breath and turned away from Healey, but incredibly audible, Callaway called Healey a “motherf—er.”

After a minute, Callaway walked back to Healey and let out a string of curse words. The manager told the reporter not to speak like that to him, knowing he and the team are upset following the loss. Callaway made fun of the way in which Healey said, “See you tomorrow” by mimicking the reporter. Callaway said Healey meant the choice words sarcastically.

“Shut the f–k up, get out of my face. Get out of here,” Callaway said as Healey attempted to explain he did not mean to slight the manager in any way.

Hah, what a shit show. You’d never see this in Philly, except for that time Les Bowen punched Jeff McLane and also when Charlie Manuel threatened Howard Eskin.

Apparently this was the precursor to the Callaway thing:

Callaway was particularly irked before he cursed at Healey. During the postgame interview, Mets beat writer Matt Ehalt of Yahoo Sports asked Callaway if he should reconsider using closer Edwin Diaz for a five-out situation.

“No, just because you think so? Absolutely not. We have a very good plan. We know what we’re doing and we’re going to stick to it,” Callaway said.

The Mets issued a statement apologizing for the incident.

Anyway, the running theory here is that Callaway is trying to get himself fired. He doesn’t get paid if he quits.

Let’s play ball!