First Place!

With their win tonight, the Phils have pulled one half game ahead of the Florida Marlins in the NL East, and are in first place! Florida is a nice story, and they have loads of good young players, but this is not their year. I'm not saying that the Phils are going to win the division, because that would be a little premature, but I do believe that the division will be won by either the Phils or the dreaded Mets. These two teams are stacked, and, while the Marlins' players have a lot of talent, it is still raw. The Phils and Mets seem to me to remain the marquee teams in the East, and along with the Cubs and Cardinals, the marquee teams of the league.

But, who wants to read about the Mets and Marlins. Let's get to the good stuff! The Phils had another great offensive showing tonight, scoring 10 runs against the second best team in the National League, record-wise. Unfortunately, the pitching was less than stellar, and allowed the Cards to keep it close all game. Brad Lidge allowed a HR to Albert Pujols. Since Lidge joined the Phils, Pujols is 1-2 against him with a HR and an intentional walk.

It's great news that the Phils have taken the division lead, and it would be nice to hold it with a win tommorrow, but it is almost impossibly hard to sweep a team, no matter what their record is, and the Cardinals are certainly no slouches. While I would love a Phils sweep, I'm not expecting one for this reason. Also, I know that the best way to win a division is one series at a time. As long as you can do that, you'll be a contender for a long time.

Also, it should be noted that with his second grand slam of the season last night, Ryan Howard tied Mike Schmidt for the Phils all-time lead, with 7.