A 1-3 start may not be what Phillie fans want to see, but there’s no need to panic. At least not yet.
Cole Hamels gets shellacked in his first start, Brett Myers still can’t get out of the early innings unscathed, and don’t even get me started on Jamie Moyer or Joe Blanton. And what about that once-heralded offense? J-Roll might want to change his nickname to K-Roll, and Lord knows nobody else on this team can hit right now…
The first four games of the season haven’t looked promising at all for the defending champs. As a matter of fact everything that could possibly have gone wrong has: the starting pitching has been atrocious (J.A. Happ leads all Phillie pitchers with a 4.15 ERA right now…no that is not a misprint), one starter is already injured (Carlos Ruiz is day-to-day with a strained oblique) and the bats clearly didn’t get the memo that the season started nearly a week ago. Factor in Cole Hamels health issues and his rough first start and you have a pretty bleak scenario for the Phils.
Not everything is doom and gloom right now though. The bullpen looks solid even without J.C. Romero (particularly in that comeback win over the Braves) and Cole Hamels insists his poor performance has nothing to do with his elbow and more to do with missing a large chunk of Spring Training. The more work he gets, the more his pitch velocity will come back (keep your fingers crossed and say a quick prayer though just in case.)
You also have to remember that the Phillies are notorious for their slow starts. Whether they can make up for that with the NL East looking as strong as it has so far has yet to be seen, but it’s really too early in the season to get excited about what other clubs are doing. I guarantee you the Marlins will not go undefeated and Emilio Bonafacio will not hit .579 all season long. I also think it’s pretty safe to say that Jimmy Rollins and Shane Victorino will hit over .125.
Just consider this a friendly reminder to pace yourselves, people. We still have 158 games to go and the sky hasn’t started falling quite yet. However if we’re still well below .500 heading into late May and/or Cole Hamels goes on the DL then all bets are off and it’s every man, woman, and child for themselves.
