Fish Smell

The Marlins are always a tough team for the Phillies.

In addition, the Fish have been extremely successful for a small-market, low-salary, no-fans team. That's bound to rub Phillies fans the wrong way.

Finally, the two squads genuinely seem to dislike each other, and that's been going on for years.

So, no surprise then that a hot Phillies squad with a slim lead in the NL East went to South Florida last night and lost to an even hotter Marlins team that has avoided all talk of the playoffs and instead set its sights on being a spoiler, pulled off a big win.

Surprising to me in all of the coverage of Brett Myers implosion was the lack of discussion of Jamie Moyer's comments following his seemingly miraculous victory over the Brewers on three days of rest.

At the time, Moyer said that pitching on three days' rest wasn't a problem. The problem, he said, was the next start after doing so. Sure enough, his next outing was 5.2 innings with 6 ER against the Braves on Tuesday night.

Myers beat those same Brewers on 3 days rest, and his second start was last night.

The only commentator I've seen take up this theme is Rich Hoffman.

In part it got overlooked in the victory Tuesday night, when Howard's 2-run home run made the Phillies look a tad invincible.

What's the point?

Well, if this really is just a three-day hangover, then Myers should be fine for his next start; but this is a cautionary tale about how to handle him and Moyer in the closing weeks and into the playoffs.

The lesson is NOT that we can't pitch them again on 3-days rest. The lesson IS that if we do so, we better have the bullpen ready early.