Similarities?

Is anybody else starting to see some disturbing similarities between this year's Phillies team and the Mets teams of 2007 & 2008?

With a very comfortable lead coming into the stretch run, the back end of the Phillies bullpen is completely incapable of converting a save, much the way Billy Wagner and company imploded in New York in September of the past two years.

Consequently, the Phillies' only hope for winning games is to generate such a huge lead (6 runs seems to do it) that even their leaky as a sieve bullpen can't blow it.

So far, the primary difference has been the chasing team. Whereas the Phils the past few years went on a tear and really took care of business against the Mets down the stretch, the Braves have been hot against everyone except the Phillies. I'm hoping that taking two of three last week in Atlanta will hold them off.

But I'd feel much more comfortable if they actually reduced that magic number to 0...and quick.

And of course, none of this bodes well for sticking around in October for very long.